On this date in both 2019, as well as 2020, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” published its first profile of the U.S. House Representative from Florida’s 12th Congressional District, Gus Bilrakis, who has held office since 2006, jumping in to be a legacy and take over where his father Michael Bilirakis to serve three terms in Florida’s 9th Congressional District before jumping to the 12th District from 2013 to the present. Prior to that, Bilrakis served in the Florida House of Representatives for four terms from 1999-2007.
Now, part of how Gus Bilirakis caught our attention was the day he hosted a women’s summit, that featured an agenda with key topics such as “weight loss” and “gardening” that are relevant to their interests. Perhaps that has a lot to do with why Bilirakis has a long, long history of voting against women’s issues, not just his pathological series of anti-choice votes, but the fact that he’s voted against every equal pay bill that’s come across his path the entire time he’s been in Congress.
Bilirakis is also a climate change denialist to the extend that he defended Donald Trump’s hair-brained decision to pull out of the Paris climate accords, and did so by citing a highly flawed study that claimed 2.7 million jobs would be lost if the United States honored the agreement.
But what troubled us the most as we dug deeper into recent statements by Gus Bilirakis was his town hall in February of 2017. His constituents were highly alarmed that the GOP-controlled Congress and Trump administration might move to repeal the Affordable Care Act, and leave tens of millions stripped of their health insurance. So what was Bilirakis’ response? He decided to begin babbling about “death panels”. Y’know, the same “death panels” that Republicans fear-mongered about in 2009 and 2010 to fear-monger about the Affordable Care Act that NEVER CAME TO BE when the law got passed. The same “death panels” that were named Politifact’s “Lie of the Year” eight years earlier. And for that, Bilirakis was booed out of his own town hall.
Florida’s 12th Congressional District has a +8 Republican lean in the Cook Partisan Voting Index, and on election day, Bilirakis got 63% of the vote and retained his seat for another two years. Over the past few years in office, Bilrakis’ voting record looked a little like this:
- December 3rd, 2019: Rep. Bilirakis is one of 71 Republicans who votes against a resolution to disallow Russia from re-entering the G7 and makes it the G8 until it leaves Ukraine.
- December 18th, 2019: Bilirakis ignores his Congressional duty to hold a president who has been proven to commit high crimes and misdemeanors accountable and votes against the impeachment of Donald Trump.
- May 15th, 2020: Bilirakis votes against the HEROES Act, to further support the healthcare industry and citizens affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.
- December 10th, 2020: Bilirakis signs his name to an amicus brief to the Supreme Court, begging them to overturn the results of the 2020 election. The same election that he won re-election in.
- January 7th, 2021: Gus Bilirakis votes for the objection to the electoral college’s votes in the 2020 election, a failure to send any sort of message that he wasn’t intimidated or sympathetic to those who attacked the Capitol to attempt a violent coup.
- January 13th, 2021: Rep. Bilirakis votes against the second impeachment of Donald Trump, because the Republican Party no longer feels like they should be accountable for anything, including failed coups that result in the deaths of both their participants and police officers.
- February 4th, 2021: Gus Bilirakis votes to keep Marjorie Taylor Greene’s committee assignments, because he wouldn’t want her to be accountable for all the bigoted remarks and conspiracy theories she’s spread online (probably because she’s a kindred spirit).
- February 25th, 2021: Bilirakis votes against HR 5, the latest version of the Equality Act, that would provide workplace protections for LGBTQ Americans.
- March 3rd, 2021: Rep. Bilirakis votes against HR 1, a bill created to prevent the corruption of money in politics, and protect voter access to the ballot box.
- March 3rd, 2021: Gus Bilirakis votes against the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021.
- March 10th, 2021: Bilirakis votes against the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, because he feels people deserve to die in poverty during a pandemic.
- March 17th, 2021: Rep. Bilirakis votes against the re-authorization of the Violence Against Women Act, likely because they feel the 2nd Amendment remaining absolute is more important than preventing people with a history of domestic abuse from owning a firearm (which statistics show, makes them more likely to use those firearms against women in their lives).
- May 19th, 2021: Rep. Bilirakis votes against HR 3233, the creation of a commission to investigate the Capitol Attack.
- May 20th, 2021: Bilirakis is one of 63 Republicans who vote against the Covid-19 Hate Crimes Act.
-
Bilirakis is currently adopting white nationalist talking points for his own, claiming there are “caravans” of illegal immigrants always headed to the U.S. border, just like Republicans seem to about every two years for political convenience while neglecting to point out that in the first two weeks alone, the caravan dwindled to 1/3 its size because of the action of Mexican authorities. A convenient little lie by omission, that.
One Year Ago, November 10th, 2020: Gus Bilirakis (FL)… 2020 Update
Two Years Ago, November 10th, 2019: Gus Bilirakis (FL)… Original Profile
Three Years Ago, November 10th, 2018: Dennis Richardson (OR)… 2018 Update
Four Years Ago, November 10th, 2017: Dennis Richardson (OR)… Original Profile
Five Years Ago, November 10th, 2016: Ben Carson (MD)… 2016 Update
Six Years Ago, November 10th, 2015: Ben Carson (MD)… 2015 Update
Seven Years Ago, November 10th, 2014: Ben Carson (MD)… Original Profile