OKLAHOMA

After transgender protest incident, state House censures OKC lawmaker Mauree Turner

Dale Denwalt, Oklahoman
Wed, March 8, 2023 

State Rep. Mauree Turner, D-Oklahoma City, speaks to a transgender rights rally inside the state Capitol in early February.

The Oklahoma House of Representatives censured Oklahoma City state Rep. Mauree Turner on Tuesday, a week after a transgender rights protester sought refuge in Turner's Capitol office following an altercation with state troopers.

According to statements made on the House floor and media reports about the incident last week, a protester threw water on Tahlequah Republican state Rep. Bob Ed Culver after the House passed legislation that would ban insurance coverage of trans health care and prohibit gender-affirming care for minors.

That individual was arrested on suspicion of assault, and troopers with the Oklahoma Highway Patrol tried to locate another person who allegedly interfered with the arrest. Troopers discovered the second person had gone into Turner's office, said state Rep. Anthony Moore, R-Clinton.

Moore, who presented the censure motion, said that Turner refused to let the troopers see their suspect. Only after House leadership intervened did Turner unlock the door and let the troopers inside the office.

"The actions willfully taken by Rep. Turner, without question, rise to the level of criminal. We are not made better by protecting those that assault our troopers," Moore said, drawing immediate rebuke from Turner's Democratic colleagues.

House Speaker Charles McCall also indicated in a news release issued immediately after the party-line vote that Turner may have committed a crime.

"This member knowingly, and willfully, impeded a law enforcement investigation, harboring a fugitive and repeatedly lying to officers, and used their official office and position to thwart attempts by law enforcement to make contact with a suspect of the investigation," McCall wrote in the news release.

State Rep. Mauree Turner, D-Oklahoma City, speaks to a transgender rights rally inside the state Capitol in early February.

Turner, however, has not been charged with a crime. Trooper Eric Foster, a spokesman for the highway patrol, said the agency hasn't recommended charges to the district attorney and only sent information about the incident to the district attorney.

Turner and members of the House Democratic Caucus said Tuesday's censure motion came as a surprise, since no one, not even law enforcement, had followed up with Turner about the incident.

"What happened last week in my office was the same thing that happens all the time," Turner said during debate on the censure motion. "People do not feel represented or protected by the people in this (Legislature). They come to find refuge in my office. They come to decompress from the most stressful times."

State Rep. Mauree Turner, D-Oklahoma City, speaks with an assistant inside her office in this 2021 file photo.

Along with being publicly reprimanded with a censure, Turner will be stripped of all committee assignments unless they apologize.

"For me personally, I think an apology for loving the people of Oklahoma is something that I cannot do. It's something I actively refuse to do," Turner said at a news conference after the censure vote. "I'll never apologize for showing up fully and freely as myself. I will never apologize for allowing the people of Oklahoma to show up fully and freely as themselves. Because that is the work that they elected me to do."

Turner has served as a state representative in House District 88 since 2021. The district encompasses part of northwest Oklahoma City west of the state Capitol building. As the Oklahoma Legislature's first openly nonbinary member, Turner has been an outspoken voice for the LGBTQ+ community.

This article originally appeared on Oklahoman: After transgender protest incident, state House censures OKC lawmaker