It just wouldn’t do for “leaders” of Arkansas to accept a court ruling that a law they passed was unconstitutional, harmful to children and being repudiated by school boards all over Arkansas.

No, they will go to court.

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Attorney General Leslie Rutledge said she will gladly appeal Circuit Judge Tim Fox’s ruling that the state ban on mask mandates by school districts (and any other public entity) was unconstitutional and shouldn’t be enforced. From her statement:

“For nearly seven years, I have always exercised my constitutional duty to represent the State of Arkansas and will continue to wholeheartedly defend state laws to protect Arkansans of all ages.”

Two things: 1) She is not required to defend unconstitutional laws. Remember Steve Clark and Creation Science? 2)   If she succeeds, she will do direct harm to thousands of children and adults who teach and staff schools.

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Governor Hutchinson, who signed the law and expressed some regrets later but hasn’t moved to exercise the power to mandate masks that he now has, has said he’ll hire his own lawyer for the appeal. (David Matthews of Rogers, a former Democratic legislator, according to the case record.) He will support the finding that the law, among other flaws, unconstitutionally restricted the governor’s emergency power during time of an infectious disease.

And wait, there’s more from House Speaker Matthew Shepherd and Senate President Pro Tem Jimmy Hickey, who provided over the runaway help-COVID-flourish legislative train. They too will hire independent counsel. Their statement:

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“Today we jointly retained the law firm of Dover Dixon Horne, PLLC to represent us in our official capacities as the leaders of the Arkansas General Assembly in the pending litigation.

We have conferred with the Attorney General and her staff as we evaluated how best to proceed.  We appreciate their representation of us to this point.  However, given the number of parties and the potential for multiple conflicts, we believe our interests in this case are best served through retaining separate counsel.

While we understand there are many different opinions as to the specific legislation at issue, the important role of the legislative branch must be preserved among our three, separate but equal, branches of government.”

Key point: If they really believed this eyewash about separation of powers, they wouldn’t have passed this governor-emasculating, local control-squashing piece of legislative trash in the first place. Another point: If they really cared about the children of their districts, they’d tell Dover Dixon to surrender.

UPDATE: The governor issued this statement:

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The Attorney General has always done an outstanding job in representing my office and the state of Arkansas, but it is her duty as the attorney for the state to defend Act 1002,” Governor Asa Hutchinson said. “I have expressed the view that Act 1002 should have been amended and questions need to be raised as to the constitutionality of the law. Generally speaking, I support the decision of Judge Fox, and my position creates an unavoidable conflict; for that reason I have asked David R. Matthews of Matthews, Campbell, Rhoads, McClure & Thompson, P.A. to represent me.  
“David Matthews has a special expertise in school law, and I have confidence that he will represent me effectively in the current litigation.”

Meanwhile, Twitter warrior Tom Mars, who led the successful lawsuit, is on the case about the consequences.

Just one example:

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PS: An open question remains on how soon this can be heard. A key question is whether the Republican-friendly Arkansas Supreme Court will step in prematurely to stop Fox’s ruling from taking effect. It wouldn’t be the first time.

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UPDATE: Mars also issued a statement:

After seeing the number of school districts that adopted mask mandates this week, including several in conservative strongholds – and having heard Dr. Cameron warn that “some kids will die” without mask mandates – I would have thought the General Assembly would set aside partisan politics for a moment and let school districts do what they must to keep children from dying.
Instead, we received a Friday afternoonoverdose of political grandstanding by three of our state’s highest public officials – all vying for attention at the expense of every K-12 child in Arkansas. I haven’t witnessed anything more disgusting since the Josh Duggar hearing.”

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