After Gov. Kay Ivey unceremoniously fired former commissioner Kent Davis from the Alabama Department of Veterans Affairs, many have questioned the legitimacy of Ivey's "supreme executive power" and why she chose to use it in this situation and not others.
In last week's episode of "1819 News: The Podcast," 1819 News CEO Bryan Dawson joined Joey Clark on News Talk 93.1's "News and Views" to explain the controversy, as Davis has vowed to pursue all legal avenues to challenge the governor's decision.
"The inability of our governor to apply standards equally across these departments on what she expects of these people is infuriating to me, specifically as it pertains to how she handled the situation with Kent Davis, who's one of the very few state agency heads in the state, who is doing a bang up job that everyone, you know, all the veterans loved him," Dawson said.
"The board that appointed him loved him so much that they were willing to go to war with the governor over it," he continued. "He was beloved and doing a phenomenal job, and he was actually helping veterans… [Y]ou put that up against, oh, I don't know how Scott Harris is doing and maybe John Cooper."
Dawson explained how Harris, the state health officer, and Cooper, the director of the Department of Transportation, have done things worthy of reprimand, if not outright termination.
1819 News recently reported that Harris had been named president of the Association of State and Territorial Health Officials, which has ties to notorious Democrat donor George Soros. Dawson said Harris's actions during the COVID-19 pandemic and vocal opposition to Alabama's laws protecting children from transgender surgeries should be enough for the governor to consider asking for his resignation.
"He is Alabama's Fauci if you remember that," Dawson said. "...[T]he reason that he couldn't be fired is because he's not appointed by the governor. He doesn't serve at the pleasure of the governor. He's appointed by this board…Well, do you know who else, Joey, is appointed "by a board? Kent Davis, the guy that she [Ivey] just unilaterally fired. He was also appointed by a board of the head of a bunch of different veterans groups, and so should have had that same protection."
Ivey said she used her "supreme executive power" to fire Kent after the board rejected her request to vote him out.
"We see now that Kay Ivey's been sleeping on this supreme executive power of this state that she could have used with Scott Harris but chose not to," Dawson said.
The same thing happened with Cooper, Dawson said, after his questionable dealings with a bridge project in Baldwin County and allegedly threatening to shoot a neighbor in Marshall County.
"You have these two people, Scott Harris, who locked us down and treated us like we were, you know, Soviet plebes during COVID and all of these other things. He has his job. Alabama Department of Transportation had John Cooper doing all the things he's done. He still has his job. But Kent Davis, who's actually doing a phenomenal job and raised some concerns about the movement of mental health funds and how it was actually being used. He's got to go. We got to fire him."
To connect with the story's author or comment, email daniel.taylor@1819news.com or find him on X and Facebook.
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