“Raylee’s Law” has less than two left to pass legislature before deadline

CHARLESTON, W.Va . (WSAZ) - There are fewer than two hours left in the West Virginia Legislative session, and one of the most-talked about pieces of legislation has yet to pass through.

“Raylee’s Law” would pause requests from parents and guardians to pull children into homeschooling, if a public school teacher has made a child abuse or neglect allegation against that parent or guardian. CPS would have a few days to conduct an investigation into the allegations before the request could proceed.

The measure is named after Raylee Browning, an eight-year-old who was found dead in Fayette County of severe neglect and abuse in 2018, just days after her father pulled her into homeschool after her public school teachers reported potential neglect.

Opponents of the bill say it’s anti-homeschooling, but supporters say it’s all about children’s safety, and has nothing to do with people who homeschool properly.

“I think the people that feel like it infringes on rights are looking at it entirely wrong... It’s not infringing on anybody’s rights,” Sen. Amy Grady (R-Mason) told WSAZ Friday. “I want to make sure that people understand it’s not an attack on homeschoolers. Homeschoolers are people who do homeschooling like they’re supposed to. These are people who are pretending to homeschool under the guise of child abuse. And that’s not okay. We should all want to put those people away.”

Friday evening, the Senate made a dramatic push to get “Raylee’s Law” to the House floor before Saturday night’s deadline. Lawmakers voted to override Senate President Randy Smith (R-Preston) and amend the measure into a different bill.

As of 10:24 p.m. Saturday, the House has yet to take up the amended bill, which supporters of the measure say they’ve been able to all day.

Sen. Ryan Weld (R-Brooke) was among the leaders in the Senate to get the measure to the House yesterday, and he implored the House to take it up for a vote, with just three hours left at the time of the interview.

“At this point in time, I’m not confident at all. And that’s sad,” he told WSAZ. “They’ve had the bill all day. They have less than three hours to do the right thing. We did the right thing.”

“Put it up for a vote,” Weld continued. “What’s more important? This is about child safety.”