Ending death penalty, rule changes among legislative proposals
By Fred Knapp , Senior Reporter/Producer Nebraska Public Media
16 de Enero de 2025 a las 00:00 ·

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Proposals ranging from abolishing the death penalty to changing legislative rules were among ideas under discussion by state lawmakers Thursday.
Among the measures that have been introduced in this legislative session is a proposal by Sen. Terrell McKinney to abolish the death penalty. The abolition would take the form of a state constitutional amendment. That means, unlike a law, it could not be changed by the Legislature.
But it also means that it would have to be approved by voters. In 2016, after the Legislature voted to repeal the death penalty, Nebraskans voted 61% to 39% to reinstate it. McKinney was asked what’s changed.
“Society has changed. We went through a pandemic," he said. "I think, why not try it to see what could happen? The conversation around a lot of things has changed and I think we should try to at least see what the voters think."
The proposal would need support from 30 senators in the 49-member Legislature to be placed on next year’s ballot.
Also Thursday, Attorney General Mike Hilgers endorsed legislation to be introduced by Sen. Tanya Storer that Hilgers says will help ease the strain on rural law enforcement dealing with people with mental health issues.
Currently, Hilgers said, rural sheriffs or deputies often have to drive people experiencing a mental health crisis for hours to get to a hospital. The legislation would create a pilot program where sheriffs could instead take people to another county that has mental health beds where they could stay, until an appropriate medical facility is available. Hilgers said the bed in such a facility would be secure, but he insisted it would not amount to a jail cell for people who had not committed a crime.
“It is not a jail cell. They are not under arrest….Could it be adjacent to a jail, or part of a jail building? Yes. But to be very clear these are not jail cells,” he said.
Storer’s bill has not yet been introduced. However, a draft of the legislation read to Nebraska Public Media News by Hilgers said the agency that runs the pilot program must have “an existing jail facility with capacity to add mental health beds either at that facility or elsewhere.” Hilgers said many rural courthouses have unused space that could be used for a pilot program.
Hilgers was also asked about Gov. Jim Pillen’s proposal to cut back or eliminate water projects that he championed in 2022 when he was speaker of the Legislature.
Pillen is proposing to make $65 million in reductions to those projects which were recommended by a committee Hilgers created and dubbed the Star Wars Committee (an acronym for the Statewide Tourism and Recreational Water Access and Resource Sustainability committee) when he was speaker. The proposed reductions include eliminating a new marina at Lake McConnaughy, a lodge at Niobrara State Park and some boat slips at Lewis and Clark Lake.
Pillen also wants to eliminate another $6 million for a study of a possible lake between Lincoln and Omaha. When it comes to decisions on Star Wars projects by the Legislature, Hilgers made it clear he is no longer with that force.
“The budget-making process and the determination to help do projects or not do projects, transformational or otherwise, is in the hands of the governor and the Legislature," he said. "I’m no longer in the Legislature, I’m a former senator so I don’t have any comment on that."
Also on Thursday, the Rules Committee held a public hearing on proposals to change the way the Legislature runs itself. Among the most significant changes were those proposed by Rules Committee Chairman Sen. Loren Lippincott to lower the number of votes needed to cut off debate and vote on a bill. Currently, the rules require votes from two-thirds of the 49 senators, or 33. Lippincott would lower that to 30, or two thirds of those voting, which could be as low as 25.
Lippincott has said these changes would put Nebraska more in line with, for example, the U.S. Senate, which requires only a three fifths majority to end a filibuster. Karin Waggoner of Omaha, testifying at the hearing, said the current system works, and opposed the proposed changes as a threat to democracy.
“Currently, this process ensures that important issues are thoroughly discussed and that all voices from both sides of the aisle are heard," she said. "These rule changes, however, lower the threshold for ending debate, making it easier for a slim majority to silence dissent and force through controversial legislation without proper deliberation."
Lippincott said he still favors his proposals, while acknowledging lawmakers need to be careful about changing the rules:
“There’s always a minority group in any legislative body or family or school, or whatever," he said. "And so we know that we have a constitutional republic. We do not have a democracy. A democracy, as Dr. Benjamin Rush said, one of our founding fathers, very quickly becomes a mobocracy, and the majority can steamroll over the minority. And we always need to guard over that."
Other proposed rules changes include excluding the media from executive sessions, where committees discuss and vote on possible changes to bills. Whatever changes the Rules Committee recommends will then have to be voted on by the full Legislature.
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