REGIER SD5
With so many changes going on in our society today I am running to conserve the Montana that we all cherish. I remember when we went to the ‘Blue Building’ to get our license plates renewed. Whitefish Mountain Resort will always be Big Mountain, and I think it is disappointing that we need a lottery ticket to get into Glacier Park; our own backyard. I am an eternal optimist and believe if we all take a stand we can hold on to the Montana way of life. It will be a team effort. All of us that want parents to be in control of raising their kids, that stand for law and order, and want a government that serves the people, must take a stand.
Parents Rights
Now more than ever there are interest groups as well as elected officials that are bent on taking over your role as a parent. There is no one that should get in-between a loving parent and their child. I was proud to support HB 676 last session that establishes that parental rights, including the right to educate their child, the religion they raise their child in, and the biometric data of their child, are exclusively the domain of parents and free from government interference and requires parents provide consent before, the child would share a room or sleeping quarters with an individual of the opposite sex on a school-sponsored trip.
I will always stand on the side of loving, rational parents to be the ones to parent.
Taxes and Economy
While much of the economy is driving or suppressed by the decisions at the Federal level, much can be implemented at the state level to promote a healthy economy, lower tax burden and provide a safe environment for business to flourish. I voted to lower state income tax rates and business tax rates and will fight to lower further. Both tax rates were enacted into law and lowered.
I have advocated for decreasing the state percentage of property tax as well capping local government furture growth of expenditures. Both State and Local can make budgets work with less burden on the property taxpayers. Unfortunately Democrats and a handful of Republicans voted against limiting state and local government and the ideas failed. (HB 856, 2023 & HB 636, 2021)
I will continue to speak our loud for the Montana taxpayer.
Water Rights
In 2015 the Montana legislature as well as our Federal delegates passed a disastrous CSKT Water compact that gave the Tribe off reservation water rights, millions of state dollars, and control of a percentage of the Flathead basin water (including storage in Hungry Horse Reservoir) and control of Kerr Dam.
Last summer we lived through the destruction of life on Flathead Lake when the water never got close to full pool. This will continue unless policy is reversed.
We must press back against any elected official (Democrat or Republican) that would give Montana water away. This is one top issue that we must stand up and claw back our constitutional right that the water belongs to the Montana public and not a small individual Indian Tribe.
Protect our Youth
'Boys will be boys', Women suffrage, Women's health, Mens gold medal winner,..... all have no meaning to the Liberal Left. We are in a period of our history that reality is being challenged. The radical Left has stated men can get pregnant, tax payer funded schools should teach different sexualization activities to grade schoolers, and the girls locker room should accept biological males. These notions defy logic and decency. Last legislative session, HB 432, Sponsored by a Democrat would have allowed for abortion inducing drugs in Montana grade schools. Fortunately it failed in committee. Republican, Democrat, or Independent we must come together to defeat these radical, harmful, and destructive ideas. That is the only way we can protect our Montana youth.
100% Pro 2nd Amendment
Just like so many of you, I love the Montana outdoors! From fly fishing in the Bob Marshall wilderness to trying to find the elusive bull elk out in Lost Prairie I love being outside. But the second amendment is not just about the freedom and ease to go out on a great Montana hunt. Our second amendment gives Americans and Montanan’s the ability to protect themselves and the power, as our US constitution puts it “being necessary to the security of a free State”. Our framers knew that there would be power in the citizens if the government could not take our ability to own firearms. I am a firm believer in the citizen and our right to bear arms. I have been A rated by the NRA, endorsed by Montana Shooting Sports, and sponsored LR-130 which kept local governments from passing ordinances infringing on our right to bear arms. I have and will continue to fight on against those that want to erode that right. Yes, they are out there and will not stop and neither will we.
Medicaid Expansion in 2025 session
Montana, as well as America, has a welfare cliff math problem. The welfare cliff is where the government, State and Federal, offer so many welfare benefits that low income earners will actually lose money/benefits by increasing their earned income. This is causing an incentive to stay on all forms of welfare and a disincentive to secure employment and increase earn income. This is backwards. We have a traditional medicaid program with 130,000 Montanans currently enrolled. The expansion program is on top of those numbers and has enrollees that are able bodied adults, earning higher wages. I believe that the government safety net is there to help citizens get back on their feet. Success of a welfare program is working till no one needs it anymore. Failure of the welfare system is getting as many as you can enrolled. We already have traditional Medicaid, Montana does not need to continue a billion dollar a year expansion program too.
In conjunction with Medicaid Expansion being a welfare program on top of welfare program, it also funds Montana abortions with 100% state tax dollars. Even the federal government, because of the Hyde Amendment (https://crsreports.congress.gov), does not use tax dollars to fund abortions. Since 2014, the year before MT implemented Expansion, Montana Medicaid paid for 390 abortions. Then after 5 years of having the Expansion program the state now funded 682 abortions in 2020, a 57% increase. (MT abortion stats from MT DPHHS)
We should not be using state tax dollars to fund abortions.
Also in 2018 the voters of Montana said no to the Medicaid Expansion program, the legislature should listen to the people and not renew the program in this upcoming 2025 legislative session.