General Assembly Post-Game Wrap-Up/Pre-Game Show: Thursday, May 15, 2025

People who I respect had told me that Speaker Mimi Minor-Brown was even worse than Our Pal Val Longhurst.  Recent events, specifically Mimi’s running roughshod over members of her own caucus during the debate on the Musk-Pass bill, and the Speaker’s attempt to hijack the Democratic NCC County Convention, had moved me in that direction.

Her blatant power play in removing Rae Moore from the Education Committee makes me wonder why we simply can’t have a well-adjusted human being as the Speaker.  Here is the entire correspondence from the Speaker on this issue:

“After careful consideration, you are being removed from the House Education Committee as of today.”

Of course, Minor-Brown went on the attack in public comments.  There are several good articles about the give-and-take.  I’ll go with this one.  Why? Because it certainly appears to me that Rep. Kim Williams played a key role in getting Moore removed from the committee:

In an interview with Spotlight Delaware, Minor-Brown said her decision came in response to questions surrounding Moore’s teaching credentials, pointing to a News Journal report published last month that said she was among 450 public school teachers working in Delaware with expired or missing licenses.

Minor-Brown also asserted that Moore had inappropriately proposed an amendment to a bill  during an education committee meeting last month that she said would have benefitted Moore personally.

The bill, at issue, would mandate that all public school teachers have a valid permit or license to work directly with students in an unsupervised setting. During the committee hearing, Moore asked the committee chair, Rep. Kim Williams (D-Stanton), whether she would consider an amendment that would add leniency provisions for teachers who are working through a certification process.

Williams, in response, said she was uncomfortable with the suggestion because she believed Moore was talking about her own situation. Moore said she wasn’t.

A week after the committee hearing, Moore submitted a formal grievance letter to members of the House leadership that highlighted what she said was a series of events involving Williams that came to a head during the Education Committee hearing last month. Among her charges, she claimed Williams’ comments at the hearing made her private information public.

In the wake of the April meeting, Minor-Brown said she began receiving emails and hearing comments from people in Legislative Hall about Moore. She called that a problem, and one that “you cannot turn a blind eye to.”

But Moore said that Minor-Brown’s decision to remove is a political one. In an interview with Spotlight Delaware, she called any claim that she isn’t legally allowed to teach “a lie,” pointing out that she recently received an emergency certification to teach special education.

She blamed administrative delays as the reason that she was on the list of teachers without a certification after a previous temporary certification had lapsed. She said she began teaching in 2018 through a program that allows second-career teachers to gain a certification without needing to obtain a new degree.

Moore further said she believes her removal from the Education Committee is rooted in what she described as a growing animus between her and Williams. In her grievance letter, Moore highlighted a bill that Williams filed in March to expand school lunches.

“It is 1,000% about the school lunch bills,” Moore said of her removal from the education committee.

Asked on Wednesday about the removal, Williams said she didn’t have details about the decision and was not a part of it. Still, she didn’t believe it was about competing school lunch bills.  (Raising the question: Why would Williams introduce her own lunch bill when Moore had already introduced one?)

She said there are “people who have had issues with the behavior of Representative Moore during the committee hearing” – an apparent reference to Moore’s discussion of amending the school certification bill.

Williams said she doesn’t believe that Moore’s removal from the committee was a result of any larger political dynamics. Still, she did note her own displeasure with what she called “revenge voting” carried out by a progressive wing of lawmakers of which Moore is a part. Williams said those members have opted to not vote on several bills widely supported by the party as a way to protest other issues.  (It goes without saying that Williams, who has been fiercely protective of her control of all education legislation in the House, here reveals the real impetus behind many of the Speaker’s machinations.)

Yet another shitty Speaker.  Three in a row.

That is obviously the Big Story today.

Here is yesterday’s Session Activity Report.  Of major note–The Senate unanimously confirmed Joshua Sanderlin as Marijuana Commissioner.

The highlight of today’s Senate Agenda is SB 6 (Townsend), which, as I read it, attempts to streamline and root out delays in the health care pre-authorization process.  I also like SB 82 (Lockman), which ‘changes the period of time for which relief may be granted under a lethal violence protective order from 1 year to 5 years.’

I couldn’t find anything that floats my boat on today’s House Agenda.  Of course it’s fair to point out that agendas aren’t put together with floating my boat in mind.