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Capitol Day Participants,

If you are picking up shirts, please go to back table opposite stage beginning at 10am.

We will be sitting in senate districts so it’s easier to eat lunch and find each other. Senate districts 1-24 will sit to the left of stage and 25-48 to the right.

Immediately following rally program, a pizza lunch will be available for those who registered. Register here. You can also pack a lunch or order food from the Cafe. Please bring your own drink. Water bottles are allowed in the Capitol, or you can get drinks and smoothies from the Cafe on the ground floor.

After lunch, your teams will plan to call legislators off the floor beginning at 1:30 but from 12:30-1 legislators might be in their offices. Do not worry if you have NEVER done this, our senate district captains will be leading! All we need is your presence! Power in numbers!

If participants would like to sit in gallery to watch Session, senate districts 24-48 are to go to the House Gallery on 5th floor and districts 1-23 to the Senate Gallery on the 5th floor at 1:30 pm.

You can take a look at the bills OKHPR is supporting HERE.

Make sure to sign up for our text alerts in case there are any last-minute changes!

If you ordered a shirt and can’t attend, please arrange pick up with a friend or your senate district captain. NO SHIRTS WILL BE MAILED TO YOU! Let us know that someone else is picking up your shirt using the button below.

For other common questions about Capitol Day’s, such as what to wear or where to park, use the button below to read our Capitol Day FAQ.

From OKHPR Research Team Member Shane Smith:

The “four largest hospitals” in OK, who are again crying wolf regarding “no beds”, have been raking in the big bucks from the federal gov’t throughout the pandemic. Here are the totals for Integris, Mercy, SSM, and OU Health. How much of this federal cash has gone to increasing capacity for more patients?

Furthermore, I want to highlight some information from the latest OSDH epidemiology report. Non-vaccinated patients make up only 71.2% of hospitalizations in this report. Most hospitals are defining ‘vaccinated” as a person who has been fully vaccinated (1 or 2 doses, depending on the brand of vaccine) AND has received at least 1 booster dose. The last dose must have been received 2 or more weeks before infection to be considered “fully vaccinated”. Almost all the hospitalizations are still happening in the age groups with the highest vaccination rates. Also, compare this most recent wave with previous ones. The wave of cases is enormous, but the wave of deaths isn’t. This seems to confirm that COVID is becoming more virulent, but less dangerous. Including the latest ICU numbers for OK. ICUs are still not overflowing.

Last year, the Oklahoma legislature passed, and the Governor signed into law, H.B. 1775, which prohibits foundational tenets of critical race theory from being taught in Oklahoma public schools. The law directs the State Board of Education to adopt and implement rules to ensure that these discriminatory concepts are eliminated from our public school system.  

Last September, the State Board of Education passed emergency rules to implement the provisions of H.B. 1775, which are available here: https://sde.ok.gov/administrative-rules.  They are found in the blue box on the page titled “Emergency Rules in Effect”.  These rules are temporary. The State Board of Education must pass permanent rules to replace the emergency rules that were passed last year—and the State Department of Education has started the process to adopt final, permanent rules. As a part of this process, the public has an opportunity to weigh in on the final rules that will be adopted by the State Board of Education and will be then sent to the Oklahoma Legislature for their review and approval. 

On Monday, January 3, 2022, the Department posted the emergency rules for public comment. “Public comment” is a thirty-day window for the public to submit comments on the emergency rule. It is very important for you to be involved in this process. The emergency rules passed by the State Board of Education last September are strong rules. But there are key changes that need to be made to ensure that Oklahoma has the strongest protections against critical race theory. 

NOW is the time to file public comments on the Department’s proposed Permanent Rules. These model public comments are intended to help you participate in the public comment process—and drafted to ensure that Oklahoma’s regulations are the most robust in the country.

Submitting public comments using this process provides a mechanism for you to request changes to the regulation that make the rule stronger and allow the State Board of Education to have additional oversight over schools that incorporate the tenets of critical race theory into public school programs. These model comments include both:1) changes you want the Department to make to the rule; and 2) aspects of the rule you do not want the Department to change. 

The rules are necessary to ensure that critical race theory and all programs and activities that teach it are eliminated from all aspects of our education system. There is evidence that Oklahoma school districts are pushing back on this law and essentially ignoring the Emergency Rules.  This is why we need to strengthen the Permanent Rules so school districts understand their obligations and so parents and grandparents know their rights when interacting with their child’s school. 

It is very important that you submit public comments on the proposed rule. It is the only way your voice will be heard, and the only way to ensure that we eliminate critical race theory from our public-school programs. Thank you for taking the time to do this!

Here are a few things to keep in mind and the process you will follow:

1. Your public comment must be submitted by 4:30 p.m. on February 2, 2022. Any comment submitted after that deadline will not be considered by the Department. 
2. You may submit your public comment one of four ways: 
   1. Via e-mail to rules@sde.ok.gov. Please SIGN YOUR NAME at the end of the email.
   2. Delivered in person at the State Department of Education (Brad Clark, General Counsel, Office of Legal Services, State Department of Education, 5th Floor, Hodge Building, 2500 N. Lincoln Blvd, Oklahoma City, 73105-4599.)
   3. Delivered by mail to the State Department of Education (Brad Clark, General Counsel, Office of Legal Services, State Department of Education, 5th Floor, Hodge Building, 2500 N. Lincoln Blvd, Oklahoma City, 73105-4599.)
   4. Appearing in person and orally delivering your comments at a public hearing, which will be held on February 2, 2022, at 2:00 p.m. (The hearing will be held at the Hodge Education Building, State Board Room, Room 1-20, 2500 North Lincoln Boulevard, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. You will be required to sign in, and time limits may be imposed. If you choose this option, bring an extra copy of your remarks to submit to Department staff.) 

Below are the step by step instructions we are asking you to follow when filing by email:

1. Open up your email to compose a new email.
2. On the address line type  Rules@sde.ok.gov
3. On the subject line type Public Comment for Proposed Permanent Rules HB1775
4. Your email will show that it is from your private account.
5. In the body of the email you will open up the attached Word document titled “Public Comments Proposed Permanent Rules HB1775.  Copy the entire document and then paste it to the body of the email you are sending. It is important that you copy and paste the entire Word Document.  Please do not pick out sections for submission.
6. It is your choice and is completely optional if you would add a personal story about your child or grandchild or your concerns about this indoctrination in our schools prior to doing the copy and  paste of the Word document.  Many legislators and State Board of Education members would like to hear your stories and your thoughts. However, if you do not also copy and paste the attached document after you make your personal comments then the staff at the State Department of Education will not know specifically what you want to have changed in the proposed Permanent Rules.
7. Be sure to sign your name after making your individual statements or you may type your name at the bottom of the Public Comment document.

If you decide to not send in your comments via email but want to submit your comments in person at the State Department of Education or send them in via traditional mail then please use the same format by copying and pasting the entire Word Document to your letter.  Remember to sign it.

Again, these must be submitted by 4:30, February 2nd.

Many of you have probably seen the news that the Supreme Court ruled on the Biden Administration vaccine mandates and has halted implementation of the mandate for employers with more than 100 employees. However, the Court is allowing the HHS mandate for health care workers in certain settings to stand. While we celebrate the win for private citizens, we are disappointed with the Court’s decision to allow the enforcement of the Biden Administration’s vaccine mandate for healthcare workers. The State of Oklahoma is already suffering from healthcare staff shortages and the CMS vaccine mandate will only make matters worse, especially in rural Oklahoma.

As a reminder, the HHS mandate only applies to certain facilities as noted below.
Impacted facilities (if the facility accepts Medicare and Medicaid funds)
Ambulatory Surgical Centers (ASCs)
Hospices
Psychiatric residential treatment facilities (PRTFs)
Programs of All-Inclusive Care for the Elderly (PACE)
Hospitals (acute care hospitals, psychiatric hospitals, hospital swing beds, long term care hospitals, children’s hospitals, transplant centers, cancer hospitals, and rehabilitation hospitals/inpatient rehabilitation facilities)
Long Term Care (LTC) Facilities, including Skilled Nursing Facilities (SNFs) and Nursing Facilities (NFs), generally referred to as nursing homes
Intermediate Care Facilities for Individuals with Intellectual Disabilities (ICFs-IID)
Home Health Agencies (HHAs)
Comprehensive Outpatient Rehabilitation Facilities (CORFs)
Critical Access Hospitals (CAHs) Clinics, rehabilitation agencies, and public health agencies as providers of outpatient physical therapy and speech-language pathology services
Community Mental Health Centers (CMHCs)
Home Infusion Therapy (HIT) suppliers
Rural Health Clinics (RHCs)/Federally Qualified Health Centers (FQHCs)
End-Stage Renal Disease (ESRD) Facilities

Attorney Aaron Siri also provided a comprehensive legal update on the Highwire earlier this week. It can be watched here, starting at 1 hour and 25 minutes.

Please share this update with your State Senator and Representative.

Yesterday a federal court judge ordered the Food and Drug Administration to publish all the data submitted by Pfizer to license its Covid-19 vaccine within one year rather than the 75 YEARS originally proposed by the agency charged with assuring the purity and safety of food and drugs.

Attorney Aaron Siri of the Informed Consent Action Network represented a group of distinguished physicians and scientists from around the globe in the request for the timely production of the documents. Siri noted that it took Pfizer only 108 days to produce the documents, but they wanted more than 20,000 days to release them.

Despite the fact that none of the documents used to allegedly evaluate the safety and efficacy of the Covid shot have been released to the public who paid for them, and the federal government has absolved Pfizer, medical services workers who administer the shot, and itself of any legal liability for injuries caused by the product, the federal government is still using every means possible to force the entire population of the US to get injected with these experimental products.

Read more about the case at Siri’s Injecting Freedom column on Substack.

Please share this message with friends and family, and please share on social networks while we still can.

The Senators listed on the left side of the above photo are the legislators who signed on to the call for a special session. Please send them a quick thank you! On the right side of the photo are those Senators who did NOT sign on. Two of those Senators will be terming out at the end of 2022. Six Senators are up for re-election in 2022, and eight will be up for re-election in 2024. Please contact those legislators who did not sign on to let them know your disappointment.

As a reminder, there was enough support from the State House of Representatives, including from Speaker Charles McCall and Governor Kevin Stitt for a special session. The following Oklahoma Senators chose not to sign on to a special session.

Senator Treat
405-521-5632
greg.treat@oksenate.gov

Senator Hall
405-521-5628
chuck.hall@oksenate.gov

Senator Haste
405-521-5602
john.haste@oksenate.gov

Senator Simpson
405-521-5607
frank.simpson@oksenate.gov

Senator Howard
405-521-5612
brent.howard@oksenate.gov

Senator Taylor
405-521-5547
zack.taylor@oksenate.gov

Senator Stanley
405-521-5584
brenda.stanley@oksenate.gov

Senator Thompson
405-521-5588
roger.thompson@oksenate.gov

Senator Rosino
405-521-5618
paul.rosino@oksenate.gov

Senator Pugh
405-521-5622
adam.pugh@oksenate.gov

Senator Paxton
405-521-5537
lonnie.paxton@oksenate.gov

Senator McCortney
405-521-5541
greg.mccotney@oksenate.gov

Senator Jech
405-521-5545
darcy.jech@oksenate.gov

Senator Garvin
405-521-5522
jessica.garvin@oksenate.gov