The Frankfort LINK: Senate passes income tax, anti-LBGTQ education legislation introduced

The Kentucky legislature reconvened for the second part of the 30-day legislative session, and they wasted no time tackling priority legislation for income tax reduction and education.  

The Senate passed legislation to further reduce the income tax from 4.5 to 4%, and the bill will now head to the governor’s desk.  

House Bill 1 codifies the income tax cuts outlined  in House Bill 8 — a bill passed during the 2022 legislative session that seeks to eliminate the income tax over ten years by half percent increments.  

Opponents of the bill argue it will blow a hole in the state’s budget due to the roughly $1.2 billion a year in lost revenue. 

Gov. Andy Beshear said he would carefully consider the bill when it hits his desk — as he’ll weigh the short and long term consequences of the bill. 

Northern Kentucky Senator and Chair of the Senate Approriations and Revenue Committee Chris McDaniel (R-Ryland Heights) said the bill is good policy. 

Intending to eliminate the income tax over 10 years, McDaniel also said he sees a path to get down into the three percent range soon.  

While the income tax is a piece of priority legislation for the  Republican dominated legislature, a bill that seeks to combat ‘wokeness’ in Kentucky schools garnered a lot of passion throughout the state capitol. 

Giving an impassioned speech on the Senate floor on Wednesday, Sen. Max Wise (R-Campbellsville) said that “wokeness” is real and is happening in Kentucky schools.  

Wise railed against the Kentucky Department of Education and its Commissioner Jason Glass for launching a website in 2022 that he said: “posted resources normalizing and promoting a variety of lifestyles more than creating a positive school culture.” 

Specifically, Wise said that the KDE listed on their website information referring to pronouns and preferred pronouns that if a student chooses to go by one name, the teacher doesn’t have to notify the parent. 

In response, Wise filed Senate Bill 150 — a bill that gives more broad authority to parents over their student’s education, according to Wise. Parental rights are something that he said shouldn’t be in the hands of the Kentucky Department of Education or the Kentucky Board of Education.  

One key part of the bill that Wise refers to as first amendment rights for staff and students would allow teachers to call students the pronouns based on their biological sex and not preferred pronouns. 

Miles Joyner, a transgender man and social worker from Louisville, said he regularly works with transgender children and the bill would devastate trans children navigating life in the classroom.