For women, the Montana Senate race between Democratic incumbent Senator Jon Tester and Republican Congressman Denny Rehberg is important and features a clash between two different views on choice. Tester is pro-choice and Rehberg is anti-choice and wants to destroy Planned Parenthood. Senator Tester has made stances that have annoyed me(and made Kos angry) but Tester has also made the right stances on a number of issues too. It goes without saying that Rehberg would make all the wrong choices.
Now that Willard Mitt Romney has endorsed Rehberg by appearing in an ad for him, we know for sure that Romney was serious when he said that now-infamous quote on Planned Parenthood.
"Of course you get rid of Obamacare, that's the easy one, but there are others," he said. "Planned Parenthood, we're going to get rid of that."
Congressman Rehberg in July
introduced a bill that would have restricted women's access to birth control and would have pulled all federal funding from Planned Parenthood.
From ThinkProgress: (emphasis is Think Progress's
The legislation also states that none of its funds can be used to carry out the Title X family planning program or be used to “implement, administer, enforce, or further the provisions” of the Affordable Care Act.
The bill scraps the provision in Obamacare that requires insurance plans to cover birth control and other preventative health services, allowing any issuer or sponsor of a group health insurance plan to refuse to cover any health care service “on the basis of religious beliefs or moral convictions.” It also increases restrictions on educating abortion physicians beyond current law and allocates $20 million for “competitive grants to provide abstinence education to adolescents.”
Of course, I would consider that Rehberg has a long history of being awful on health care issues, considering that he once said this:
In the Dec. 26, 1994, issue of Newsweek, then Lt. Governor Rehberg was quoted as saying "The problem with AIDS is: you got it, you die. So why are we spending money on the issue?" when discussing cuts to the state's hospital budget
More on the very bad positions of Rehberg and the good and bad of Jon Tester is below the Fleur-de-Kos
Since his election in 2006, Jon Tester has had a very mixed record as a Senator. The biggest weaknesses to his record(to progressives not necessarily to Montanans) are his anti-immigrant record(Tester voted No to the DREAM Act) and his weak LGBT record(opposes marriage equality but wouldn't pursue a Constitutional Amendment. Voted to repeal DADT to his credit), and a spotty environmental record(voted for the Keystone XL pipeline, opposed using reconciliation to pass cap and trade)
One area where Tester is strong is on health care. He voted for Obamacare, wanted prescription negotiation for Medicare and would have supported a public option
Jon Tester is also as I mentioned pro-choice. He has an 100% rating from NARAL. He has also been for stem cell research.
Denny Rehberg in addition to his stated record on being anti-Planned Parenthood also has a very homophobic voting record. Think Progress has a really great paragraph that details some of Rehberg's lowlights:
Rehberg has consistently fought against marriage equality and even domestic partnership benefits for same-sex couples.
In his Senate campaign kickoff, he told supporters: “I will never, ever, ever be ashamed to stand for the life of the unborn child and the sanctity of traditional marriage.” He has indeed shown no shame, voting twice for a federal constitutional amendment requiring “marriage in the United States shall consist only of the union of a man and a woman.” He also voted for a 2011 amendment reaffirming the unconstitutional Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), a 2007 amendment restricting the District of Columbia government from using any federal funding to provide domestic partnership benefits, and a 2004 bill of questionable constitutionality to strip federal courts of the right to review whether DOMA is unconstitutional. In May, he reiterated his support also for his state’s same-sex marriage ban, saying “Montana’s state constitution says ‘Only a marriage between one man and one woman shall be valid or recognized as a marriage in this state,’ and I agree.”
Rehberg has also voted no to
hate crime bills and has consistently voted no to ENDA.
NARAL has given Rehberg a 0% ratingand it's not hard to see why.
And this is more of a personal pet peeve(My sister would be up in arms if she knew about this): Rehberg introduced two billsthat would have led to wolves being wiped out in this country. From TreeHugger:
In what wildlife conservationists are calling a dangerously unprecedented move, Montana Representative Denny Rehberg introduced two separate bills aimed at removing wolves from the endangered species list. This would enable the wolves to be hunted at will across the country -- and biologists say that it could "set the stage for nationwide wolf eradication."
We are 5 days from the election, and Montana faces a choice between a Democrat who represents them or a Republican who would advance the War on Women, would make sure to make life miserable for the LGBT community and would be another vote for the Party of No. I hope that Montana makes the right choice.
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For those in Montana, early voting info