Democratic leaders in Olympia say the Worker Privacy Act is dead

The Worker Privacy Act - organized labor's biggest priority for the 2009 legislative session - is dead, according to Governor Chris Gregoire, Senate Majority Leader Lisa Brown, and House Speaker Frank Chopp, who issued the following statement this morning:

We are no longer considering action on House Bill 1528 and Senate Bill 5446, also known as the Worker Privacy Act.

Immediately upon becoming aware of an email linking potential action on the bill to campaign contributions, bringing the bill forward was no longer an option.

The email raises serious legal and ethical questions.

The matter has been referred to the Washington State Patrol for investigation.

Something is clearly amiss.

No further details were provided about this email, but the decision to refer the matter to the State Patrol was probably not made lightly. Although we don't know the details yet, we commend the Governor, Speaker, and Majority Leader for disclosing this development (rather than quietly killing the bill and keeping that a secret). We'll reserve further judgment until we know more.

UPDATE: The State Labor Council is taking responsibility - they've released the following statement fromk President Rick Bender:

We regret the incident. It was a result of frustration with the Legislature’s failure to protect workers' rights in the workplace. Our job is to always protect workers' rights.

We do not believe that any law has been violated and we have no additional comments until we know where this will go.

We still don't really know what the "incident" was, but we do know the consequences: The Worker Privacy Act is history. Business lobbyists all over Olympia are undoubtedly having a good chuckle about its demise today.