(The Center Square) - The loss of 1,400 jobs in Ardmore was an "economic earthquake," Sen. Jerry Alvord told an Oklahoma Senate committee examining the closing of a Michelin plant there.

The Select Committee on Business Retention and Economic Development grilled Ardmore and state economic officials Tuesday about the closing and what could be done in the future to retain industry.

Michelin announced last week it would wind down production at the plant by the end of 2025. The plant is a fixture in the community, opening in 1970.

"This decision is linked to the North American market’s shifting needs and transformations, and the site not being equipped to deliver tires at competitive costs to meet these evolving market demands," Michelin officials said in a news release.

Alvord said the announcement caught everyone off guard.

"What we experienced in southern Oklahoma over the last week has been tragic," Alvord, R-Wilson, told the committee. "It is an economic earthquake for Southern Oklahoma and the state."

Lawmakers acknowledged that Michelin made a business decision and the state may not have been able to stop it but questioned what the Department of Commerce is doing to retain businesses in the state.

"We do have our regional development teams that are out in quadrants in Oklahoma," said Brig. Gen. Hopper Smith, the interim executive director of the Department of Commerce. "In the past, I think it was in the early 2000s, during a budget contraction, we had more RDS [Regional Development Specialists] teams and one of those budget shortfall years agencies were told to cut and we did and the executive director at the time reduced those RDS teams."

Smith said he would like to restore those teams so that one person is not covering a quadrant of the state.

Committee co-chair Sen. Kristen Thompson, R-Edmond, said she is convinced the current structure in place is not the best.

“Most of our state’s focus has been on recruiting rather than retention," Thompson said. "If we want to compete nationally and globally, we must be more intentional in supporting our smaller and medium-sized Oklahoma businesses that are already here and investing in our local communities. They are the backbone of our state’s economy, and we need to do more to help them grow and expand."

Senate Pro Tem Greg Treat formed the select committee in March to examine the state's business recruitment and retention efforts after Oklahoma was passed over for two large manufacturing projects despite offering large incentive packages.

"We have a history of going out of our way to offer advantages other states cannot," Treat said at the time. "There is no reason for us to continuously lose out to another state in this country on major business developments."

(The Center Square) – Nine governors are asking the National Collegiate Athletics Association to rewrite its policy on transgender participation in sports, saying it is unfair to female athletes.

The NCAA updated a 2010 policy last year that requires transgender females to show they have undergone a year of testosterone suppression treatment. Testosterone levels are also checked before competitions.

South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem and eight other governors cited University of Kentucky swimmer Riley Gaines as an example of why the policy is unfair.

Gaines tied with transgender athlete Lia Thomas for the top trophy at the NCAA Division I national championship in 2022. The NCAA gave Thomas the first-place trophy.

"The decade of hard work and the countless hours spent in the pool were suddenly wasted," the governors said in an Oct. 30 letter to the NCAA. "Riley's lifetime of achievement was ripped away from her by someone who shouldn't have even been in the race – all for a photo op."

William Thomas swam for the men's team at Penn his first three years. He changed his name to Lia, said he identified as a woman and swam for the women's team in a fourth year of competition.

The governors said the NCAA has an opportunity to "create a fair environment for women's sports.

"But if you continue the NCAA's misguided policies, stories like Riley Gaines' will only become more common," they wrote. "Policies that allow men and women to compete against one another validate an average male athlete stealing the recognition from a truly remarkable female athlete."

Noem spearheaded a bill during the 2022 legislative session that requires South Dakota students to compete in sports based on their sex at birth. Twenty-two other states passed similar laws, according to ESPN.

The governors said they intervened because the federal government has not.

"As governors of our states, it is our responsibility to care for our constituents, and we are doing all we can to protect the fairness of athletics in our states," the governors said in the letter. "Now, it is time for the NCAA to do the same and make the best decision for all of your athletes."

The governors also quoted a study that said males have an advantage over females.

"Science proves that it is fundamentally unfair for a biological male to compete against a biological female – that does not change when someone declares themselves as being of a different gender," they said. "The National Institutes for Health found that there is on average a 10% difference between the top performing males and females in athletic competition. In high-level athletic competition, a 10% difference is massive – and can even be insurmountable."

A majority of respondents to a poll by The Center Square this summer said they oppose biological males competing in female sports. Fifty-two percent of the 2,500 questioned said they strongly opposed, while 15% said they somewhat supported the issue.

(The Center Square) – Nine governors are asking the National Collegiate Athletics Association to rewrite its policy on transgender participation in sports, saying it is unfair to female athletes.

The NCAA updated a 2010 policy last year that requires transgender females to show they have undergone a year of testosterone suppression treatment. Testosterone levels are also checked before competitions.

South Dakota Gov. Kristi Noem and eight other governors cited University of Kentucky swimmer Riley Gaines as an example of why the policy is unfair.

Gaines tied with transgender athlete Lia Thomas for the top trophy at the NCAA Division I national championship in 2022. The NCAA gave Thomas the first-place trophy.

"The decade of hard work and the countless hours spent in the pool were suddenly wasted," the governors said in an Oct. 30 letter to the NCAA. "Riley's lifetime of achievement was ripped away from her by someone who shouldn't have even been in the race – all for a photo op."

William Thomas swam for the men's team at Penn his first three years. He changed his name to Lia, said he identified as a woman and swam for the women's team in a fourth year of competition.

The governors said the NCAA has an opportunity to "create a fair environment for women's sports.

"But if you continue the NCAA's misguided policies, stories like Riley Gaines' will only become more common," they wrote. "Policies that allow men and women to compete against one another validate an average male athlete stealing the recognition from a truly remarkable female athlete."

Noem spearheaded a bill during the 2022 legislative session that requires South Dakota students to compete in sports based on their sex at birth. Twenty-two other states passed similar laws, according to ESPN.

The governors said they intervened because the federal government has not.

"As governors of our states, it is our responsibility to care for our constituents, and we are doing all we can to protect the fairness of athletics in our states," the governors said in the letter. "Now, it is time for the NCAA to do the same and make the best decision for all of your athletes."

The governors also quoted a study that said males have an advantage over females.

"Science proves that it is fundamentally unfair for a biological male to compete against a biological female – that does not change when someone declares themselves as being of a different gender," they said. "The National Institutes for Health found that there is on average a 10% difference between the top performing males and females in athletic competition. In high-level athletic competition, a 10% difference is massive – and can even be insurmountable."

A majority of respondents to a poll by The Center Square this summer said they oppose biological males competing in female sports. Fifty-two percent of the 2,500 questioned said they strongly opposed, while 15% said they somewhat supported the issue.

(The Center Square) - Oklahoma's Superintendent of Instruction said he will be creating guidelines for every district on discipline.

"You can go across the state and hear stories from parents but the research is also clear," Ryan Walters said during Thursday's State Board of Education meeting. "A disruptive classroom environment makes it very difficult for students to achieve the academic gains that are possible."

Walters said other states went "the other direction."

"California announced sweeping measures that are going to prohibit suspensions, even when kids are violent towards teachers and violent towards each other," Walters said. "We've seen President Biden and we've seen the former president Obama send guidelines to states and the schools to limit suspensions, to limit discipline actions in schools."

No timetable was given as to when the policy would be released.

Walters also said administrators have reviewed the curriculum regarding the history of Israel.

"We believe it's essential to be clear on this issue," Walters said. "Our young people don't need to be confused on this. It should be crystal-clear on where the country stands and where basic human emotions, civility stand, so we want to make sure this indoctrination we are seeing in higher ed toward pushing this anti-Israel, anti-Semitic bullying doesn't go on in K-12."

The board of education denied requests from the Moore and Cushing school districts to change the gender or sexual orientation of a student.

"There is obviously a concerted effort to try to threaten, intimidate, bully schools into adopting this transgender ideology," Walters said. "This is again what we are seeing as part of this war on our schools to inject this ideology."

A group of parents addressed the school board during the public comment session in support of allowing transgender students to be identified as they want in schools, calling gender issues "simple biology."

(The Center Square) – A broad, bipartisan 33-state coalition filed a federal lawsuit in California against Meta, which operates Instagram and Facebook, alleging harms to youths' “mental and physical” health after a nationwide investigation announced in 2021 involving many of the coalition’s member states.

The lawsuit alleges that Meta “designed and deployed harmful features on Instagram and Facebook that addict children and teens” and seeks injunctive and monetary relief. More specifically, the lawsuit claims Meta has violated the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act, which protects the online privacy of children under 13 years old, California's False Advertising Law, which prohibits false and misleading advertising, and California’s Unfair Competition Law, which prohibits unlawful, unfair and fraudulent business practices.

“Our bipartisan investigation has arrived at a solemn conclusion: Meta has been harming our children and teens, cultivating addiction to boost corporate profits,” said California Attorney General Bonta in a public statement. “With today’s lawsuit, we are drawing the line. We must protect our children and we will not back down from this fight. I am grateful for the collaboration of my fellow state attorneys general in standing up for our children and holding Meta accountable."

The attorneys general claim Meta’s business model is focused on maximizing young users’ time on its platforms, uses “harmful and psychologically manipulative platform features while misleading the public about the safety of those features,” reports “misleadingly low rates of user harms,” and both “conceal[s] and downplay[s] its platforms’ adverse effects.”

“We share the attorneys general’s commitment to providing teens with safe, positive experiences online, and have already introduced more than 30 tools to support teens and their families,” said Meta in a statement responding to the lawsuit. “We’re disappointed that instead of working productively with companies across the industry to create clear, age-appropriate standards for the many apps teens use, the attorneys general have chosen this path.”

The states part of the federal lawsuit filed in California include Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Georgia, Hawaii, Idaho, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, South Carolina, South Dakota, Virginia, Washington, West Virginia, and Wisconsin. Florida filed its own federal lawsuit in the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Florida, and eight additional attorneys general — representing the District of Columbia, Massachusetts, Mississippi, New Hampshire, Oklahoma, Tennessee, Utah, and Vermont, which have filed related actions in their respective state and state-level courts.

(The Center Square) - Oklahoma's universities spend millions on diversity, equity, and inclusion requirements, and one lawmaker said he wants to do something about it.

Sen. Rob Standridge, R-Norman, called for a study on DEI at the state's universities during a recent meeting of the Senate Education Committee.

“I think it’s really destroying our higher ed institutions and it’s really hurting both our faculty and our students and I’ve had many, many parents and faculty, both family and friends, who have complained to me about this for quite a few years,” Standridge said.

At Oklahoma State University, all new students must complete a diversity course, according to Matt Beienburg, director of education policy at the Goldwater Institute. Job applicants seeking to join the faculty at various institutions are required to submit a “diversity statement” along with their resume and cover letter, he said.

“The rubrics that are then used to judge these have explicitly penalized applicants who say things like, ‘well, I treat all students the same regardless of race.’ That is deemed to be a misunderstanding and an unsatisfactory understanding of DEI,” Beienburg said.

Many universities also use “bias reporting systems.” At Oklahoma State University, people can report someone for a comment they made in class, a post on social media, or for using someone’s incorrect pronouns, Beienburg told the committee.

The programs cost millions, the panelist told the committee.

“By their own admission they’ve spent approximately $84 million in the last decade on DEI," said Jonathan Small, president of the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs, a public policy research organization.

Small said he would "put higher ed back to where it was two years ago."

“They all essentially kind of gave you all the impression that if you gave them about $100 million a year that, particularly our flagship university, wasn’t going to raise tuition. I would just take all that back and start this Workforce Needs Scholarship Program," Small said. "That’s $100 million that could be pro-rated across the number of students who are interested in the various fields.”

Small also suggested reducing the budget for higher education institutions to curb DEI spending and raising standards for professors.

“At OSU, approximately 20% of the professors are doing nearly 50% of the teaching. And so if you just require professors to become more efficient, like the top 20% at OSU, you’re talking about saving students and taxpayers $80 million a year,” said Small.

(The Center Square) - Oklahoma Attorney General Gentner Drummond said the approval of a Catholic charter school by the Oklahoma Statewide Virtual Charter School Board violates the U.S. Constitution.

Drummond filed a lawsuit with the Oklahoma Supreme Court on Friday against the board and its members, challenging its approval of the St. Isidore of Seville Virtual Charter School earlier this week. The school is the first approved religious charter school in the U.S. that would receive taxpayer funding.

“There is no religious freedom in compelling Oklahomans to fund religions that may violate their own deeply held beliefs,” Drummond said. “The framers of the U.S. Constitution and those who drafted Oklahoma’s Constitution clearly understood how best to protect religious freedom: by preventing the State from sponsoring any religion at all.”

The attorney general said the approval could have unintended consequences and asked the court to dismiss the board's action.

"Because of the legal precedent created by the Board’s actions, tomorrow we may be forced to fund radical Muslim teachings like Sharia law," Drummond said. "In fact, Governor Stitt has already indicated that he would welcome a Muslim charter school funded by our tax dollars. That is a gross violation of our religious liberty."

Stitt called the lawsuit a political stunt.

"AG Drummond seems to lack any firm grasp on the constitutional principle of religious freedom and masks his disdain for the Catholics’ pursuit by obsessing over non-existent schools that don’t neatly align with his religious preference. His discriminatory and ignorant comment concerning a potential Muslim charter is a perfect illustration," Stitt said in a statement. "The creation of St. Isadore’s is a win for religious and education freedom in Oklahoma. We want parents to be able to choose the education that is best for their kids, regardless of income

Drummond said the approval is a waste of taxpayer's money.

“At a time when Oklahoma students underperform their peers across the country in every subject, why would we spend one penny of our tax dollars educating them on Catholicism, Sharia law or any other religious teaching?" Drummond said. "I would prefer we focus on reading proficiency so they can read the Bible at home with their family."

The charter school board did not respond to a message seeking comment.

Domestic terrorism and violent extremism are growing threats in the United States. The FBI had 9,049 open domestic terrorism cases in fiscal 2021, up 357% from the number of open domestic terrorism cases in fiscal 2013. Many of the most violent incidents of domestic terrorism in the U.S. today are carried out by individuals who have been radicalized by racist, homophobic, ethnocentric, or anti-government ideologies - ideologies widely propagated by extremist hate groups.

According to the Southern Poverty Law Center, a nonprofit legal advocacy group, there were 1,224 active hate and anti-government groups in the U.S. in 2022. These groups include those with distinct chapters in cities across the country, such as the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, the Ku Klux Klan, and ACT for America. While specific views vary between these and other groups, they are generally all galvanized by curtailing government power or hatred toward individuals of certain races, religions, ethnicities, or sexual orientations.

The SPLC identified 13 active hate and anti-government groups in Oklahoma in 2022. Adjusting for population, this comes out to about 3.3 extremist groups for every million people, the 16th lowest concentration among states.

The number of hate groups operating in the state climbed by 44.4% since 2021. Active extremist groups in Oklahoma today include nine anti-government groups and one neo-Völkisch group.

All data in this story is from the SPLC report The Year in Hate & Extremism 2022.

RankStateExtremist groups per 1M people, 2022Total number of extremist groups, 20221-yr. change in active extremist groups (%)1Wyoming15.593502Idaho11.0212503Montana10.9122004New Hampshire10.8151505North Dakota10.383006South Dakota8.981007Delaware7.07758Maine6.691259Rhode Island6.47133.310Nebraska6.11233.311South Carolina5.83076.512Oregon5.72414013Pennsylvania5.67214015Alaska5.5430014Hawaii5.5810016Utah5.41880017Arizona5.43977.319Arkansas5.31677.818Colorado5.33172.221Virginia5.04311520West Virginia5.095023Ohio4.75517522Tennessee4.73317.924Vermont4.635025Indiana4.329107.128Maryland4.125127.326Florida4.18967.927North Carolina4.14353.630Iowa3.81250029Nevada3.81233.331Washington3.72952.633Wisconsin3.6217532Missouri3.62229.434Minnesota3.319111.135Oklahoma3.31344.436Connecticut3.11157.137Michigan2.92961.138Illinois2.83552.239New York2.75351.440California2.610358.541Alabama2.613045New Mexico2.4540043New Jersey2.42283.342Texas2.47238.544Mississippi2.47-12.546Georgia2.224047Kansas2.065048Kentucky2.09049Massachusetts1.611-21.450Louisiana1.57-53.3

(The Center Square) – Energy markets continued to decline in the Midwest during the summer, but a modest increase is projected.

The Kansas City Federal Reserve’s third quarter energy survey, released on Friday, reviewed oil and natural gas markets in the bank's district, which covers Colorado, Kansas, Missouri, Nebraska, New Mexico, Oklahoma and Wyoming. Energy firms were contacted between Sept. 15 and 29. The survey reports on several energy indicators, including drilling, capital spending and employment. Companies also give projections for oil and gas prices.

“District drilling and business activity declined further in Q3, but revenues grew after declining for three consecutive quarters and employment continued to increase at a moderate pace,” Chad Wilkerson, senior vice president at the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City, said in the report. “Firms’ sentiment for future activity improved in light of increased commodity prices.”

Companies reported oil must be on average approximately $64 per barrel for drilling to be profitable and $90 per barrel to cause substantial increases in drilling. For natural gas drilling to be profitable, it needed to be at $3.45 per million per British Thermal Unit, a standard of measure of energy needed to raise or lower a pint of water by one degree Fahrenheit. A price of $4.36 per million BTU is necessary for drilling activity to increase.

The report said year-over-year oil and natural gas indexes were mixed. While drilling and business activity showed a moderate decline, the report found revenue, profits and supplier delivery time decreased at a slower pace than during the second quarter.

Employment indexes in the sector cooled as wages and benefits measures increased. Companies also expressed negativity when asked about access to credit. The poor outlook for credit was the first since the survey for 2020's fourth quarter.

Companies were asked about expectations for the amount of oil and natural gas rigs in the U.S. rig count during the next six months when taking current conditions into account. Almost half (48%) of the companies expect the number of rigs to be slightly higher and 45% expect it to be the same. Only 3% expect it to be significantly higher or lower.

When asked how productivity changed at their business during the past year, 45% of respondents reported a slight increase and 31% reported no change. When asked about the coming year, 70% of the companies expect a slight increase in productivity.

(The Center Square) - Oklahoma is among the top ten best states financially, according to an analysis by think tank Truth in Accounting.

The state had an estimated $5.7 billion left over after paying all its bills, according to the report, which analyzes the fiscal health of all 50 states.

Oklahoma is one of 22 states with a taxpayer surplus of $5,200 per taxpayer. A taxpayer surplus is defined as "the amount of money left over after all of a state’s bills are paid, divided by the estimated number of taxpayers in the state."

The state released its annual financial report late. A report is timely if it is released within 180 days after the end of a fiscal year, according to the Government Finance Officers Association.

Oklahoma took 426 days to release its financial report. Due to this delay, data from fiscal year 2021 was used for Oklahoma in Truth in Accounting’s analysis.

Oklahoma had $17.6 billion available in fiscal year 2021 to pay $11.9 billion worth of bills, leaving the state with over $5 billion surplus. The state was among 18 that received a “B” grade, which is given to any government with a taxpayer surplus between $1 and $9,999, according to the report.

Only four states received an “A” – Alaska, North Dakota, Wyoming, and Utah.

The state with the highest taxpayer surplus was Alaska, with $80,000 per taxpayer, the report said. New Jersey was the worst-performing state, with a taxpayer burden of $53,600.

State governments must disclose most retirement liabilities, including unfunded pension and post-employment benefits. The majority of state debt comes from retirement plans, the report found.

Total unfunded pension liabilities in the U.S. exceeded $780 billion in fiscal year 2022. With a lack of updated data for 2022 at the time of the report, it’s unclear where Oklahoma stands on this issue.

“The information for many states that have produced their 2022 financial reports revealed that the large unrealized gains of 2021 turned into losses in 2022. When newer data is available, the state’s amount of unfunded pension promises could increase significantly,” the report said.

Debt among the 50 states was $938.6 billion, the report said, an improvement from the combined $1.2 trillion debt states had collectively at the end of fiscal year 2021. Despite the progress, 28 states did not have enough money to cover their bills, according to the report.

Other states in the top ten were Tennessee, Nebraska, Idaho, Oregon, and South Dakota. Those determined to be in the worst financial position were Hawaii, Massachusetts, Illinois, Connecticut, and New Jersey.