Posted on 05/04/2020 5:02:40 PM PDT by lightman
State Rep. Cris Dush said Gov. Tom Wolf’s lack of transparency in his management of the coronavirus crisis resembles a page out of a “socialist playbook.”
At Monday’s House State Government Committee, the Jefferson County Republican lawmaker criticized the governor’s reluctance to share information with the press or the public related to decisions his administration has made in response to the pandemic. Dush wants more transparency surrounding the number of COVID-19 patients who have recovered and the waiver application process related to the governor’s order to close businesses.
“More and more I go back to the German Democratic Nationalist Socialist Party, the Nazi party. I go to the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, the USSR,” Dush said. “This is a socialist playbook.”
Rep. Kevin Boyle, the ranking Democrat on the committee, immediately interrupted him, calling on committee Chairman Garth Everett to cut Dush off.
“Chairman , this is outrageous,” said Boyle of Philadelphia. “Stop it with these Nazi references. It’s offensive and wrong. Stop it.”
Dush responded, “It’s a statement of history. It’s history. It’s history.”
Everett directed Dush to stay focused on the bill that the committee eventually approved that requires the administration to post online its decisions on business waiver requests.
“When you start hiding stuff from the public, when you start hiding things from the press and not allowing it to come out, there is a genuine reason for concern,” Dush said. “This is a socialist playbook and I have to say it’s important for people of this state to start having access to this information rather than having it pulled off to the side and hidden for an agenda.”
A reaction from the governor’s office was not immediately available.
The governor as well as other administration officials have refuted claims they are withholding information although several of their departments say they are closed and are not processing requests filed under the state’s Right-to-Know Law.
About the patient recovery data, Health Secretary Dr. Rachel Levine has said hospitals don’t report information to the state when coronavirus patients are discharged.
As for the business waiver program, Wolf has declined to publicly provide a complete list of businesses that received waivers. He also has said it would be premature to release information regarding the decision-making process behind whether or not a business was granted an exemption to the closure order until all the waivers were processed.
Meanwhile, a state Senate committee issued a subpoena to the Wolf Administration demanding information about the waiver program be provided to it by May 8.
This step was taken on Thursday after finding the administration’s responses lacking to questions posed during a legislative hearing. Lawmakers sought to find clarity behind the methodology used to determine a “life sustaining” business that was exempt from the governor’s closure order.
State Auditor General Eugene DePasquale has agreed to perform an audit of the waiver program, which Wolf has said he welcomed.
More than 40,000 companies applied for waivers to reopen their doors. The waiver application period ended early this month.
About one-third of those who applied for waivers were denied, Wolf said in a conference call with news media on Thursday
“We actually did this in a way that was meant to be fair and honest,” Wolf said Thursday.
“Were some mistakes made? Maybe,” Wolf said. “And if they were, the folks in Pennsylvania have a right to know that.”
Ping!
Time for torches and pitchforks?
Truer words been never spoken. My county gets up to Jefferson. In Armstrong County. We have 2 deaths in this county and we can’t get our frickin dog groomed or our haircut?
And the problem with that is?
How’s it feel when YOU’RE called the Nazi? We’ve been called that for over a decade by simply supporting freedom but it’s about time the real socialists are called out for what they are “Nazis”.
PA went for Trump didn’t it? How do they elect a guy like this also?
Too many governors and mayors have become *little dictators*, as a result of the Chinese Wuhan CCP Virus, and now that they have the POWER to do it, they won’t let go of it.
NEVER give the gov’t any special powers, as we’ll never get it back. They’ll keep it in their Dictator Jar, on the shelf, for whenever they want to use it. The precedent’s been set.
To the former, yes. To the latter Philadelphia and Pittsburgh.
Trump won Pennsylvania because of the Amish vote in Lancaster County and the deep red voters of York County.
York is Wolf’s home County. Wolf didn’t carry his home County in either of his elections.
Wolf is poised to take revenge on Lancaster by lumping it in with Philadelphia and the southeast when it comes to reopening.
He is adamant that while in some regions individual counties may go slower or faster, the southeast is to treated as a “regional whole”.
This litte dictator is paired up with the dickless one aka the Transylvania Trannie aka Dr. (Dickless) "Rachel" Levine.
That is one face that should ALWAYS be masked.
Tar and feathers my friend...
Good question, but, like a number of states, notably Illinois and New York, our governors are elected by Filthydelphia and Spitsburgh.
I am very worried about these weird states that voted Trump but voted absolute morons as guvs. President Trump needs Pennsylvania and Michigan.
Remember what they say about Pennsylvania - my home state: “Philadelphia and Pittsburgh, surrounded by Lower Alabama.”
You are right to be concerned about PA. Wolfe has forced thru vote by mail...and also new voting machines that transmit vote tallies over the internet twice.
The fraud will be off the scales.
I often think of the term Nazi. Our dear Democratic Socialists are the true Nazis. The litmus test:
I would wish to ask AOC (or Bernie) if she (they) would love to have the Democratic Party as the one and only national party. Of course the answer would be a definitive, “Yes.”
Now, who are the true Nazis?
Pennsyltucky.
We’re not supposed to know history much less apply lessons learned.
We’re supposed to blindly follow orders.
Yessir!
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