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"We know of at least 23 deaths in North Dakota where it's listed as a primary cause," Gov. Kelly Armstrong said on this episode of Plain Talk, referring to the substance kratom.
Armstrong made headlines this week when he announced a temporary executive order banning kratom, and that he was calling lawmakers to Bismarck for a special session to pass more permanent policy. Some claimed that kratom is a ruse intended to cover other issues, such as the red-hot data center debate, or the financial disaster that is a military museum on the capitol grounds, but Armstrong made it clear that the session is very much about kratom.
"We've basically only started testing for this stuff since September of last year, nd everybody I talked to in this space that knows what it is from the health perspective says this stuff is really, really addictive and it's really bad news and it's completely unregulated right now in North Dakota," he said.
"If we have to overreact to something this addictive, I'm comfortable overreacting," he added.
But Armstrong did indicate that he hopes lawmakers do something about the military museum mess while in Bismarck, even if it just means appropriating the dollars needed to winterize the project, buying some time for the legislature to come up with a way to address it during their regular session beginning in January.
He also indicated that, while he has no control over what bills lawmakers consider, he would be very skeptical of signing any sort of a data center moratorium. "I'm not a huge moratorium guy," he said. "If the argument is we have to make sure there's more local control, doesn't a moratorium take all local control away? I don't see that as being a real viable scenario at this point."
Also on this super-sized episode of Plain Talk, Signe Snortland, a candidate for the state Senate in District 33 said that if she were participating in the special session, she'd vote for a moratorium. The district she lives in touches on four counties, each of which have at least one proposed data center project in them.
She acknowledges that the data centers are needed, but said North Dakota needs more time to consider the policies around them.
One thing she'd like to see on the table is a requirement for reclamation bonds, in case the markets turn and the data centers are abandoned. "We're worried what will happen if the bubble bursts and people walk away from these plants," she said. "What happens in the county and the city? How do they reclaim the land?"
Co-host Chad Oban and I also discussed the ways in which Doug Burgum is overshadowing his strong legacy as a leader and businessman in North Dakota by carrying President Donald Trump's rancid political water, the controversy over pride flags in Detroit Lakes, and political shakeups in Fargo-area legislative districts, including the possibility that Rep. Jim Kasper, an elderly lawmaker who has been out of the public eye for some time after suffering a brain bleed, could soon be replaced.
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