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All he does is win: Governor Scott Walker’s long record of pro-life victories

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Scott Walker - pro-life deeds, not pro-life words
Scott Walker – pro-life deeds, not pro-life words (Image provided by ECM)

Life News has an overview of Scott Walker’s record fighting against abortion.

Here’s the latest accomplishment:

Earlier this year, Walker burnished his pro-life credentials by issuing a letter saying he would sign a bill to ban abortions after 20 weeks.

“As the Wisconsin legislature moves forward in the coming session, further protections for mother and child are likely to come to my desk in the form of a bill to prohibit abortions after 20 weeks. I will sign that bill when it gets to my desk and support similar legislation on the federal level. I was raised to believe in the sanctity of life and I will always fight to protect it.”

Since then, the Wisconsin legislature has approved the pro-life measure and Governor Walker is expected to sign the 20-week abortion ban into law soon.

The position is not a new one as Walker co-sponsored legislation in 1998 while he was a member of the Wisconsin state legislature to ban abortions after 20 weeks.

And here’s the rest of the list:

Abortion Funding: As an Assembly Representative, Walker voted against taxpayer funding of abortions for public employees. As Governor, Walker signed into law a state budget provision to prohibit the UW Hospital Authority from being involved in performing abortions and from using taxpayer dollars to pay medical students to learn to perform abortions. Also as Governor, Walker signed legislation allowing Wisconsin to opt-out of taxpayer-funded abortion coverage under ObamaCare.

Funding Abortion Providers: As an Assembly Representative, Walker voted to prohibit taxpayer dollars from going to organizations that provide or promote abortions. As Governor, Walker signed into law a state budget provision to prohibit Title V taxpayer dollars from going to organizations that perform abortions. Also as Governor, Walker steered funds from the Wisconsin Well Woman program to local counties instead of Planned Parenthood.

Protecting Unborn Children: As an Assembly Representative, Walker voted to recognize an unborn child as a separate victim of a criminal act against the pregnant mother, to prohibit partial-birth abortions, and to protect unborn children at risk due to drug or alcohol use by the mother.

Protecting Families: As an Assembly Representative, Walker voted to strengthen Wisconsin’s law requiring parental consent before a minor’s abortion. As Governor, Walker signed legislation returning sex education curriculum to local control and allowing abstinence-only programs.

Protecting Women: As an Assembly Representative, Walker voted for the Woman’s Right to Know Act which requires that women be given full information prior to an abortion and establishes a 24-hour waiting period. As Governor, Walker signed legislation to protect women from coerced abortions; to prohibit unsafe RU 486 chemical web cam abortions designed to expand abortions into local communities; to require that a woman view an ultrasound of her unborn child 24 hours before an abortion can take place; and to require abortionists to have admitting privileges at a hospital within 30 miles of the abortion clinic.

Alternatives to Abortion: As an Assembly Representative, Walker voted for tax exemptions related to adoption expenses; to improve adoption laws; to expand funding for adoption assistance for children at risk of developing disabilities; and for a provision to allow a woman and her unborn child to be considered as a family eligible for BadgerCare.

Conscience Protections: As an Assembly Representative, Walker authored legislation to strengthen conscience protections for medical professionals and institutions.

Other: As an Assembly Representative, Walker voted in favor of legislation to prohibit lawsuits based on the “wrongful” life of an unborn child and to prohibit the sale of body parts of aborted babies.

The radically leftist National Journal, which despises Scott Walker, explains how he wins:

The son of a conservative small-town minister who showed his son how to be “pastoral,” Walker has mastered the art of governing in a manner that mobilizes the party faithful while campaigning in a way that doesn’t scare off moderates, independents, and even some Democrats. This misdirection has been the source of much of Walker’s political success.

“Even as he cut that abortion ad, there isn’t a single pro-life voter in the state who suddenly thinks he’s pro-choice,” said Matt Batzel, executive director of American Majority, a conservative activist group. “They know he shares their views.”

Batzel, who is based in Wisconsin and has had a front-row seat for Walker’s biggest political battles, added: “He has legislated very conservatively. But when you look at his tone and how he wins elections, it’s different. And that’s a needle he’s successfully been able to thread in Wisconsin.”

This is the story of Walker’s political rise. In a National Journal magazine profile last year, the governor’s friends and foes alike remarked on his unique ability—demonstrated over the past two decades—to wrap a fierce ideological agenda in a neighborly, nonthreatening persona.

“He has an altar boy’s appearance,” said Bob Jauch, a longtime Democratic state senator who worked closely with Walker in the legislature. “But Darth Vader writes his policies.”

Now, I understand that some pro-lifers would prefer that Walker sound more direct about his pro-life views during election campaigns. They think that there are enough pro-lifers who will go for tough rhetoric of the Ted Cruz sort. But that’s false of course. Candidates who sound shrill on social issues in a purple state like Wisconsin simply don’t win elections. Pro-lifers are notorious for shooting themselves in the foot when it comes to politics, and there is a lot of pious chest-pounding from the sidelines. But Walker knows better. He knows that to win elections, you have to speak about the issues that everyone cares about, like balancing the budget and creating jobs and lowering property taxes, and that’s how he gets elected. Then, when he is elected, he actually does pro-life things. Why would you talk to the hostile left-wing media about abortion? They will just use anything you say against you! A much better idea is to promise fiscal achievements, achieve them, win re-election on the strength of your fiscal achievements, and then be the guy who can quietly push for incremental pro-life legislation. Walker has done more for the pro-life cause than a whole host of shrill pro-life activists who have strong rhetoric, but do not have the chance to make the impact that a governor does.

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Governor Scott Walker cuts wasteful spending on leftist university system

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I knew that the mountain of skulls of his enemies was real!
I knew that the mountain of skulls of his enemies was real!

This is from The Daily Caller. (H/T Scott)

It says:

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker is poised to win a huge victory on education as the state legislature passed a budget that repeals state tenure guarantees while also slashing the budget of the University of Wisconsin.

[…]The two-year, $73 billion budget approved Thursday makes a host of changes Walker has sought in the realm of education. Wisconsin’s school voucher program is expanded, and $250 million in funding is taken from the University of Wisconsin. That’s down from the $300 million cut Walker originally sought, but still a substantial haircut.

Bowing to the fait accompli, later on Thursday the University of Wisconsin approved its own budget, implementing the big cuts expected of it. About 400 positions will be laid off or will go unfilled, and the university’s budgets no money for pay hikes. The school’s situation is made tougher because the legislature has also frozen in-state tuition.

While academics have accused Walker of sabotaging the school’s competitiveness, Walker has refused to yield, arguing that professors should be teaching more classes.

[…]University of Wisconsin-Madison Chancellor Rebecca Blank sent a letter to Walker Friday begging him to veto the changes, saying they would drive away current and prospective faculty.

[…]Angry faculty have directed a great deal of venom toward Blank and the UW board of regents, accusing them of letting the tenure provisions pass by failing to make a loud protest.

Walker is expected to sign the budget by Monday, when he is scheduled to officially announce his presidential campaign.

Keep in mind that the angry faculty and the chancellor are all Democrats, so this is nothing but an attack on influential leftists – hitting them where they hurt. The pocketbook.

Universities are very far on the left, and – like big corporations, big unions, mainstream news media, trial lawyers, and Hollywood – they donate almost exclusively to Democrats:

Ivy League educators overwhelmingly supported President Obama with their campaign donations in the presidential election, reinforcing the suspicions of critics who say their bias also shows up in the classroom.

Some 96 percent of faculty and staffers at the eight universities who donated wrote their checks to Obama, and at Brown University, just one professor contributed to Mitt Romney’s bid, according to a study by student political advocacy group Campus Reform. In all, the employees of the prestigious schools sent more than $1.2 million to President Obama and just $114,166 for Romney’s campaign — a ratio of more than 10-to-1.

Think conservatives are welcome  on these leftists campuses?  About as welcome as Jews would be at a Nazi party rally.

Why is it important to do cur funding for a leftist university? It’s important because it is another step in Walker’s war on the left’s ability to give donations to Democrats. What Walker likes to do is go after the big leftist elites and take their money away and return it to the ordinary taxpayers who earned the money in the first place. This is the simple, low-key way of turning the Titanic around. Removing the influence of the left on politics by removing the money they have to influence politics. The advantage of this is that not only does it solve the fiscal problems that most Americans care about, but it also makes it harder for the left to push for more liberal laws and policies on social issues. They don’t have the money any more, the taxpayers have their money back.

Although some impatient Christians attach a lot of importance to people like Ted Cruz, who talk tough on social issues, but have never been able to move any legislation, I think we should be more interested in governors like Scott Walker and Bobby Jindal, who have had to work with legislatures to get the bills they want signed into law. Walker in particular is very good at appealing to moderates, independents and libertarians. He wins elections because he focuses on doing a good job for the middle class on financial issues. If you look a little deeper under the surface of his fiscal policies, you can see how his policies promote common sense conservative values and personal responsibility.

We need to favor people who win the tough battles and get things done in purple / blue states. No sense electing a conservative firebrand who loses in the general election because he has nothing to say to fiscal conservatives who also happen to be social liberals.

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How a Democrat district attorney terrorized conservatives in Wisconsin

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District attorney John Chisholm (left)
District attorney John Chisholm (left)

Would you like the police to break into your house at 4 AM and search it just because you are a conservative? Then order you to tell no one about the raid? That’s what happened in Wisconsin.

Religious liberty expert David French writes about it in National Review.

Excerpt:

It was still dark outside when “Jonah” (not his real name) heard the pounding on his front door. As luck would have it, he was awake — or mostly awake. He’d gotten up at 4:00 a.m. on October 3, 2013, to see his parents off to the airport. They were leaving on a quick trip to raise money for the children’s charity his father runs. Jonah was 16 at the time, old enough to stay home alone for a short time, but not old enough to deal with what awaited him on the other side of the door.

The pounding continued, and Jonah peered out the window to discover its source. To his horror, he saw uniformed officers, their guns drawn. “Police,” they yelled. “We have a warrant.” An officer shined a flashlight on a document Jonah couldn’t read. Unsure what to do, but unwilling to defy the authorities, he let them in.

The officers sat him down, read him the entire search warrant, and ordered him not to tell anyone about the raid — not even school officials. He asked if he could call his parents. They said no. He asked if he could call a lawyer. They said no.

Then, they proceeded to turn his house “upside down.”

[…]The pretense for the October raids was suspected “coordination” between various conservative organizations and Wisconsin governor Scott Walker’s campaign — activity that a trial court has held constituted nothing more than entirely legal “issue advocacy,” if it even occurred. Because they’d had the temerity to engage in this issue advocacy — constitutionally protected free speech — multiple conservative citizens were subjected to so-called John Doe proceedings by Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm, a Democrat.

[…]As a prominent Wisconsin conservative and political consultant, Jonah’s father was one of Chisholm’s targets.

Obviously, Jonah’s father’s career was negatively impacted when news of this raid got out. But even more interesting than the  professional damage was the psychological damage:

Even reliving the experience of the raid in an interview was difficult for Jonah. He has a “deep sense” that his home is no longer safe. His family lives in a rural part of their county, and cars — especially dark SUVs — approaching their driveway now cause him deep, immediate anxiety. His family used to be more politically active; now, they watch what they say. They used to be more trusting, especially of police; now, they assume the worst.

And his mother continues to be terrified by the thought of what could have happened in the raid.

“We’re so fortunate that he’s okay,” she says. “He could have been in the shower. They could have broken the door down. He could have been shot. Over politics.”

You know, we have all these stories of secular leftist regimes in the Soviet Union, Cambodia, Vietnam, China, etc. and we imagine to ourselves “well, that can’t happen here, because secular leftists are different here”. No they aren’t. They just have to operate within a legal framework that puts the brakes on what they’d really like to do to people who disagree with them. Historically speaking, the left does shoot people over politics. They have shot millions and millions of people over politics in the last 100 years. That is not my opinion, that’s the record of leftist political regimes in the 20th century. There is no right-wing regime that shoots people over politics – to be right-wing means to be for free enterprise, free speech, freedom of religion, marriage and family, right to life, private property, self-defense, and so on. People on the right value individuals, businesses and families. Conservatives oppose big secular government breaking down people’s doors at 4 AM, with guns drawn.

Previously, I blogged about some of Chisholm’s other victims. One of them has now filed a civil rights lawsuit against him, which is good news – although criminal charges would be better. And criminal charges would also be good for the IRS leaders who persecuted conservative groups just ahead of the 2012 election.

IRS Chief Fascist Lois Lerner
IRS Chief Fascist Lois Lerner

And there is actually more news about the IRS targeting of conservatives, from The Stream.

Excerpt:

Newly released documents show Department of Justice officials, Internal Revenue Service and Federal Bureau of Investigation officials were discussing prosecuting nonprofit organizations for allegedly engaging in illegal political activity.

An official “DOJ Recap” document obtained by the group Judicial Watch details an Oct. 8, 2010 meeting between DOJ, IRS and FBI officials, including Lois Lerner, where the administration employees discussed “several possible theories to bring criminal charges under FEC law” against groups “posing” as tax exempt nonprofits.

Those groups are, of course, the Tea Party groups – groups that could have affected the re-election of Barack Obama.

More:

Judicial Watch says another document shows that just prior to the October 2010 meeting the IRS began giving the FBI confidential taxpayer information on nonprofits. The document obtained by Judicial Watch says the IRS gave the FBI some 21 disks with 1.25 million pages of taxpayer records.

“These new documents show that the Obama IRS scandal is also an Obama DOJ and FBI scandal,” Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton said in a statement. “The FBI and Justice Department worked with Lois Lerner and the IRS to concoct some reason to put President Obama’s opponents in jail before his reelection. And this abuse resulted in the FBI’s illegally obtaining confidential taxpayer information. How can the Justice Department and FBI investigate the very scandal in which they are implicated?”

Does anyone in the leftist media care about this? Of course not. They like that government is criminalizing conservatives. They are 100% on board with it, and that’s why they cover it up.