The Impeachment of Governor Matt Bevin
Don’t get me wrong: I am not a fan of Gov. Matt Bevin. I voted for and supported Jack Conway. I think Gov. Bevin’s administration and his conduct in office is bad for Kentucky. In particular, his budget cuts of education and the discontinuation of KYNECT are shortsighted at best. At worst, they are ill-conceived ideological experiments in which Kentucky residents are the unfortunate lab rats. On a personal level, Bevin has displayed a disturbing level of arrogance. But, NONE of this is impeachable conduct.
The Kentucky Constitution says the governor and other officials can be impeached for “misdemeanors.” There is very little other instruction. In fact, the whole process is so cloaked in mystery that in 1991, the Legislative Research Commission (LRC) decided to publish an Informational Bulletin #176 on it. You can find a link to the PDF at the bottom of this post.
The Informational Bulletin concluded that criminal acts are required to impeach. As far as I know, no reputable source has suggested a crime has been committed. Admittedly, his arrogance could lead to criminal activity someday, but there’s no evidence of any at this point.
If criminal malfeasance takes place in the future, the current premature calls for impeachment could make justified calls for impeachment hard to take seriously.
So in short, people: Lay off the impeachment talk until you really have something!
