Oregon state Senate President Peter Courtney (D) announced Tuesday that House Bill 2020, a plan to enact a cap-and-trade climate bill in Oregon, was dead for this session, and a few hours later, Gov. Kate Brown (D) confirmed the bill's demise. The Senate's 11 Republicans, who fled the state a week ago to stymie the legislation by denying the 18 Democrats a quorum, "have blocked a bill that provides a better future for our state and for our children, and the tactics they employed to do so are not just unacceptable, but dangerous," Brown said in a statement.
"Unfortunately the chaos and corruption of Washington, D.C., are coming to Oregon, my Oregon," Brown told The Washington Post. "Oregon government used to function. They literally shut down the legislative branch. Eleven people took their marbles and went home." Brown challenged the Republicans to "prove me wrong" by coming back to work so the Senate can consider the remaining 125 bills before the legislative session ends on Sunday. "Are they against climate change legislation or are they against democracy?" she asked. "If they are not back by Wednesday afternoon, we will know the answer."
Senate Republicans don't seem inclined to return. Sen. Herman Baertschiger (R), speaking over the phone from an "undisclosed location" in Idaho, told reporters "it saddens me that we have to do this," but "this session has been horrible. It has been anything but bipartisan." His caucus fled the Senate in May, too; after Democrats agreed to drop two bills, on gun control and vaccinations, Republicans agreed to return and stay until the end of the session. After they fled again, one senator, Brian Boquist (R), appeared to threaten to shoot any State Police officer who came to collect him, and right-wing paramilitary groups sided with the Republicans, leading to the Capitol shutting down on Saturday. Peter Weber
There has been speculation that a recent series of letters between President Trump and North Korean leader Kim Jong Un — Trump called Kim's "beautiful" while Kim dubbed Trump's "excellent" — might lead to a third summit between the two leaders, after the second summit ended in February with no progress on denuclearization. South Korean President Moon Jae-in said Wednesday that in fact U.S. and North Korean officials are holding "behind-the-scenes talks" to arrange a third summit, in an unspecified time and place. He didn't say if the talks were face-to-face or who participated.
"There's no reason to regard the current situation as a stalemate in the peace process on the peninsula just because the pace has remained slow," Moon wrote in response to questions from seven news organizations, including The Associated Press. "Complete denuclearization and a permanent peace regime on the peninsula are tasks that cannot be achieved overnight." Trump is traveling to Japan for a G20 summit on Friday, before heading to South Korea to meet with Moon, and "he is reportedly considering a visit to the demilitarized zone that divides the two Korea," CNN reports, citing a South Korean government official.
Earlier Wednesday, North Korea's foreign ministry slammed the U.S. for having "viciously slandered" Pyongyang by suggesting its sanctions will "bring us to our knees." The foreign ministry's statement criticized Secretary of State Mike Pompeo but not Trump, even referring to the president "as the 'supreme leader' of the United States," mirroring Kim's title in North Korea, CNN notes.
The foreign ministry is trying to distinguish the Kim-Trump "bromance from the relationship between their two countries," Duyeon Kim, an analyst at the Center for a New American Security, suggested to CNN. "It sounds like they're sending a warning to Washington, almost as if to manage expectations ahead of a third summit, while making an appeal to Trump to basically put a straitjacket on his staff." Peter Weber