Keeping personal politics out of W.Va. government

Lawmakers in West Virginia have every right to support the presidential candidate of their choosing. However, they cross a dangerous line when they attempt to use the power of state government to ensure their favored candidate wins.
Consider House Concurrent Resolution 203, introduced this week during the West Virginia Legislature’s special session. The resolution, sponsored by Dels. Bill Ridenour, R-Jefferson; Margitta Mazzocchi, R-Logan; Henry Dillion, R-Wayne; Todd Longanacre, R-Greenbrier; Geoff Foster, R-Putnam; Dave Foggin, R-Wood; Elias Coop-Gonzalez, R-Randolph and Brandon Steele, R-Raleigh, orders the Legislature “shall not recognize an illegitimate presidential election.”
Sounds OK, right? No one wants an illegitimate presidential election. But how exactly does the resolution define an “illegitimate presidential election?”
First, the resolution states a candidate will not be recognized if there is “election interference.” That is defined as “censorship, information suppression or manipulation, or other unconstitutional, extraconstitutional, illegal or otherwise illegitimate actions by the federal government, foreign governments, or other state governments, either directly or in collusion with elements of the media, social media entities, information entities, or political entities.”
The resolution does not state who in West Virginia is an expert in any of these matters, nor what it would mean if the state would not recognize the next president. It only notes that the West Virginia Attorney General and West Virginia Secretary of State would provide input on these matters.
Then there’s a section on who votes in the election: “The Constitutions of the United States and the State of West Virginia require that only legal citizens may vote in U.S. and West Virginia elections, and that there is abundant evidence that non-citizens have been and are being registered to vote in the national election of 2024.”
The resolution provides no evidence that non-citizens are voting or have voted in prior elections. The Brennan Center for Justice queried elections officials in some of the most immigrant-heavy jurisdictions in the country after the 2016 election, according to The Associated Press. It found only about 30 incidents of a possible noncitizen voting out of 23.5 million votes cast in those places, the AP reported. Trying to make an issue of it at the state level here in West Virginia is both irresponsible and dangerous to our democracy.
This is nothing more than pandering by a small group of House members to those pushing the illegitimate election narrative — a vocal contingent of the national Republican Party.
Thankfully, responsible legislative leaders in Charleston see this for what it is. The proposed resolution was sent to the House Judiciary Committee — a committee that is not scheduled to meet during the special session. There’s no real chance this gains any traction prior to the Nov. 5 election.
That was the right move.
We all want free and fair elections, but until there is real evidence that election fraud or interference is taking place — and right now, there’s not — pushing to involve state government in the process at any level may be the most irresponsible idea to come about.
West Virginia has so many good things happening — tourism is flourishing, companies are moving here after recognizing the business-friendly environment that’s being fostered, taxes are being reduced in a reasonable manner. That’s why it’s hard to comprehend why any lawmaker would want to get in the way of that progress. The focus should always be on growing our state — not in taking it backward.
That’s all House Concurrent Resolution 203 would achieve.