You may have heard that Wal-Mart's CEO came out yesterday and asked Asa Hutchinson to veto the Arkansas version of Indiana's license-to-discriminate bill. There was a reason they requested specifically that it be vetoed.
You may also have heard that Hutchinson is asking the state legislature to recall the bill so they can make some changes to it. Hutchinson claims this is because his son has signed a MoveOn.org petition against it.
Mr. Hutchinson, a Republican, said he understood the divide in Arkansas and across the nation over the question of same-sex marriage and its impact on people’s religious beliefs. His own son, Seth, he said, had asked him to veto the bill, which critics say could allow individuals and businesses to discriminate against gay men and lesbians.
To ensure that the state is “a place of tolerance,” Mr. Hutchinson said, he was considering using an executive order that would seek to balance the “competing constitutional obligations” if the legislature declined to make changes to the bill.
“What is important from an Arkansas standpoint is one, we get the right balance,” he said, “and secondly, we make sure that we communicate we’re not going to be a state that fails to recognize the diversity of our workplace, our economy and our future.”
Asa Hutchinson is a political coward of the highest degree, because he knows he has to veto the bill in order to prevent it from becoming law, and yet he's working as hard as he possibly can not to use that veto pen.
Here's what happens if he postures for five days and doesn't veto or sign it: It becomes law.
By fussing around with calls to recall the bill and talking about signing executive orders to overcome part of it, he's putting the full extent of his political cowardice on display for all to see.
He should be held just as accountable as Mike Pence, because not signing the bill is the very same thing as signing it. Don't be fooled by all the smoke and mirrors intended to pretend he gives a damn about changing it. He only wants to avoid accountability for it.
