On this date in 2014, 2015, 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, as well as 2020, “Crazy/Stupid Republican of the Day” published profiles of the U.S. House Representative from Wisconsin’s 6th Congressional District, Glenn Grothman, a man whose record on women’s issues as a state legislator is bad enough that he didn’t just vote against emergency contraception for rape victims so that they couldn’t avoid get pregnant, he has publicly gone on record to say that women who seek it out are “trained” to say they were raped so they could get the morning after pill. He also has spent a lot of time badmouthing Planned Parenthood, calling the organization “racist” at times, and at others accusing them of allowing pregnant women to have sex-selective abortions, and arguing against funding them because “as a guy” he didn’t think their services would do HIM any good. Grothman would also like to cancel Martin Luther King Day, called Kwanzaa “a fake holiday for black people”, and while he’s at it, has tried cancelling the weekend for workers. Grothman has pledged to cut all government assistance from others because “it’s a bribe to not work hard” and has encouraged his constituents to scrutinize people using food stamps in public to determine if they are “genuinely poor”.
Rounding out his delightful personality is his support for the anti-gay laws Uganda pushed forth, where the punishment for being gay is death, and that he feels the Obergefell v. Hodges ruling should not be honored because it would be disrespectful to the American Soldiers who gave their lives fighting for their deeply held religious beliefs in the Civil War (because that makes sense). Back in 2012, Grothman claimed that President Obama and Sen. Tammy Baldwin only won office in 2012 because of widespread voter fraud, so voting record in Wisconsin supported repeated measures on Voter ID In two consecurtive presidential elections now, Grothman straight up predicted Republican presidential candidate would have a better chance of winning Wisconsin because the Voter ID law was put into place, straight up admitting in April of 2016 that it would help stop Hillary Clinton (and sadly, he was proven correct).
Glenn Grothman has managed to weigh in on more issues in ways that we can only describe as inexplicably d***ish. In March of 2017, he went on a rant against college Pell Grants, arguing that they shouldn’t be funded because they, we s*** you not, “discourage marriages”. Don’t think about why attendance in college might discourage someone from settling down with a spouse too hard, because there is no statistic or logic behind Grothman’s stupid argument. But he was far from done… as the Supreme Court will be making a ruling in the Gill v. Whitford case, which is aimed at overturning an outrageous level of gerrymandering that was set up in Wisconsin several years back. And yet, Glenn Grothman is challenging that the Supreme Court shouldn’t have the authority to do that.
“I’m not sure there should be any restrictions whatsoever, because I don’t think it is the court’s business to draw lines. There are many rules right now — that the courts have laid out — that if you want your redistricting map approved you have to meet.”
Now, Grothman has made various insensitive racial comments through the years, and since we last updated his profile, he was asked about his feelings about Donald Trump’s “s***hole countries” remarks, and Grothman responded that it really wasn’t as offensive as things other presidents have done, like just for example, the time that Barack Obama met with the Reverend Al Sharpton:
“The past president brought Al Sharpton into the White House something like 80 times. That was kind of stunning to me, but nobody ever made a big ruckus out of it.”
Yes, Grothman just equated meeting with a civil rights leader with disparaging the entire African continent and Haiti as a “s***hole”. Making it worse? His comments came, of on all days… Martin Luther King Day.
Glenn Grothman withered in front of a town hall back in his home district in April 2017, and when faced with outrage over an attempted “Repeal and Replace” plan for the Affordable Care Act, straight up lied to his constituents and claimed that it would still cover pre-existing conditions (See Above, it didn’t). He was also his usually abrasively conservative self, acknowledging he supports a highly expensive but almost certainly ineffective border wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, lying by claiming that Planned Parenthood is the “biggest abortion provider in the country,” and took time to s*** on the country’s welfare system, falsely claiming that it “discourages” work and marriage.
The +8 Republican lean of Wisconsin’s 6th Congressional District was enough to see Glenn Grothman was re-elected to a third term in 2020 with 59% of the vote. Do you think he has a large swath of partisan votes that he’s made? You bet your ass he has:
- December 3rd, 2019: Rep. Grothman votes against a resolution to disallow Russia from re-entering the G7 and makes it the G8 until it leaves Ukraine.
- December 18th, 2019: Grothman ignores his Congressional duty to hold a president who has been proven to commit high crimes and misdemeanors accountable and votes against the first impeachment of Donald Trump.
- May 15th, 2020: Grothman votes against the HEROES Act, to further support the healthcare industry and citizens affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.
- January 13th, 2021: Rep. Grothman 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: Glenn Grothman 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: Grothman votes against HR 5, the latest version of the Equality Act, that would provide workplace protections for LGBTQ Americans.
- March 3rd, 2021: Rep. Grothman 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: Glenn Grothman votes against the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021.
- March 10th, 2021: Grothman 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. Grothman 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. Grothman votes against HR 3233, the creation of a commission to investigate the Capitol Attack.
Grothman has been doing the political calculus and seems to think that eliminating all of the social safety net for all Americans isn’t a winning formula for him, so instead, he’s specifically attacking the social safety net that’s available for immigrants, who he has also been demonizing in discussions about the U.S./Mexico border. He’s always had a white nationalist bent in who he makes the targets of his rhetoric, so this stance tracks with his overall brand of being an ***hole.
Of course, the big campaign issue in 2020 was Covid-19, and on that, Grothman almost certainly didn’t do himself any favors, turning up maskless at the Wisconsin GOP convention in July 2020, and while speaking, going into a savage coughing fit that sent respiratory droplets into the crowd. He insisted he was never sick, and it was just “a dry throat”, but with all the other evidence turning up right now, the more likely thing is that he just doesn’t care if he spreads Covid-19 or any other disease to anyone else.