Fellow Missourians: Are you getting what you voted for?
(Ianm35/iStock Images).
The governor and the Missouri legislature have been in session for over six weeks, and many of their policy proposals and priorities are beginning to take center stage.
Now is the time to become engaged and remain vigilant.
Are their priorities the same as yours? Are you pleased with their actions so far?
If not, make your sentiments known, especially to those you voted for.
There are multiple ways to do that, from making a telephone call, writing a letter, sending an email or scheduling a personal visit. You can also elicit others who share your views or concerns — friends, family, neighbors, political action groups, news publications, etc. — to join you in getting your elected officials' attention.
While it is early in the legislative session, there are many issues, actions and proposals commanding lots of attention and effort.
Many are primarily politically motivated or driven by special interests versus what is in the best interests of the citizens of Missouri. They also can be deemed as a diversionary tactic when you consider some of the other major challenges and issues we face as a state.
Take the focus on DEI programs, for example.
While the Trump administration is determined to remove every DEI program in departments and agencies that receive federal dollars, the governor through an executive order and the Missouri House through a bill seeking to ban all DEI programs in state agencies.
The actions are being taken under the guise that the elimination of DEI programs will ensure equal access and opportunity for all Missourians. The governor said in a press release: 'Our state agencies must operate under a framework that ensures fairness, equal opportunity, and merit-based decision-making.'
'This order reaffirms Missouri's commitment to a constitutional, color-blind approach that serves all citizens fairly.'
Has Missouri or this nation ever been color-blind and operated under a framework that ensures fairness, equal opportunity for all its citizens based on merit?
Hardly.
Did DEI programs significantly reduce or eliminate discriminatory practices against Blacks?
Certainly not.
Just look around in your workplace, your school, your neighborhood, in the broader landscape and many other areas of American life. What do you see? What has been your experience?
More importantly, what measures will the governor and legislature enact to ensure that constitutional, color-blind practices are actually being adhered to in governmental agencies that are supported by Black taxpayers' dollars?
What recourse is available to Black Missourians when the governmental agencies, whose services they pay for and rely on, are comfortable marginalizing and discriminating against them?
Did you vote for the governor and your representative because one of their first priorities was to eliminate DEI programs? Did they even campaign that it would be?
What about their other legislative priorities that are emerging in addition to getting rid of DEI programs?
Criminalizing certain drag shows that could be witnessed by children, and providing tax credits for parents who choose to home school or send their children to private schools — are these issue areas that stand to harm or benefit most Missourians?
Wouldn't it make more sense to focus on ensuring the support of the many foster children who may be at risk for sexual abuse and other harmful conditions? What legislative initiatives are being pursued to improve student performance and achievement in public schools, and to blunt the impact should the Trump administration eliminate the Department of Education?
What about major legislative actions and bills that could impact a large segment of Missourians, such as farmers.
Agriculture is the number one industry in the state. Yet farmers stand to be harmed by a bill being proposed to increase taxes if they participate in solar or wind energy production. In a time when alternate forms of energy are in demand to fight climate change, why penalize farmers who are trying to provide it.
Is it for political reasons? Is it to fall in line with a national agenda which is designed to abandon any climate change efforts to use clean energy and to increase the use of fossil fuels instead?
What about the potentially devastating impact on Missouri soybean farmers that could result because of the swift decimation and disembowelment of the USAID department by the Trump administration's DOGE initiative? Soybeans are the No. 1 crop in Missouri, covering over five million acres every year.
The potentially negative economic impact of proposed and threatened tariffs on many of the produce and cattle farmers across the state is unknown, but no doubt looms heavily in terms of not only maintaining their livelihood, but advancing it.
What are the legislators you voted for going to do about it? In Jefferson City or Washington?
What is being done to address or mitigate the potential harm other DOGE random, erratic, irrational dissolution, or funding cuts for programs will have on many Missourians?
While the Trump administration claims that they will not cut Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare, there is a proposal circulating in Congress to cut the federal contribution to the states' expanded Medicaid programs. Millions of recipients will be negatively affected.
There is also growing concern that the Congressional proposed budget will include massive cuts to Medicaidthat will harm children, people with disabilities, rural Americans, and seniors.
What are the legislators whom you voted for doing about it?
Are you contacting them to find out?
There are so many issues and actions being thrown at us on a daily basis. While alarming and daunting, now is not the time to tune out or ignore what is going on in our state or in Washington.
You voted for your representatives for one or more reasons. Are their actions meeting your needs and expectations?
If they are not, we only have ourselves to blame.
In the future, what will we do about it?
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