Chuck Muth: Republicans missing chance on taxes and Amanda’s Law

The GOP’s historic takeover of the Nevada Legislature should have meant, at the very least, a budget without tax hikes and passage of gun rights bills that have been bottled up by anti-gun Democrats for years.

Instead, Senate Republicans have been pushing for the largest tax increase in Nevada’s history – including a new gross receipts tax that’s even worse than the one some 80 percent of Nevadans rejected at the ballot box last November.

And living up to the GOP’s well-deserved reputation for never blowing an opportunity to blow an opportunity, Senate Republicans are now blocking the most important, hard fought gun rights bill instead of greasing it through with flying colors.

“Amanda’s Law” would allow adults with a concealed carry permit to carry their weapons on campus for self-protection rather than risk becoming a disarmed victim, the way Amanda Collins was in 2007 when she was brutally raped in the parking garage floor at University of Nevada, Reno.

Collins came forward in 2011 and painfully recounted her nightmarish experience to the Legislature in an effort to pass campus carry. Amanda’s Law was approved with bipartisan support in the Senate. However, it was then killed by Assembly Democrats who refused to even give the bill a hearing, let alone an up-or-down vote.

Ditto 2013 when the bill was reintroduced. Again, Assembly Democrats killed the bill without giving it a vote.

But this year, with Republicans in charge, Amanda’s Law (AB148) passed easily in the Assembly, 25-15, with every Republican voting “yea.”

It then moved over to the Senate, where nine senators from both parties who voted for Amanda’s Law in 2011 are still serving.

So Republicans should only need two new votes to pass Amanda’s Law and send it to the governor’s desk for signature. And there are now five new GOP senators who weren’t there in 2011. So this should be a no-brainer.

Alas, “brainless” appears to be the GOP’s middle name.

Amanda’s Law is now suffering the same fate at the hands of Senate Republicans as it did at the hands of Assembly Democrats. Senate Judiciary Chairman Greg Brower — who voted for Amanda’s law in 2011 — has refused to give the bill even a hearing, claiming it doesn’t have the votes to pass.

If that’s true, it’s outrageous considering the GOP majority. But the truth is, we really don’t know if it’s true or not. One can never be 100 percent sure how someone is going to vote until they, you know, actually vote.

Mr. Muth is president of Citizen Outreach and the publisher of www.NevadaNewsandViews.com. He personally blogs at www.MuthsTruths.com.