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Committee flags contested civil-investigation language in voter-intimidation bill; will coordinate with Senate S23
Summary
Judiciary leaders said the committee encountered problematic civil-investigation language in a voter-intimidation bill; the same provision appears in Senate S23 (GovOps), and the committee plans to remove it from their draft and craft consolidated Title 17 language for future sessions.
The House Judiciary Committee on Jan. 16 raised concerns about a civil-investigation provision in a voter-intimidation bill and flagged identical language in Senate bill S23, which is under consideration in the Senate GovOps committee.
Presiding Member (unnamed) said testimony from the attorney general's office and a superior court judge revealed issues with the civil-investigation text. He reported consulting Senator Calmore (chair of the Senate committee) and said their working conclusion was to leave that provision in S23 for now and remove it from the House draft pending a larger consolidation effort: "So that the other thing I'm planning on doing is... consolidating all of Title 17 civil investigations into one place and addressing the concerns that we heard," he said.
The Presiding Member said he would reach out to President Smola to invite input and possibly testimony, and members asked to schedule the ACLU for the next week. He also said a witness, Falco, had been postponed and the committee would wait for a new draft before further testimony.
Committee leaders characterized the step as procedural and directed staff to prepare revised draft language and outreach to interested stakeholders before taking additional action.
