Growing up on a multi-generation, large-scale chicken farm near Yelm, state Rep. J.T. Wilcox is no stranger to manure.
But, it’s his time spent as Minority Leader of Washington’s House of Representatives that pushed his crap threshold over the edge.
“I’m done with this bullsh-t,” Wilcox told The Chronicle last week on his decision to step down from the leadership role. “You have a certain amount of capacity for watching people lie and avoid responsibility. … I was heartsick.”
He said politicians on both sides of the aisle in the Legislature have turned to “demonizing” one another rather than taking and/or seeking accountability. When that happens, he said, the opposition becomes so “distasteful and evil and no one has to consider them anymore. To me, that is the awful thing that has overtaken our politics.”
In his resignation announcement, Wilcox said he believes the state Legislature is best served by people treating it as a part-time duty, not as a career. Turnover in leadership allows for generational change, he said.
“I’ve said in the past that if my leadership didn’t result in better results and a more balanced Legislature for our state then it was time for a change,” Wilcox wrote. “That time is now.”
Speaking with The Chronicle at the beginning of the session, Wilcox said he believes the four major elements of lawmaking are ideology, playing for your own team, intellect and empathy.
The first two, he said, were the “least valuable” focuses when creating legislation, but were the easiest traps for people to fall into.
“Experience is valuable in government, but it also has a shelf life,” he wrote in the announcement. “I hope that all across our state and country we can recognize the value of a newer generation of leaders who will have less investment in the antagonisms that have consumed the last years.”
State Rep. Drew Stokesbary, R-Auburn, was elected to the position one day after Wilcox’s resignation.
Despite his counterpart in the House not seeing overhaul in the partisan wars of state law, Senate Minority Leader John Braun, R-Centralia, felt the 2023 legislative session was more bipartisan than any others in recent years.
In the budget, he said, funding was secured for regional Criminal Justice Training Commission centers, which Braun called a “big deal … to rebuild our law enforcement.”
The capital budget in general, he said, had a great deal of “Republican influence” despite the GOP being the minority party. No new taxes were implemented, a last-minute majority push for more property tax collectability was halted and, Braun said, the Legislature made some progress on housing regulation reform.
Braun also said the biggest win for the 20th district this session was easily securing $70 million for the Office of Chehalis Basin, another nonpartisan effort.
