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FOR THE PEOPLE, BY THE PEOPLE.

WEDNESDAY, MAY 14, 2025

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Chris Barnett and the Selective Outcry of Lawfare: When the Law Only Matters If It Works for You By: John Oliver Josephine County Commissioner Chris Barnett has been sounding the alarm in recent weeks about becoming a victim of “lawfare”—a term commonly used to describe the strategic use of legal systems as weapons to suppress, discredit, or exhaust political adversaries. He has claimed that he’s been unfairly targeted, persecuted, and burdened by legal scrutiny. On the surface, this might sound like a legitimate concern for anyone in public office. But dig deeper, and you’ll find a narrative where the definition of “lawfare” seems to shift depending on whether Barnett is playing offense or defense. When laws or legal mechanisms serve his interests, Barnett embraces them with both hands. When they don’t—when they impose oversight, reveal uncomfortable facts, or fail to support his version of events— he waves the lawfare flag and cries foul. In short, Chris Barnett may be right that lawfare is happening in Coo’s County. But not quite in the way he wants the public to believe. The Convenient Embrace of the Law Barnett has demonstrated a keen ability to use the law when it serves his political agenda. When critics call out his conduct as a public official, he responds with defamation threats. When a reporter publishes unflatter-

ing but factual articles, Barnett claims he’s the victim of character assassination, and demands legal intervention. When legal protections such as the corporate veil offer him a shield, he eagerly stands behind it. In the civil case Adelsperger v. Elkside Development LLC, for instance, Barnett invoked LLC protections to argue that he bore no personal responsibility for the elder financial abuse and broken promises tied to lifetime campground memberships sold to dozens of seniors. But the Oregon Court of Appeals disagreed, twice affirming that LLC protections

don’t shield individuals from personal liability when fraud or abuse is involved. Instead of accepting that legal reasoning, Barnett went to the media and cried “lawfare,” suggesting he was the one being wronged. That’s not lawfare. That’s the law doing exactly what it’s designed to do—protect vulnerable citizens and hold power to account. In Barnett’s world, accountability appears to be a zero-sum game: If he’s not the one holding the legal sword, then someone must be unfairly targeting him with it. But public office doesn’t come with a legal immunity

card. Commissioners, like any other citizen, are bound by rules of conduct, public records laws, ethics regulations, and the state constitution. When journalists and watchdogs file public records requests to investigate how ARPA or airport grant funds were distributed under Barnett’s watch, he characterizes those inquiries as part of a political witch hunt. When constituents demand transparency, he labels them "activists" or "trolls." And when legal claims arise—from lease disputes to ethics complaints—Barnett paints himself as a martyr, a victim of lawfare rather than a participant in the democratic process of checks and balances. The irony is sharp. Barnett isn’t facing lawfare. He’s facing accountability. If lawfare is the use of legal mechanisms to silence, punish, or outlast your opponents, then perhaps the most egregious example of it is Barnett’s own approach toward local journalists and civic critics. Legal threats against the Grants Pass Tribune have become routine. Political pressure has been exerted on advertisers to abandon independent media. And behind closed doors, sources allege that local officials have coordinated efforts to discredit those who dare to speak out. That’s textbook lawfare—wielding the

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Grants Pass Gas Prices: Where Logic Goes to Die and Wallets Go to Cry By: Leaf Barret If you’ve filled your tank in Grants Pass lately, odds are you’ve walked away muttering words not fit for print. That’s because this charming Southern Oregon town, nestled in the Rogue Valley and known for its small-town appeal, now enjoys the dubious distinction of having some of the highest gas prices in the state. While Oregon’s average gas price hovers around $3.93 per gallon, Grants Pass drivers are dishing out nearly $4.41 — sometimes more, depending on which station has decided to play “who can gouge the most” this week. So, what’s the excuse? Is it greed, logistics, politics, or all of the above? As it turns out, it’s a cocktail of causes — shaken, stirred, and served with a garnish of corporate opportunism and government inertia. First, there’s the annual ritual that happens every spring: the switch to summer-blend gasoline. This is the more environmentally friendly version of fuel, required by federal law to reduce smog during warmer months. Unfortunately, it’s also more expensive to produce. Add in scheduled refinery maintenance that tends to conveniently overlap with this seasonal switch, and wholesale prices spike across the West Coast — especially in supply-choked regions like ours. Oregon has no refineries of its own, which means fuel must be imported, typically from Washington or California. That puts us at the

tail end of the supply chain. Transportation costs pile on, especially in rural areas like Josephine County. The further fuel has to travel, the more you’ll pay for it — and in Grants Pass, with our isolated location and few supply alternatives, the cost gets passed down with interest. But it’s not just the geography. Oregon’s gas taxes don’t help either. While not the highest in the nation, they’re high enough to matter, especially when every other factor is already stacked against the consumer. And unlike other states that have taken temporary steps to ease fuel costs, Oregon has mostly stayed the course, leaving residents to fend for themselves at the pump. The real kicker in Grants Pass seems to be a perfect storm of low station competition, high demand, and what can only be described as price-point opportunism. In towns with a limited number of stations, prices tend to stay artificially high. There’s no real incentive to un-

dercut the competition when everyone’s playing from the same inflated pricing playbook. Toss in tourism traffic along the I-5 corridor and our reliance on personal vehicles due to limited public transit, and it’s a captive market. If you're going to fill up no matter what, why wouldn’t they charge as much as they can get away with? Beyond state borders, international tensions are also fueling the fire. New tariffs on Canadian and Mexican oil imports have begun to ripple through U.S. markets, putting pressure on refineries to cover rising costs. While Canada supplies a huge portion of the oil refined on the West Coast, political friction has made that flow more expensive. And in the brilliant wisdom of supply economics, when refiners pay more, you pay more — period. Even when crude oil prices fall, gas stations often seem slow to lower prices. There's a lag effect — when prices go up, they hike them overnight. But when prices drop? Sud-

denly, there’s a long, slow, mysterious process before the savings trickle down — if they ever do. That’s because many stations are still selling fuel bought at higher prices. Or so they say. At the end of the day, Grants Pass residents are paying more because they can’t not pay more. It’s the kind of economic trap that frustrates working-class families and small business owners trying to stretch every dollar. Every delivery, commute, or trip to the store becomes an exercise in mental budgeting. It’s not just a number on a sign — it’s a weight on the local economy. The question isn’t why gas prices are high in Grants Pass — we’ve answered that. The better question is: Why isn’t anyone doing anything about it? Between government silence, industry indifference, and market manipulation, consumers are left navigating a broken system. And until something shifts — a change in policy, infrastructure investment, or serious enforcement of price fairness — it seems the gas pump will remain the town’s most reliable source of daylight robbery.