Rep. Dan Ruby, Minot

Almost every election year someone makes the comment that I represent my own interests or agendas. After five successful elections, where my voting record is available to anyone and my credentials are clearly listed in campaign materials, the voters decided that they liked how I voted on the majority of issues. They felt that I have the qualifications to occupy the legislative seat that belongs to District 38.

Now Dionne Spooner takes her turn saying I represent my own interests, without giving any specifics except for her disagreement with my position on the business closures. She then goes down the path of an elitist view that if you don’t have a degree from college, you aren’t qualified to have a position about most issues. Would she openly say that all learning stops when you leave the school property? She then expands her intellectual elitist view to my son Matthew, whom has taken several college classes but didn’t finish his degree. She says that we need to ask medical professional, first responders and National Guard members about this issue. Why doesn’t she talk to my son Matthew? He has been in the National Guard for ten years. Another one of my sons is in the Guard also and I’m very proud of their service.

I may not have been to college but I am running three companies, I have a payroll of 45 employees and my waste company serves 61 communities in the central and northwestern areas of the state. Don’t tell me it was given to me because my parents started the company. When I got out of high school, we were basically a one truck operation and I started running that route. I’ve been a part of building it since the beginning. How could someone with only a high school diploma do such things? Not to mention getting elected to the ND House of Representatives for twenty years.

Dionne was also untruthful in her letter. I would challenge her, or anyone, to show me where the letter, that we sent to the governor, says we are going to sue him. It doesn’t and I would know since I helped write it. Obviously, she never read the letter. Makes me question the research capabilities of a college professor. Nobody who signed on to that letter is threatening or planning to sue the governor.

I can understand if someone disagrees with me about issues. Happens all the time. Dionne Spooner seems to think that we don’t believe the CDC and the WHO. Although I do think the WHO dropped the ball and caused the pandemic to spread further than it would have, our letter did not discount their warnings or guidelines. Only how they are being used.

The governor shut down certain businesses in mid-March to prevent a spike in Covid-19 cases that would outpace the capacity of the hospitals to treat patients. We heard over and over that we needed to flatten the curve. That spike never happened and we didn’t have a curve to flatten. Possibly due to the closures and social distancing. Fine! That appears to have worked. But we have never gotten close to stressing our medical facilities. The governor’s goal was met. Now it is time to open the businesses back up and if the positive cases rise then we know we can handle them. The closure order never had the expectation to prevent exposure in perpetuity because that would be impossible. Now that we have the information that came from the waiting period, we need to use that information and allow people to go back to work and provide for their families.

Oh, by the way, if there are any grammatical or punctuation errors, blame it on my lack of education. And thank God for spellcheck.