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The Tulsa Beacon

 

Ray Carter

Center for Independent Journalism

Ray Carter is the director of OCPA’s Center for Independent Journalism.

OKC mayor, conservative Republicans differ on California-style election scheme

Tulsa Beacon

When officials with Oklahoma United launched an initiative petition to effectively end primary elections in Oklahoma and instead adopt a California-style “jungle primary” system, they touted the support of Oklahoma City Mayor David Holt. Under the proposed system, all candidates from all parties would compete on a single June ballot with all voters able to…

Bergstrom pursues Oklahoma personal income-tax repeal

Tulsa Beacon

Oklahoma’s personal income tax rate would be immediately reduced and then gradually eliminated under legislation filed by state Sen. Micheal Bergstrom. Senate Bill 1, by Bergstrom, would cut the state personal income tax from its current rate of 4.75 percent to 4.5 percent in the 2025 tax year. The bill provides for additional, automatic income-tax…

National Supermajority agrees with Oklahoma-Style transgender laws

Tulsa Beacon

In recent years, Oklahoma has been at the forefront of states that have prohibited males from participating in women’s sports as “transgender women” and made it illegal to perform sex-change surgeries on children. Opponents claimed those laws would cause people to leave Oklahoma and prompt businesses to avoid the state. But a new poll shows…

Oklahoma group launches effort to adopt California Voting System

Tulsa Beacon

Officials with Oklahoma United announced they have launched an initiative-petition effort to place State Question 835 on the ballot in 2026, asking Oklahoma voters to effectively end primary elections and instead replace them with a June general election followed by a November runoff general election. The proposed system is similar to California’s election process. The…

GOP Easily Holds Legislative Majorities In Oklahoma

Tulsa Beacon

Oklahoma Republicans easily held onto their supermajorities in the state legislature during this week’s elections, emerging unscathed. Republicans went into the 2024 election cycle holding 81 seats in the Oklahoma House of Representatives to the 20 districts held by Democrats, while in the Senate the GOP held 40 seats to the eight held by Democrats….

Arm of Oklahoma Supreme Court engages in campaigning for justices

Tulsa Beacon

Under state law, the Oklahoma Bar Association (OBA) is considered “an official arm” of the Oklahoma Supreme Court. As a result, when Oklahoma Bar Association President Miles Pringle used the association’s resources to email all licensed attorneys in the state, urging them to retain three members of the Oklahoma Supreme Court facing retention-ballot elections this…

Report finds Oklahoma professors overwhelmingly support Democrats

Tulsa Beacon

Based on campaign contributions, university professors are overwhelmingly left-wing—and Oklahoma is no exception. According to a recent report, “Educators Overwhelmingly Support Democrats, Even in Republican States,” 93 percent of political contributions made by professors nationwide went to Democratic candidates in 2022. In Oklahoma, the share of professor contributions going to Democrats was 92 percent. “Both…

Families moving to Oklahoma

Tulsa Beacon

Oklahoma is gaining more families, measured as a percentage increase, than all but 11 states in the country, according to a recent analysis. According to the report by the Institute for Family Studies, the trend among most (although not all) states that are gaining families is that those states are generally conservative political environments. “Today,…

Oklahoma among top states in job creation

Tulsa Beacon

A recent analysis by an official with the Committee to Unleash Prosperity finds Oklahoma has been among the nation’s top states for job creation since February 2020, the last pre-COVID month. Based on data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, Committee to Unleash Prosperity Senior Fellow E.J. Antoni found that Oklahoma generated more jobs than…