Paul LePage
Having state legislators from across the country drafting legislation in close cooperation with corporate sponsors seemed
bad enough. But Maine Gov. Paul LePage has gone ALEC one better. He just
copied and pasted his regulatory agenda from lobbyist wishlists.
Maine's Freedom of Access law enabled the Portland Phoenix to obtain documents which:
confirm the central role of Preti Flaherty and Pierce Atwood, whose proposals on behalf of their clients were often literally cut and pasted into the governor's infamous "Phase I" regulatory reform agenda. The two Portland-based firms wrote at least 28 of the 50 environmental rollbacks the governor's office submitted to the legislature in January, some of which have since been enacted into law. (Four other rollbacks were borrowed from a white paper created by a transition subcommittee chaired by Pinza.)
[...]
In most cases, language from the industry and lobbyist's memos was copied word-for-word into LePage's reform proposal, suggesting the governor and his staff made little effort to analyze or shape policies themselves.
And it wasn't just the environment:
These include rolling back Maine's civil rights and wage and tip sharing laws to weaker federal standards (proposed by Portland restaurateur STEVE DIMILLO); repealing the ban on the use of strikebreakers and eliminating unemployment benefits for strikers (proposed by Pinza's subcommittee); weakening child labor laws (MAINE INNKEEPERS ASSOCIATION); privatizing Department of Environmental Protection field investigations (Preti Flaherty); directing the Bureau of Insurance to ease oversight over insurance rates (MAINE ASSOCIATION OF HEALTH PLANS) and the Maine Housing Authority to move away from green construction (contractor NICKERSON & O'DAY); and considering Maine's withdrawal from the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (PIERCE ATWOOD on behalf of the paper industry).
There's more, and it's nauseating.
In contrast to the likes of Scott Walker, John Kasich and Rick Scott—Republican governors who have clear personal engagement with their extremist agendas—LePage is almost buffoonish, a weapon rather than a warrior in the corporate war on the environment and workers. But the damage to a state is the same, regardless of whether the governor came up with the ideas himself or just cut and pasted them as directed by his corporate masters.