Gov. Kevin Stitt talks at the Tulsa Regional Chamber of Commerce’s State of the State Luncheon on Thursday.
Stitt takes heat on COVID absence: Democrats in the Oklahoma House of Representatives last week continued to be one of the few groups challenging Gov. Kevin Stitt’s near-silence about the state’s rising COVID-19 deaths, hospitalizations and rates of infection.
“Governor Stitt hasn’t held a press conference on COVID since March, but today he found time to address the Tulsa Chamber of Commerce,” state Rep. Monroe Nichols, D-Tulsa, said following Stitt’s speech to the chamber on Thursday.
“He didn’t mention the 7,800 Oklahomans we have lost to COVID nor did he mention COVID at all. There was no plea to citizens to get vaccinated or any plan to protect the voters who elected him.
“This crisis has left Oklahomans begging for a leader, and at every turn, Governor Stitt has shown that it isn’t him,” Nichols said.
Noting that Attorney General John O’Connor, a Stitt appointee, says he’ll sue school districts that impose mask mandates, state Rep. Melissa Provenzano, D-Tulsa, said COVID-19 continues to be “one of the worst crises in our state’s history, and Oklahomans have not heard their top, elected leader address it in five months. How different today would look if the Governor would have used an hour a week addressing Oklahomans and advocating for the vaccine.”
“Over 4100 new cases just today, and @GovStitt didn’t mention COVID at all in a so-called ‘State of the State,’” tweeted Minority Leader Emily Virgin, D-Norman.
