All information below this paragraph is obsolete, having been superseded by updated information accurate as of mid-October 2010, which can be accessed by clicking here.
Here we continue our information about candidates (find State & Federal candidates' information here: http://coloradorighttolife.blogspot.com/2010/05/colorado-state-federal-candidate.html). This information supersedes all previous information (we had published updates in March and April), and includes everything we have to date.
If a candidate you know isn't on this list, please ask them to return their survey, which can be found here: http://www.coloradorighttolife.org/candidate-survey .
The introduction, where we explain Colorado Right to Life's stance and why we are so "hard on candidates" (it's called holding them accountable) is in the other post, linked above. Here's a brief synopsis:
Colorado Right to Life pulls no punches -- if we have doubts about a candidate's sincerity, we'll tell you. The old definition of "pro-life" won't work. Personhood is the new definition -- a Right to Life from the beginning of biological development until natural death. No exceptions for rape or incest (if you have a Right to Life, it is inviolable). We also ask candidates not to "regulate" abortion, because a regulation implies a "right" to do whatever is being regulated (i.e. abortion). Candidates and legislators have been slow to adapt to these new definitions and stands, but they are definitely changing.
Personhood has been an issue in Colorado for only 2 years now -- it was first on the ballot in 2008, and is again on the ballot in 2010 (as Amendment 62 -- plus, it will soon be on the ballot in other states also, such as Mississippi in 2011). Don't accept a candidate who self-identifies as pro-life but who won't support Personhood, or won't respond to the Colorado Right to Life Candidate Survey. Someone who says they are pro-life but they have exceptions, or aren't willing to enact their pro-life principles in law are "pro-abortion with exceptions." Personhood IS the Right to Life -- someone who does not support Personhood does not support recognizing a God-given Right to Life in law!
We do not assume any candidate is pro-life unless they've responded to our candidate survey, or we have some other reason to trust their positions are sincere. CRTL does not officially endorse candidates for any office, but we will let you know which ones are NOT pro-life, and try to offer guidance on the rest. Please, NEVER assume a candidate is pro-life because of their party affiliation! CRTL does not support candidates from any particular political party -- if a candidate from the Constitution Party or even the Democrat Party is pro-life, we will let you know. We do not ever recommend voting for the "lesser of two evils" because we stand on very important principles which we will not compromise for purposes of political expediency.
Personhood -- support for the God-given Right to Life from the beginning of a human's biological development until natural death -- is CRTL's only real standard for judging a candidate's qualifications, though we do challenge candidates on several questions which relate closely to Personhood but which may be considered separate issues.
A final note: Because of our principled stand, many of our past financial supporters consider us extreme. If you appreciate our uncompromising principles in favor of a real, God-given Right to Life for all Persons, no exceptions, please consider supporting us financially. Most organizations do not hold to their principles because it's not profitable. That's not a reasonable excuse, and we will not follow, but there are consequences for standing up for what's right. Donations can be accepted here: http://www.coloradorighttolife.org/donate
Colorado State Senate Candidates
State Senate District 1
Sen. Greg Brophy (R) has a strong record of supporting Personhood (though like many current pro-life officeholders, he also supports regulating abortion -- we will continue efforts to change his mind). He has not returned his CRTL survey, but we hope someone will remind him.
State Senate District 2
Republican candidate Kevin Grantham has responded to our survey, answering 7 of 7 questions correctly! He also advertises his pro-life values on his website (many lukewarm candidates won't do this), citing a pro-Personhood "life at fertilization" standard.
Grantham faces primary opponents, but we have not heard from them.
State Senate District 3
Republican candidate Alexander Lucero-Mugatu has responded to our survey, responding correctly to 6 of 7 questions. His response to question #2, on rape & incest exceptions, makes us think he does not necessarily support prohibiting abortion for rape or incest (which undermines the Personhood of the unborn child), but we will work with him on these apparent exceptions. For now, it remains a red flag, and we hope that a supporter will be able to speak with him about this.
Mugatu faces a Republican primary, but we have not heard from his opponents.
State Senate District 5
Republican candidate Wayne Wolf has responded to our survey with 7 of 7 questions answered correctly! He did indicate a possible exception for certain regulations, but it sounds like he is very close to our position, and we can work with him on defining specifics.
Wolf faces a Republican primary, but we have not heard from his opponent.
State Senate District 6
Rep. Ellen Roberts (R) is a pro-abortion Republican who was the lowest scoring Republican in the 2007-08 CRTL Legislative Scorecard, having supported pro-abortion positions on a number of occasions, and even cosponsoring legislation requiring even pro-life medical personnel to promote "emergency contraception" like RU 486 or Plan B -- strong chemical abortifacients meant to kill a developing unborn child. Several Democrats were considered more pro-life than her.
However, Republican Dean Boehler entered the race as a conservative, pro-life challenger. He answered 7 of 7 of CRTL's questions correctly in our candidate survey, and we consider him 100% pro-life.
Democrat Bruce Whitehead is unknown to us, but is assumed to be pro-abortion.
State Senate District 7
Rep. Steve King (R) voted in favor of "emergency contraception" (i.e. abortifacient pills intended to kill an already-concieved human child) in 2007. It's his only black mark we're aware of (we have not yet calculated the 2009-10 legislative scorecard), but this is obviously of serious concern. He has not responded to our survey, and we are unaware of whether he claims to be pro-life or not.
We have not heard from Democrat Claudette Konola, but she is assumed to be pro-abortion.
State Senate District 9
This district features a primary contest between two Republicans of decidedly opposite persuasions.
Rep. Kent Lambert (R) is running for Sen. Schultheis’ senate seat. Lambert is one of the strongest pro-life votes in the legislature, and is pro-Personhood. Sadly he, along with all other current pro-life legislative officeholders, is still supporting regulations, but we hope he will change his mind if he wins this seat. We are hopeful.
His Republican primary opponent, Thomas McDowell’s, only reason to run seems to be that he has a chip on his shoulder about pro-life legislators like Lambert and Schultheis, and he’s made opposition to Christians and socially conservative positions a centerpiece of his campaign. McDowell is petitioning onto the ballot.
We are not familiar with Democrat Nick Werle, and in Colorado Springs we can't necessarily predict his stands.
State Senate District 11
We have tried to reach the candidates in this district -- Republican Owen Hill and Rep. John Morse -- but haven't heard from them. Morse has a pro-abortion record in the legislature. If you know Owen Hill, please have him contact us.
State Senate District 13
Sen. Scott Renfroe (R) is running for re-election. We believe Renfroe is the only current legislator who has run an actual pro-Personhood bill. Renfroe is very supportive of Personhood, and even took time from his busy day to oversee the petitions being turned in to the Sec. State’s office in 2008. Pro-life issues are central to his political philosophy.
We do not know anything about Democrat Ken Storck, but presume he is pro-abortion.
State Senate District 15
Two Republicans and two Democrats are running for this seat.
Rep. Kevin Lundberg (R) is known as a strong leader of Colorado’s pro-life contingent in the legislature. Again, he’s not yet renounced regulations, but in 2008 he was honest about his continuing support for regulations, but also strongly supported Personhood. We remain hopeful that he will change his mind about regulations. He answered correctly on 6 of 7 questions (i.e. except for regulations) in 2008, and we’re waiting to hear from him on his 2010 survey.
A Republican primary challenger is Torsten Eckstein, who has not responded and we know nothing about.
The Democrat Richard Ball is unknown to us, but we assume is pro-abortion.
State Senate District 16
Two Republicans and two Democrats are running for this seat also.
One of the Republican candidates is former CRTL board member Tim Leonard, who has also run for Governor previously on the Constitution Party ticket. In the past, Leonard has supported Personhood. We hope that he will continue to do so. We still await his candidate survey responses, however.
His primary opponent is Mark Hurlbert, Boulder DA.
Democrat Jeanne Nicholson is unknown to us, but is presumed to be pro-abortion.
State Senate District 20
Rep. Cheri Jahn (D) and her primary opponent Jonathan Ruchman have not responded to surveys. Jahn has a pro-abortion voting record.
We have not heard from their Republican challenger, John Odom.
State Senate District 22
Sen. Mike Kopp (R) supports Personhood and is 100% pro-life. He's part of the Republican Party leadership, and we're excited to see where he will take the legislature in coming years. We have not received his survey, but we have no doubts he is strongly pro-Personhood.
State Senate District 24
We have not heard from Republican Luis Alvarez. His Democrat opponent, Sen. Lois Tochtrop has a pro-abortion voting record.
State Senate District 30
Sen. Ted Harvey (R) supports Personhood, but also supports regulations. We hope to work with him in the coming year on that issue.
State Senate District 32
Sen. Chris Romer (D) has a pro-abortion voting record. We have not heard from his Republican challenger, Tyler Kolden.
State Senate District 34
We have not heard from the two Democrat candidates, Lucia Guzman or Rep. Joel Judd (D), though Judd has a pro-abortion voting record.
We also have not heard from Republican Derec Shuler, though his website indicates the government should stay out of our lives "especially our personal lives", which is usually code for pro-choice (i.e. pro-abortion).
Almost all of these candidates have been sent e-mails at least once, many of them twice. We've also checked most of their websites. There may be other senate candidates whose websites indicate a pro-life or pro-Personhood position. If you have information on a candidate, please let us know by e-mailing office@coloradorighttolife.org.
Colorado State House Candidates
We will only highlight a district if we have something useful to say. Some districts are currently uncontested, for instance, but if they've returned a survey we will list them. It can normally be assumed Democrats are pro-abortion unless stated otherwise. It cannot be assumed Republicans are pro-life -- many Republicans are not, and even many who claim to be support abortion in many cases. Our assumption is that if a candidate who has received our survey (every Republican should have gotten an e-mail unless they announced late, and many Democrats have too) has not returned it, they are not pro-life (i.e. they're hiding something). State House candidates are not famous for returning surveys, partly because they have small/no staff, and partly because they're usually advised not to return surveys (more experienced candidates know that sometimes exceptions should be made). But we also assume that if they were pro-life, one of their supporters or campaign volunteers would have mentioned they weren't on our list, and asked them to return the survey. Those who are still "no response" after 3 months of trying are "conspicuously absent."
State House District 3
We have not heard from either Daniel Kagan (D) or Christine Mastin (R), though both have been sent our survey. This is a City of Denver district, but is more conservative than most of the city, and Republicans have held this seat before. Mastin is a Tea Party associate, and is "fans" of some pro-life people on Facebook. Can we take that as an indicator she's pro-life? No, but it leaves the possibility open. Please let us know if you know more.
State House District 5
We had previously noted that JJ Swiontek, one of our 2008 "7 of 7" pro-Personhood respondents, had switched parties and was running in the Democrat primary. Unsure of how his stand might have changed during his conversion, but he is apparently no longer running -- perhaps he was eliminated during an assembly.
The remaining Democrats, Mark Thrun and Crisanta Duran, are unknown to us, as is the Republican Ronnie Nelson.
State House District 14
Dr. Janak Joshi is the Republican candidate for this seat. His website indicates that he is pro-life because he is a doctor – if only more doctors felt that way!
We have no information as to whether he supports the Personhood Initiative. If you have information, we would welcome your help. Also, please encourage him to return his CRTL candidate survey so we can establish his positions for sure.
State House District 15
Rep. Mark Waller (R) is running for re-election. In the 2008 race his pro-life credentials were not very well established (his opponent in the primary was pro-Personhood), but he claims to be pro-life. He seems ambivalent about the Personhood Initiative, and we have no reason to believe he is now supportive, or ever will support it.
Please encourage Rep. Waller to return his CRTL survey, and to support the Personhood Initiative (Amendment 62).
State House District 16
Democrat Janet Tanner is assumed to be pro-abortion, though in Colorado Springs districts that cannot necessarily be assumed.
Incumbent Rep. Larry Liston (R) has a record of voting pro-life, though he was one of our "rogue" Republicans who for some reason supported the 2007 bill on "emergency contraception" (which can kill a child on her 1st, 2nd or 3rd day of development). We are concerned about that vote, which we'd love an explanation for.
State House District 17
Republican Mark Barker has signed the Personhood petition, supports Personhood, and regards it as one of the most important principles to be upheld by an officeholder. He defeated a pro-abortion opponent, Kit Roupe, at the recent assembly.
We do not yet have Barker’s candidate survey (he has not had much time to respond), but we expect to get a favorable reply back soon. Please encourage him to return the survey when he can.
Democrat Rep. Dennis Apuan is known to be pro-abortion.
State House District 18
Republican candidate Karen Cullen seemed unfamiliar with pro-life concepts, and didn’t exactly jump to call herself pro-life when quizzed at a candidate forum several weeks ago. She flatly refused to support the Personhood Initiative (a Constitutional amendment) because she believes in “a clean Constitution."
It is possible that she was entirely misunderstood, and she may believe she is pro-life. If so, it is important that she establish this by returning her candidate survey. Also, we hope that she will be open to dialogue, and will realize the relative moral importance of maintaining a “clean Constitution” versus saving the lives of tens of thousands of unborn children who are being murdered. Perhaps some people who know her can talk her into changing her mind!
State House District 28
Rep. Jim Kerr (R) is running for re-election. He has always called himself pro-life, and seems to have been sincere in meaning well. While CRTL has been concerned that he was not strongly pro-life in the past, and he did also support the 2007 “emergency contraception” legislation, we are encouraged to note that he signed the 2010 Personhood Initiative petition (one of at least 4 legislators to join the 2010 effort who did not publicly support the 2008 effort!) which seems to indicate he has shifted to be more solidly pro-life. Please pray for Jim and his stance on these issues, and encourage him to return his CRTL candidate survey.
Democrat Steve Harvey is assumed to be pro-abortion.
State House District 32
Kaarl Hoopes (R) has signed the Personhood Initiative petition, and appears to be very strongly pro-life. He defeated a pro-abortion opponent at the assembly, Andrew Goad.
Please encourage Kaarl to return his candidate survey when he can.
State House District 35
Republican candidate Edgar Antillon indicated he would be responding to our survey, but he never did. We're not quite sure how to read that. He says he is pro-life, but we cannot confirm whether he's a "casual pro-lifer" or a serious pro-lifer without his responses. Please encourage Antillon to return his survey!
State House District 43
While incumbent Rep. Frank McNulty has not returned his candidate survey, he has told a supporter he does support Personhood. Please encourage him to return his survey!
Democrat Gary Semro is assumed to be pro-abortion.
State House District 44
Republican Chris Holbert quickly returned his survey with “7 of 7” pro-Personhood answers marked. We consider him one of the most strongly pro-life candidates in this race, and despite his tough primary race he took time to attend a legislative/candidates breakfast with CRTL. We appreciate his strong stance and his deep commitment.
Two Republicans are opposing him in the primary -- David Casiano and Polly Lawrence -- neither of which has responded to our survey. Lawrence talks about alot of issues on her website, for instance, but not abortion. We have no reason to believe either is pro-life, and we're sure if they are someone will tell us. We've made a second attempt to contact them.
State House District 46
The only Republican running in this district is Steven Rodriguez, who quickly answered CRTL’s survey with a “7 of 7” pro-Personhood response.
Democrat Sal Pace is assumed to be pro-abortion.
State House District 49
Rep. BJ Nikkel (R) is running for election to a seat she was appointed to mid-term – 1 year ago. She is one of the “new faces” on the steps of the Capitol at pro-life events, and she is supporting Personhood. We haven’t received her survey yet, but we’re hopeful that she will develop into a strong pro-life leader.
Democrat Karen Stockley is assumed to be pro-abortion.
State House District 54
There are no fewer than 4 Republicans running in this race -- David (Larry?) Cox, Robert Hislop, Duncan McArthur & Ray Scott. They've all been e-mailed if they had available contact information. Surely at least one of these guys is pro-life, but we don't know. Does anyone know them???
State House District 57
Republican candidate Randy Baumgardner responded to our survey, answering 6 of 7 questions correctly (he may have missed question #2 on rape/incest exceptions, or he might have avoided answering -- we're following up to find out for sure).
State House District 65
Rep. Jerry Sonnenberg (R) is running for re-election, so far unopposed. He is another of the strongly pro-life legislators who is pro-Personhood. We haven't gotten a survey from him this year, but he did respond "7 of 7" as 100% pro-life. He's also attended CRTL events, and we have no doubt of his sincerity.
Remember – because CRTL believes “pro-life” regulatory measures promote the impression that abortion is approved by the state, and may have unintended consequences which could support abortion and undermine the concept of a Right to Life, CRTL does not believe “pro-regulation” legislators fully understand the Personhood concept, though we still believe they are sincere and well-meaning in their pro-life convictions.
There may be other house candidates whose websites indicate a pro-life or pro-Personhood position. We have not had much time to research this, as we’ve been focused on the ballot initiative signature gathering process. If you have information on a candidate, please let us know by e-mailing office@coloradorighttolife.org.
If you have any questions about this information -- or if you have information to add -- please contact Donna at Colorado Right to Life (303-753-9394) or at office@coloradoRTL.org. Please don't be angry with her, if that's why you're calling, because she didn't collect or post this information. We are very interested in correcting any errors of fact or judgment on these pages, so please help us make this as correct as it can be (we will require verification of some type if your information contradicts the information we have).
Wednesday, May 19, 2010
Monday, May 17, 2010
Colorado State & Federal Candidate Positions & Survey Responses - May 2010
This blog post is obsolete, having been superseded by information updated to mid-October 2010, which can be accessed by clicking here.
***UPDATE: Please Note (July 21): In just a few days, we will be updating some of this information on candidates, including Ken Buck (positive information), Dan Maes (positive information), Scott McInnis (negative information), Ryan Frazier (negative information) and Scott Tipton (negative information). Please hold onto your ballots for just a few days to see this new information in case it might affect your vote. In short, not every candidate who claims to be pro-life has been telling the whole story.***
This is a comprehensive list of all the information Colorado Right to Life has about the candidates running for office in the Colorado Caucus, Assembly & Primary season. We had published two previous releases of information on the candidates, in March and in April. The useful, updated information from both is included here, and we ask that you please consider this to supersede any older material.
If you're coming to the Colorado State Republican Assembly Saturday, or to any of the Congressional or legislative assemblies on Friday, please stop by our Personhood booth! We will also have representatives at the Sarah Palin event this weekend.
A brief, necessary introduction:
Colorado Right to Life pulls no punches -- if we have doubts about a candidate's sincerity, we'll tell you. The old definition of "pro-life" won't work. Personhood is the new definition -- a Right to Life from the beginning of biological development until natural death. No exceptions for rape or incest (if you have a Right to Life, it is inviolable). We also ask candidates not to "regulate" abortion, because a regulation implies a "right" to do whatever is being regulated (i.e. abortion). Candidates and legislators have been slow to adapt to these new definitions and stands, but they are definitely changing. Here are the questions they were asked in our survey: http://www.coloradorighttolife.org/candidate-survey (at the bottom is also an explanation of our anti-regulation position, as well as a policy statement on "life of the mother" exceptions).
Personhood has been an issue in Colorado for only 2 years now -- it was first on the ballot in 2008, and is again on the ballot in 2010 (as Amendment 62 -- plus, it will soon be on the ballot in other states also, such as Mississippi in 2011). Don't accept a candidate who self-identifies as pro-life but who won't support Personhood, or won't respond to the Colorado Right to Life Candidate Survey. Someone who says they are pro-life but they have exceptions, or aren't willing to enact their pro-life principles in law are "pro-abortion with exceptions." Personhood IS the Right to Life -- someone who does not support Personhood does not support recognizing a God-given Right to Life in law!
In 2008, most major candidates were unwilling to take a stand on Personhood. It's possible that Bob Schaffer, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate, lost because he did not endorse Personhood, and many voters did not consider him sufficiently pro-life. By contrast, in 2010, every credible Republican candidate for top statewide offices has said they support Personhood, and most of the credible Republican candidates for U.S. Senate and Congress have also expressed support for Personhood. Source: http://www.gjsentinel.com/news/articles/prolife_measures_support_reviv
While we are excited that all these candidates support Personhood publicly, we question the sincerity of some, who may only be endorsing Personhood for reasons of political expediency (to avoid Schaffer's fate, perhaps?). Candidate Ali Hasan, for instance, encourages support for Personhood, and uses that as a reason people should vote for him and his principles. However, Hasan does not actually support the concept of Personhood -- he supports killing some children by abortion, for a variety of reasons, and may even support abortion until the 6th month of pregnancy!
Former Congressman Scott McInnis was formerly a ranking member of Republicans for Choice (a pro-abortion Republican group), and is known to have opposed pro-life measures and supported pro-abortion measures (even public funding) in the past. He says he has "changed his mind," but he was slow to endorse Personhood, and has made no firm pledges to do more than cut off public funding and end Partial Birth Abortion. We are naturally suspicious, but if he is really a convert we hope to see real commitments from him. Until then, Colorado Right to Life naturally prefers voters to support candidates who are known to have made solid pro-life statements or commitments (like responding to our survey).
We do not assume any candidate is pro-life unless they've responded to our candidate survey, or we have some other reason to trust their positions are sincere. CRTL does not officially endorse candidates for any office, but we will let you know which ones are NOT pro-life, and try to offer guidance on the rest. Please, NEVER assume a candidate is pro-life because of their party affiliation! CRTL does not support candidates from any particular political party -- if a candidate from the Constitution Party or even the Democrat Party is pro-life, we will let you know. We do not ever recommend voting for the "lesser of two evils" because we stand on very important principles which we will not compromise for purposes of political expediency.
Personhood -- support for the God-given Right to Life from the beginning of a human's biological development until natural death -- is CRTL's only real standard for judging a candidate's qualifications, though we do challenge candidates on several questions which relate closely to Personhood but which may be considered separate issues.
A final note: Because of our principled stand, many of our past financial supporters consider us extreme. If you appreciate our uncompromising principles in favor of a real, God-given Right to Life for all Persons, no exceptions, please consider supporting us financially. Most organizations do not hold to their principles because it's not profitable. That's not a reasonable excuse, and we will not follow, but there are consequences for standing up for what's right. Donations can be accepted here: http://www.coloradorighttolife.org/donate
Here is what we know about the candidates running for office in Colorado. We cannot assume that a candidate is not pro-life just because they haven't responded to our survey, but we really don't know for sure. We are suspicious of any candidate who does not respond to our survey, and we hope you will be too. Encourage them to respond to the survey and refuse to support them if they don't. Our Survey has 7 questions, and response to 6 or 7 questions correctly (depending which ones) tell us that we're working with someone who has tremendous potential to be a leader, and who is close to being consistent on the God-given Right to Life. Though we have hesitations about candidates who respond to the "regulation" question incorrectly (because these candidates are willing to support "bad law" that will entrench the concept of abortion "rights" in this country despite the intent being to limit abortion), we will continue to work with them to explain the full Personhood concept and why "exceptions" and "regulations" were the cited reason for Roe v. Wade in the first place.
We have made serious efforts to reach most candidates for major offices, and if they have not responded that probably means they've ignored at least two attempts to contact them. Legislative candidates have all been e-mailed at least once, unless we had reason to believe they were pro-abortion.
U.S. Senate
Michael Bennet (D) is clearly pro-abortion, supports federal funding, Obama's health care, etc.
Andrew Romanoff (D) is also pro-abortion, supports Obama's health care, etc.
Republican Ken Buck is a credible candidate we consider very strongly pro-life and pro-Personhood, based on conversations with him. He is on record supporting Personhood, though we have not received his candidate questionnaire.
Republican Jane Norton has supported "abortion exceptions" in the past (i.e. for rape & incest, which is from our perspective "pro-abortion with exceptions"), and for some time refused to support Personhood. She was scheduled to meet with someone about Personhood, but the meeting hasn't happened yet despite every effort. However, she has apparently endorsed Personhood recently, along with the other Republican candidates for U.S. Senate. Questions to her campaign to confirm this went unanswered, and she has not responded to our survey, sent by certified letter, and she's had enough time to respond.
Again, we must question Jane Norton's sincerity on this issue, because she has seemed more reluctant than willing. She did participate in Gov. Owens' cutoff of Planned Parenthood from state funding, and we applaud her actions on that (as a cabinet member). She also is rumored to soon be endorsed by Sarah Palin, though that's certainly no indicator of pro-life status (Palin also endorsed John McCain against a pro-life opponent, despite McCain's long checkered history of occasional support for abortion and continued support for embryonic destruction, which Palin joined in endorsing).
Republican Cleve Tidwell has responded to our survey, and answered correctly on 7 of 7 questions -- he is strongly pro-Personhood. His responses to some other surveys were not as solid, but we believe he is sincere. He took the initiative to respond quickly to our survey, and we appreciate that he was our first respondent.
Tom Wiens (R) has traditionally been a pro-life legislator, and had promised to respond to our survey, but we haven't received it yet after a couple months of trying. He is petitioning onto the ballot, so will not be a candidate at the Assembly.
We do not have information on Maclyn Stringer, or John Finger, the two Libertarian Party candidates. Libertarians normally support abortion, but not always.
Governor
John Hickenlooper (D) is known to be pro-abortion.
Scott McInnis (R - Former Congressman) is the establishment candidate who the GOP thinks is "the man to beat Hickenlooper." He is running as a pro-life candidate, but is short on meaningful specifics. He was formerly a ranking member of the pro-abortion group Republicans for Choice, and is known to have supported some pro-abortion legislation (including taxpayer funding for abortions) and to have opposed some pro-life measures. He claims to have "changed his mind" about abortion, and has even expressed support for Personhood, but he has not responded to CRTL's survey (sent by certified letter 2 weeks ago, and also several times by e-mail), and we have real doubts about his sincerity. Don't believe his claims that he has a "pro-life voting record" -- HE DOES NOT.
National Right to Life (NRTL -- no current affiliation with Colorado Right to Life) scored him at 94% or 100% in each of his last 5 terms in office, however NRTL and some other notable pro-life groups are known to "rig" their scorecards to support Republicans even if they are substantially pro-abortion. NRTL rarely considers support for Embryonic Stem Cell Research a disqualifier, or support for chemical abortifacients. McInnis also missed a number of the votes NRTL scored (thus avoiding being graded down). Pro-life campaign workers have vouched for him (but they would -- they're employed by him, and campaigns carry a certain degree of "hero worship" with all staffers).
If McInnis has really changed his mind about abortion, he needs to start making solid commitments, like more vocal support of Personhood with promises to back it up.
We were impressed when Dan Maes (R) became only the second major candidate to respond to our candidate survey. We had a question about his original survey, and in time and after some dialogue he responded with support for 7 of 7 of CRTL's central points, as explained in our candidate survey. We consider him 100% pro-life, and are happy that he is doing so well in the Governor's race -- no one gave him a chance early on, but he's turned out to be a strong and credible candidate.
There is a new Republican candidate for Governor in just the past couple of weeks. Joe Gschwendtner. On day one, he announced support for a Right to Life from conception to natural death, and responded to our survey with 6 or 7 of 7 questions answered correctly (he left some wiggle room in a response on regulation, which we'll work to clarify).
Republican candidate Yoon Mager's website suggests she is "pro-abortion with exceptions" (our words, not hers). She supports some regulations or limits on abortion, but is otherwise supportive of abortion.
Constitution Party candidate Benjamin Goss is known to be a strong supporter of Personhood, and has signed the Personhood petition and responded correctly to 7 of 7 questions on the CRTL survey.
Secretary of State
Republican candidate Nancy Doty has either dropped out or never announced for this office. The only remaining Republican we're aware of is Scott Gessler, who has not responded to our survey.
Democrat incumbent Bernie Buescher is known to be pro-abortion.
Treasurer
This is an office where candidates normally don't take positions on life issues, but this year a strange competition has started between two of the candidates over who is more pro-life. It's also an important office, because traditionally the Treasurer's Office is a stepping stone into the Governor's Office (Lamm, Romer, Owens).
Democrat incumbent Cary Kennedy is assumed to be pro-abortion.
Republican candidate Walker Stapleton has not responded to our survey, and we have no reason to believe he is pro-life.
Republican Ali Hasan has sent a mailer to homes encouraging support for Amendment 62, the Personhood measure. However, he also implies he is strongly pro-life, which is very misleading. In actuality, he opposes taxpayer funding and opposes euthanasia, which is good. And he signed the Personhood petition. But we have reason to believe he has done so as a means to trick voters into thinking he is strongly pro-life. His position 2 years ago, and as far as we know still today, approved of abortion through all of the first two trimesters. He did not support a Right to Life at that time, and his own recent e-mail to CRTL confirms that he would only score 3 questions correct out of 7 if he responded to our survey. Ali Hasan may support having Amendment 62 on the ballot so people can choose, but he is NOT pro-life, even by traditional Republican measures, and CRTL certainly does not want any voter to vote for him because they believe he is.
Republican JJ Ament is the son of a former legislator who was pro-choice, but there's no reason to believe his son is pro-abortion. He has not responded to our survey, however, and so far all we have is his claim that he is pro-life. CRTL has received no firm commitment. For that matter, we're not even sure if he has endorsed Personhood, as his opponent Hasan has. He did not sign the petition, despite being asked.
*** Update on JJ Ament: We're told that in a conference call yesterday (May 19) JJ was asked about Personhood and he said former Senate candidate Bob Schaffer had talked him out of supporting it, even though he is "still" pro-life. Odd that he would accept the advice of someone who lost in large part due to his refusal to support Personhood (in other words, Republicans take this seriously -- Personhood IS the new definition of pro-life, anything less isn't good enough). ***
Attorney General
Republican incumbent John Suthers says he is pro-life, but he publicly opposes the Personhood Initiative, preferring incremental regulatory limits.
Suthers' office also did not cooperate with a request from pro-life groups to investigate Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains for failure to report teenage and pre-teen patients as possible rape cases (it is state law that underage pregnancies should be reported if there is a possibility that sexual abuse was involved).
We have no reason to believe Democrat candidate Stan Garnett is not pro-abortion.
1st Congressional District
Diana DeGette (D) is one of the most pro-abortion women in Congress.
Apparently, Steve Barton (R) has switched from running for the U.S. Senate to running for the 1st Congressional District. Barton has signed the Personhood petition, and is fully supportive of Personhood.
2nd Congressional District
Republican candidate Stephen Bailey is a pro-abortion Republican. He had a conversation recently with a CRTL activist, who reported this. Bailey said he did not support a God-given Right to Life. He did not sign the Personhood petition. He opposes public funding of abortion, opposes Partial Birth Abortion, but says he would not vote to make abortion illegal "because people will still have abortions." (that's a reason?). He believes there's no consensus on abortion and it's a divisive issue, so he won't take a stand against it.
***UPDATE: Please Note (July 21): In just a few days, we will be updating some of this information on candidates, including Ken Buck (positive information), Dan Maes (positive information), Scott McInnis (negative information), Ryan Frazier (negative information) and Scott Tipton (negative information). Please hold onto your ballots for just a few days to see this new information in case it might affect your vote. In short, not every candidate who claims to be pro-life has been telling the whole story.***
This is a comprehensive list of all the information Colorado Right to Life has about the candidates running for office in the Colorado Caucus, Assembly & Primary season. We had published two previous releases of information on the candidates, in March and in April. The useful, updated information from both is included here, and we ask that you please consider this to supersede any older material.
If you're coming to the Colorado State Republican Assembly Saturday, or to any of the Congressional or legislative assemblies on Friday, please stop by our Personhood booth! We will also have representatives at the Sarah Palin event this weekend.
A brief, necessary introduction:
Colorado Right to Life pulls no punches -- if we have doubts about a candidate's sincerity, we'll tell you. The old definition of "pro-life" won't work. Personhood is the new definition -- a Right to Life from the beginning of biological development until natural death. No exceptions for rape or incest (if you have a Right to Life, it is inviolable). We also ask candidates not to "regulate" abortion, because a regulation implies a "right" to do whatever is being regulated (i.e. abortion). Candidates and legislators have been slow to adapt to these new definitions and stands, but they are definitely changing. Here are the questions they were asked in our survey: http://www.coloradorighttolife.org/candidate-survey (at the bottom is also an explanation of our anti-regulation position, as well as a policy statement on "life of the mother" exceptions).
Personhood has been an issue in Colorado for only 2 years now -- it was first on the ballot in 2008, and is again on the ballot in 2010 (as Amendment 62 -- plus, it will soon be on the ballot in other states also, such as Mississippi in 2011). Don't accept a candidate who self-identifies as pro-life but who won't support Personhood, or won't respond to the Colorado Right to Life Candidate Survey. Someone who says they are pro-life but they have exceptions, or aren't willing to enact their pro-life principles in law are "pro-abortion with exceptions." Personhood IS the Right to Life -- someone who does not support Personhood does not support recognizing a God-given Right to Life in law!
In 2008, most major candidates were unwilling to take a stand on Personhood. It's possible that Bob Schaffer, the Republican nominee for U.S. Senate, lost because he did not endorse Personhood, and many voters did not consider him sufficiently pro-life. By contrast, in 2010, every credible Republican candidate for top statewide offices has said they support Personhood, and most of the credible Republican candidates for U.S. Senate and Congress have also expressed support for Personhood. Source: http://www.gjsentinel.com/news/articles/prolife_measures_support_reviv
While we are excited that all these candidates support Personhood publicly, we question the sincerity of some, who may only be endorsing Personhood for reasons of political expediency (to avoid Schaffer's fate, perhaps?). Candidate Ali Hasan, for instance, encourages support for Personhood, and uses that as a reason people should vote for him and his principles. However, Hasan does not actually support the concept of Personhood -- he supports killing some children by abortion, for a variety of reasons, and may even support abortion until the 6th month of pregnancy!
Former Congressman Scott McInnis was formerly a ranking member of Republicans for Choice (a pro-abortion Republican group), and is known to have opposed pro-life measures and supported pro-abortion measures (even public funding) in the past. He says he has "changed his mind," but he was slow to endorse Personhood, and has made no firm pledges to do more than cut off public funding and end Partial Birth Abortion. We are naturally suspicious, but if he is really a convert we hope to see real commitments from him. Until then, Colorado Right to Life naturally prefers voters to support candidates who are known to have made solid pro-life statements or commitments (like responding to our survey).
We do not assume any candidate is pro-life unless they've responded to our candidate survey, or we have some other reason to trust their positions are sincere. CRTL does not officially endorse candidates for any office, but we will let you know which ones are NOT pro-life, and try to offer guidance on the rest. Please, NEVER assume a candidate is pro-life because of their party affiliation! CRTL does not support candidates from any particular political party -- if a candidate from the Constitution Party or even the Democrat Party is pro-life, we will let you know. We do not ever recommend voting for the "lesser of two evils" because we stand on very important principles which we will not compromise for purposes of political expediency.
Personhood -- support for the God-given Right to Life from the beginning of a human's biological development until natural death -- is CRTL's only real standard for judging a candidate's qualifications, though we do challenge candidates on several questions which relate closely to Personhood but which may be considered separate issues.
A final note: Because of our principled stand, many of our past financial supporters consider us extreme. If you appreciate our uncompromising principles in favor of a real, God-given Right to Life for all Persons, no exceptions, please consider supporting us financially. Most organizations do not hold to their principles because it's not profitable. That's not a reasonable excuse, and we will not follow, but there are consequences for standing up for what's right. Donations can be accepted here: http://www.coloradorighttolife.org/donate
Here is what we know about the candidates running for office in Colorado. We cannot assume that a candidate is not pro-life just because they haven't responded to our survey, but we really don't know for sure. We are suspicious of any candidate who does not respond to our survey, and we hope you will be too. Encourage them to respond to the survey and refuse to support them if they don't. Our Survey has 7 questions, and response to 6 or 7 questions correctly (depending which ones) tell us that we're working with someone who has tremendous potential to be a leader, and who is close to being consistent on the God-given Right to Life. Though we have hesitations about candidates who respond to the "regulation" question incorrectly (because these candidates are willing to support "bad law" that will entrench the concept of abortion "rights" in this country despite the intent being to limit abortion), we will continue to work with them to explain the full Personhood concept and why "exceptions" and "regulations" were the cited reason for Roe v. Wade in the first place.
We have made serious efforts to reach most candidates for major offices, and if they have not responded that probably means they've ignored at least two attempts to contact them. Legislative candidates have all been e-mailed at least once, unless we had reason to believe they were pro-abortion.
U.S. Senate
Michael Bennet (D) is clearly pro-abortion, supports federal funding, Obama's health care, etc.
Andrew Romanoff (D) is also pro-abortion, supports Obama's health care, etc.
Republican Ken Buck is a credible candidate we consider very strongly pro-life and pro-Personhood, based on conversations with him. He is on record supporting Personhood, though we have not received his candidate questionnaire.
Republican Jane Norton has supported "abortion exceptions" in the past (i.e. for rape & incest, which is from our perspective "pro-abortion with exceptions"), and for some time refused to support Personhood. She was scheduled to meet with someone about Personhood, but the meeting hasn't happened yet despite every effort. However, she has apparently endorsed Personhood recently, along with the other Republican candidates for U.S. Senate. Questions to her campaign to confirm this went unanswered, and she has not responded to our survey, sent by certified letter, and she's had enough time to respond.
Again, we must question Jane Norton's sincerity on this issue, because she has seemed more reluctant than willing. She did participate in Gov. Owens' cutoff of Planned Parenthood from state funding, and we applaud her actions on that (as a cabinet member). She also is rumored to soon be endorsed by Sarah Palin, though that's certainly no indicator of pro-life status (Palin also endorsed John McCain against a pro-life opponent, despite McCain's long checkered history of occasional support for abortion and continued support for embryonic destruction, which Palin joined in endorsing).
Republican Cleve Tidwell has responded to our survey, and answered correctly on 7 of 7 questions -- he is strongly pro-Personhood. His responses to some other surveys were not as solid, but we believe he is sincere. He took the initiative to respond quickly to our survey, and we appreciate that he was our first respondent.
Tom Wiens (R) has traditionally been a pro-life legislator, and had promised to respond to our survey, but we haven't received it yet after a couple months of trying. He is petitioning onto the ballot, so will not be a candidate at the Assembly.
We do not have information on Maclyn Stringer, or John Finger, the two Libertarian Party candidates. Libertarians normally support abortion, but not always.
Governor
John Hickenlooper (D) is known to be pro-abortion.
Scott McInnis (R - Former Congressman) is the establishment candidate who the GOP thinks is "the man to beat Hickenlooper." He is running as a pro-life candidate, but is short on meaningful specifics. He was formerly a ranking member of the pro-abortion group Republicans for Choice, and is known to have supported some pro-abortion legislation (including taxpayer funding for abortions) and to have opposed some pro-life measures. He claims to have "changed his mind" about abortion, and has even expressed support for Personhood, but he has not responded to CRTL's survey (sent by certified letter 2 weeks ago, and also several times by e-mail), and we have real doubts about his sincerity. Don't believe his claims that he has a "pro-life voting record" -- HE DOES NOT.
National Right to Life (NRTL -- no current affiliation with Colorado Right to Life) scored him at 94% or 100% in each of his last 5 terms in office, however NRTL and some other notable pro-life groups are known to "rig" their scorecards to support Republicans even if they are substantially pro-abortion. NRTL rarely considers support for Embryonic Stem Cell Research a disqualifier, or support for chemical abortifacients. McInnis also missed a number of the votes NRTL scored (thus avoiding being graded down). Pro-life campaign workers have vouched for him (but they would -- they're employed by him, and campaigns carry a certain degree of "hero worship" with all staffers).
If McInnis has really changed his mind about abortion, he needs to start making solid commitments, like more vocal support of Personhood with promises to back it up.
We were impressed when Dan Maes (R) became only the second major candidate to respond to our candidate survey. We had a question about his original survey, and in time and after some dialogue he responded with support for 7 of 7 of CRTL's central points, as explained in our candidate survey. We consider him 100% pro-life, and are happy that he is doing so well in the Governor's race -- no one gave him a chance early on, but he's turned out to be a strong and credible candidate.
There is a new Republican candidate for Governor in just the past couple of weeks. Joe Gschwendtner. On day one, he announced support for a Right to Life from conception to natural death, and responded to our survey with 6 or 7 of 7 questions answered correctly (he left some wiggle room in a response on regulation, which we'll work to clarify).
Republican candidate Yoon Mager's website suggests she is "pro-abortion with exceptions" (our words, not hers). She supports some regulations or limits on abortion, but is otherwise supportive of abortion.
Constitution Party candidate Benjamin Goss is known to be a strong supporter of Personhood, and has signed the Personhood petition and responded correctly to 7 of 7 questions on the CRTL survey.
Secretary of State
Republican candidate Nancy Doty has either dropped out or never announced for this office. The only remaining Republican we're aware of is Scott Gessler, who has not responded to our survey.
Democrat incumbent Bernie Buescher is known to be pro-abortion.
Treasurer
This is an office where candidates normally don't take positions on life issues, but this year a strange competition has started between two of the candidates over who is more pro-life. It's also an important office, because traditionally the Treasurer's Office is a stepping stone into the Governor's Office (Lamm, Romer, Owens).
Democrat incumbent Cary Kennedy is assumed to be pro-abortion.
Republican candidate Walker Stapleton has not responded to our survey, and we have no reason to believe he is pro-life.
Republican Ali Hasan has sent a mailer to homes encouraging support for Amendment 62, the Personhood measure. However, he also implies he is strongly pro-life, which is very misleading. In actuality, he opposes taxpayer funding and opposes euthanasia, which is good. And he signed the Personhood petition. But we have reason to believe he has done so as a means to trick voters into thinking he is strongly pro-life. His position 2 years ago, and as far as we know still today, approved of abortion through all of the first two trimesters. He did not support a Right to Life at that time, and his own recent e-mail to CRTL confirms that he would only score 3 questions correct out of 7 if he responded to our survey. Ali Hasan may support having Amendment 62 on the ballot so people can choose, but he is NOT pro-life, even by traditional Republican measures, and CRTL certainly does not want any voter to vote for him because they believe he is.
Republican JJ Ament is the son of a former legislator who was pro-choice, but there's no reason to believe his son is pro-abortion. He has not responded to our survey, however, and so far all we have is his claim that he is pro-life. CRTL has received no firm commitment. For that matter, we're not even sure if he has endorsed Personhood, as his opponent Hasan has. He did not sign the petition, despite being asked.
*** Update on JJ Ament: We're told that in a conference call yesterday (May 19) JJ was asked about Personhood and he said former Senate candidate Bob Schaffer had talked him out of supporting it, even though he is "still" pro-life. Odd that he would accept the advice of someone who lost in large part due to his refusal to support Personhood (in other words, Republicans take this seriously -- Personhood IS the new definition of pro-life, anything less isn't good enough). ***
Attorney General
Republican incumbent John Suthers says he is pro-life, but he publicly opposes the Personhood Initiative, preferring incremental regulatory limits.
Suthers' office also did not cooperate with a request from pro-life groups to investigate Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains for failure to report teenage and pre-teen patients as possible rape cases (it is state law that underage pregnancies should be reported if there is a possibility that sexual abuse was involved).
We have no reason to believe Democrat candidate Stan Garnett is not pro-abortion.
1st Congressional District
Diana DeGette (D) is one of the most pro-abortion women in Congress.
Apparently, Steve Barton (R) has switched from running for the U.S. Senate to running for the 1st Congressional District. Barton has signed the Personhood petition, and is fully supportive of Personhood.
2nd Congressional District
Democrat incumbent Jared Polis is known to strongly support abortion.
Democrat Mike Niland is assumed to be pro-abortion (running for the Democrat nomination in Boulder -- easy assumption).
Republican candidate Bob Brancato responded to our survey, and supports Personhood (signed the petition) though it's not clear he understands Personhood very well. His responses are essentially 5 out of 7 correct. He still supports exceptions for rape and incest (i.e. pro-abortion with exceptions) and supports regulations. But these responses are promising for a candidate we've not had time to dialogue with. We'll keep working with him.Republican candidate Stephen Bailey is a pro-abortion Republican. He had a conversation recently with a CRTL activist, who reported this. Bailey said he did not support a God-given Right to Life. He did not sign the Personhood petition. He opposes public funding of abortion, opposes Partial Birth Abortion, but says he would not vote to make abortion illegal "because people will still have abortions." (that's a reason?). He believes there's no consensus on abortion and it's a divisive issue, so he won't take a stand against it.
3rd Congressional District
Democrat incumbent John Salazar supports abortion.
Scott Tipton (R) has not responded to our survey (he did not respond at all in 2008 either). We have no reason to believe he is sincerely pro-life. Please encourage him to respond to the survey and prove our doubts wrong!
*** (Tipton Information just in - we are told an activist from 3rd Congressional has spoken to Scott Tipton who says he had not seen our survey - he says he is staunchly pro-life and opposes taxpayer funding - he has been re-sent the survey by e-mail and if we get his responses in coming days we will post it here as well as making a separate post - Tipton's office was sent the survey at least twice previously by e-mail, but I'm sure he gets lots of e-mail) (July 21 update -- we never heard from Tipton, he was just pandering)***
Bob McConnell (R) has responded to CRTL's survey, and he answered 6 out of 7 questions correctly. His only reservation was on the matter of supporting "regulatory" laws (which CRTL believes actually undermine the concept of Personhood, even though many pro-lifers believe regulations "save some babies"). This is a long-term discussion, and CRTL has been trying to educate the pro-life movement for a number of years, but many politicians still believe reulations are pro-life. On this particular matter, we believe strongly in a candidate's good intentions, and we will attempt to work with the candidate to change their opinion eventually.
4th Congressional District
Democrat incumbent Betsy Markey defeated pro-Personhood Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave in 2008 using a pro-abortion, anti-social-conservative platform.
Republican candidate Diggs Brown has dropped out, and we don't know much about Dean Madere except that he claims to be pro-life.
Cory Gardner (R) has been an outstanding pro-life legislator, and has attended a number of CRTL functions, including two Legislative luncheons/breakfasts (something most legislators don't attend). We value his dedication to these issues! Cory has responded to our survey with 7 of 7 questions answered correctly, without any reservations or exceptions. He supported Personhood in 2008 also.
Tom Lucero (R) also responded with 7 of 7 questions correct!
Mike Nelson is a Unity Party candidate, and he responded to our survey that in no uncertain terms he supports "abortion rights" 100%. He is clearly hostile to the concept of Personhood.
5th Congressional District
To the best of our knowledge, pro-Personhood Congressman Doug Lamborn is running without primary opposition this year. While he has not yet responded to our survey, he has supported Personhood (Human Life Amendment) legislation at the national level, and we are confident his support will continue.
6th Congressional District
Incumbent Republican Mike Coffman has a history of association with Colorado Right to Life, has responded favorably to the CRTL survey in the past with 7 of 7 responses correct. No response this year, but we don't have any reason to believe he's changed his position on Personhood.
7th Congressional District
Incumbent Democrat Ed Perlmutter is pro-abortion.
Republican Lang Sias has said he is pro-life, but we cannot confirm this as we have not heard from him, even after a registered letter was sent to his campaign office.
Republican Ryan Frazier claims to be pro-life BUT HE IS NOT. He supports certain limits on abortion, but is willing to go no further. He has not responded to CRTL's survey (sent several times by e-mail, and 2 weeks ago by certified letter), and we expect he would score badly if he did. Frazier speaks as if he is one of us, but he wants you to ignore statements like he made to Westword, "I am not a fan of abortion, but I struggle with whether it is the appropriate role of the government to place itself there." That's like struggling with the role of government to ban slavery. The Aurora Sentinel said, "Frazier's shown a more liberal bent in his approach on social issues, however, voicing support for same-sex couples and expressing a measured stance on government regulation of abortion." He also has ignored a registered letter to his campaign asking for his survey responses. The statements on his website and in person are cleverly worded to sound like he's on our side, but many of these same things were said by John Kerry and other pro-abortion Republicans and Democrats.
Republican candidate Mike Sheely has responded to our survey with 7 of 7 responses correct, and has also attended a Colorado Right to Life breakfast where we discussed strategy and philosophy. We value his attention to these issues.
Republican Michael Deming has said he's not sure where he stands on abortion, but would oppose federal funding. Obviously not a committed pro-life candidate.
This concludes our review of candidates for State and Federal offices. We will soon post our results for candidates for legislative (State House and Senate) offices.
Each of the Republican candidates have been contacted at least once, most of them twice by e-mail. The credible Republican candidates for Governor, Senate and 7th Congressional were sent certified letters two weeks ago to remind them we would be posting these results. Anyone in those categories who has not responded is probably ignoring us for strategic reasons, which makes us suspicious of their motives.
We have also contacted most Democrat candidates by e-mail at least once, as well as candidates for the Libertarian Party and Constitution Party, Unity Party, etc, though not all of these candidates are yet known so some may not have been contacted. The information has also been up on our website so people can respond if they look for it.
Candidates who have not responded are still welcome and encouraged to respond -- we will post them as they respond.
If you're looking for responses from Legislative candidates (State House or State Senate) that information can be found here: http://coloradorighttolife.blogspot.com/2010/05/colorado-legislative-candidate.html
Friday, April 9, 2010
Response to Eagle Forum on Personhood
(feel free to print this and bring it with you to your assembly as a handout or reference)
Dear Pro-Life Voter:
Please support the Personhood Amendment #62! The most fundamental right recognized by our Constitution is the God-given right to life. It is government’s foremost duty to uphold the right to life of all innocent human beings, without exception. The Personhood Amendment – Amendment 62 on Colorado's November ballot –recognizes the right to life of unborn children from the beginning of their biological development as a human being.
Forty states currently are following Colorado's leadership and trying, through legislation or ballot initiatives, to get Personhood recognized for the unborn child. This has transformed the pro-life movement and given it new energy! For the first time in recent history, there is light at the end of the tunnel, and we may see abortion prohibited in the relatively near future.
Unfortunately, many politicians, including Republicans, and even some pro-life groups fear losing control of the agenda. They are trying to smother the Personhood movement in its crib! You may see an Eagle Forum flyer here (at political gatherings) today, spreading misleading statements.
They mean to discourage pro-lifers by pointing out that our 2008 measure only received 27% support – the first time any state has ever voted on Personhood. They say we should not try again. What successful social movement has ever given up after its first try? What if the anti-slavery movement had quit at their first setback? What if Britain had surrendered to Hitler because victory seemed impossible? It's not leadership to say, “We tried once and failed, so we should stop.”
In 2008 conventional wisdom held that only one out of eight people would vote for a total abortion ban. Yet in our first time on the ballot we received over 600,000 votes, more than doubling what was expected, in a state that had just elected a pro-abortion governor and president. With a well-run campaign, in this non-presidential election year, where just some Personhood voters bring another voter to the polls, we could win. Of slavery, the Holocaust, and abortion, we're now at two down and one to go!
The anti-personhood flyer claims pro-abortion groups are “enriched” by getting to fight the Personhood amendments in several states. The ACLU and Planned Parenthood don't see it that way. They're suing to keep Personhood amendments off the ballot in Missouri, Alaska, and Nevada, and they've announced that they might sue here in Colorado. (We're ready for them if they do.) And Mississippi has already certified their state's Personhood Amendment to be on the ballot, and signatures are being collected by the hundreds of thousands in Florida and California and elsewhere. Further, the pro-abortion group NARAL put Personhood USA, parent group of one of our sponsors, on their national Hall of Shame! What an honor! They fear what we can see: that Personhood has ignited a broad base of grassroots activity with more being done to stop abortion than any time in the last twenty years!
The “pro-life” opponents of Personhood claim “it’s not the right time,” but it’s never the wrong time to do the right thing. They say they want to back Personhood “eventually,” but the US Supreme Court is not yet “ready” to support a pro-life measure. This admission comes after decades of their efforts to change the court, which admission is proof from their own mouths that their strategy is utterly failing. Republicans have nominated the majority of the federal judiciary, and the federal courts are overwhelmingly pro-abortion, so we need a new, direct strategy of teaching the public and our politicians the difference between right and wrong.
After decades of electing pro-life presidents, there is not a single Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court who has ever once advocated the right to life of the unborn child. So National Right To Life has never been able to claim the $10,000 offered them for simply naming a single pro-life Supreme Court Justice. That check is already written and remains un-cashed in the office of the Colorado-based American Right To Life.
Eagle Forum points to a memo by National Right To Life attorney James Bopp, which claims they fear a challenge to Roe v. Wade now might “make things worse.” Fear never won a fight. Over a million children will die from abortion this year! Fifty million dead children and they are afraid to pursue victory because things might get worse? That's like giving in to terrorists because we don't want to make them mad. Tragically, National Right To Life's general counsel tried to compromise the Republican Party platform by modifying it to support embryonic stem cell research, which is lethal experiments, on the tiniest children, little boys and girls just like the snowflake children, the adopted frozen embryos who themselves are the proof that these are precious little children. Thank God that National Right To Life's attorney failed.
That failed strategy, the old pro-life approach, of electing politicians who are pro-life, who will appoint judges who are pro-life, has failed because we didn’t have “quality control” and all our candidates, without opposition from NRTL, openly admitted that they would ignore abortion when nominating judges. And the proof is in the pudding, along with the poison, of scores of pro-abortion judges that we have unwittingly put on the bench. We need to teach our politicians that there is an actual right to life (i.e. Personhood)! We need to insist that they appoint judges who acknowledge the God-given right to life of each child. Where we stand right now, we don’t need “one more pro-life justice” – we need five! That old strategy has proved an utter failure.
What’s more, we’ve been teaching the American public the wrong lessons. When we say “the unborn child has a right to life!” and then turn around and promote laws to protect some babies, but not others, the American people rightly detect hypocrisy!
Footnote 54 of Roe v. Wade ruling (which tragically was written by a Republican Justice, Harry Blackman, and passed by a Republican majority) points out this very thing – that you cannot say the unborn child is a Person, and then say there are some circumstances when that innocent Person can be killed. That hypocrisy was cited as the reason why abortion was decriminalized– because existing "pro-life" laws actually didn’t recognize unborn children as Persons. But the Roe v. Wade decision itself also said that if a law were passed to recognize the Personhood of the unborn child, then the Supreme Court would have to protect unborn children under the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment!
Personhood is a legal strategy, aimed at that "loophole" in Roe. But more than that, Personhood is a social movement, trying for the first time in 30 years to convince the American public that there exists an actual, God-given right to life for innocent children – no exceptions! Imagine the outcry if a massive body of citizens cried out to stop the slaughter, and the courts or politicians stood by and did nothing! They cannot. Personhood will force the politicians and the courts to change – if we insist our politicians support Personhood, then eventually the courts will follow.
Some defeated folks claim we have no power to change things, and we must accept the world as it is. They have no hope for victory, and they want you to abandon hope also. Their reasoning is all based on political calculation and conventional wisdom. But they forget that Christian social movements changed the world by relying on God’s wisdom! Remember the anti-slavery movement! Remember the civil rights movement! These were not secular in nature – these movements were Christian at their core! They dared to believe God would help them, and they changed the world!
That’s the promise of Personhood. In 2008 Colorado launched this strategy, and in 2010 there are 40 states following the example of our first “failure!” We’ve just now set out! We must press forward and not look back!
Press forward with us! Personhood for the unborn child – NOW!!!
Amendment 62 Co-Sponsors
Leslie Hanks
Colorado Right To Life
Gualberto Garcia Jones
303-456-2800
Personhood Colorado
Dear Pro-Life Voter:
Please support the Personhood Amendment #62! The most fundamental right recognized by our Constitution is the God-given right to life. It is government’s foremost duty to uphold the right to life of all innocent human beings, without exception. The Personhood Amendment – Amendment 62 on Colorado's November ballot –recognizes the right to life of unborn children from the beginning of their biological development as a human being.
Forty states currently are following Colorado's leadership and trying, through legislation or ballot initiatives, to get Personhood recognized for the unborn child. This has transformed the pro-life movement and given it new energy! For the first time in recent history, there is light at the end of the tunnel, and we may see abortion prohibited in the relatively near future.
Unfortunately, many politicians, including Republicans, and even some pro-life groups fear losing control of the agenda. They are trying to smother the Personhood movement in its crib! You may see an Eagle Forum flyer here (at political gatherings) today, spreading misleading statements.
They mean to discourage pro-lifers by pointing out that our 2008 measure only received 27% support – the first time any state has ever voted on Personhood. They say we should not try again. What successful social movement has ever given up after its first try? What if the anti-slavery movement had quit at their first setback? What if Britain had surrendered to Hitler because victory seemed impossible? It's not leadership to say, “We tried once and failed, so we should stop.”
In 2008 conventional wisdom held that only one out of eight people would vote for a total abortion ban. Yet in our first time on the ballot we received over 600,000 votes, more than doubling what was expected, in a state that had just elected a pro-abortion governor and president. With a well-run campaign, in this non-presidential election year, where just some Personhood voters bring another voter to the polls, we could win. Of slavery, the Holocaust, and abortion, we're now at two down and one to go!
The anti-personhood flyer claims pro-abortion groups are “enriched” by getting to fight the Personhood amendments in several states. The ACLU and Planned Parenthood don't see it that way. They're suing to keep Personhood amendments off the ballot in Missouri, Alaska, and Nevada, and they've announced that they might sue here in Colorado. (We're ready for them if they do.) And Mississippi has already certified their state's Personhood Amendment to be on the ballot, and signatures are being collected by the hundreds of thousands in Florida and California and elsewhere. Further, the pro-abortion group NARAL put Personhood USA, parent group of one of our sponsors, on their national Hall of Shame! What an honor! They fear what we can see: that Personhood has ignited a broad base of grassroots activity with more being done to stop abortion than any time in the last twenty years!
The “pro-life” opponents of Personhood claim “it’s not the right time,” but it’s never the wrong time to do the right thing. They say they want to back Personhood “eventually,” but the US Supreme Court is not yet “ready” to support a pro-life measure. This admission comes after decades of their efforts to change the court, which admission is proof from their own mouths that their strategy is utterly failing. Republicans have nominated the majority of the federal judiciary, and the federal courts are overwhelmingly pro-abortion, so we need a new, direct strategy of teaching the public and our politicians the difference between right and wrong.
After decades of electing pro-life presidents, there is not a single Justice on the U.S. Supreme Court who has ever once advocated the right to life of the unborn child. So National Right To Life has never been able to claim the $10,000 offered them for simply naming a single pro-life Supreme Court Justice. That check is already written and remains un-cashed in the office of the Colorado-based American Right To Life.
Eagle Forum points to a memo by National Right To Life attorney James Bopp, which claims they fear a challenge to Roe v. Wade now might “make things worse.” Fear never won a fight. Over a million children will die from abortion this year! Fifty million dead children and they are afraid to pursue victory because things might get worse? That's like giving in to terrorists because we don't want to make them mad. Tragically, National Right To Life's general counsel tried to compromise the Republican Party platform by modifying it to support embryonic stem cell research, which is lethal experiments, on the tiniest children, little boys and girls just like the snowflake children, the adopted frozen embryos who themselves are the proof that these are precious little children. Thank God that National Right To Life's attorney failed.
That failed strategy, the old pro-life approach, of electing politicians who are pro-life, who will appoint judges who are pro-life, has failed because we didn’t have “quality control” and all our candidates, without opposition from NRTL, openly admitted that they would ignore abortion when nominating judges. And the proof is in the pudding, along with the poison, of scores of pro-abortion judges that we have unwittingly put on the bench. We need to teach our politicians that there is an actual right to life (i.e. Personhood)! We need to insist that they appoint judges who acknowledge the God-given right to life of each child. Where we stand right now, we don’t need “one more pro-life justice” – we need five! That old strategy has proved an utter failure.
What’s more, we’ve been teaching the American public the wrong lessons. When we say “the unborn child has a right to life!” and then turn around and promote laws to protect some babies, but not others, the American people rightly detect hypocrisy!
Footnote 54 of Roe v. Wade ruling (which tragically was written by a Republican Justice, Harry Blackman, and passed by a Republican majority) points out this very thing – that you cannot say the unborn child is a Person, and then say there are some circumstances when that innocent Person can be killed. That hypocrisy was cited as the reason why abortion was decriminalized– because existing "pro-life" laws actually didn’t recognize unborn children as Persons. But the Roe v. Wade decision itself also said that if a law were passed to recognize the Personhood of the unborn child, then the Supreme Court would have to protect unborn children under the Equal Protection Clause of the 14th Amendment!
Personhood is a legal strategy, aimed at that "loophole" in Roe. But more than that, Personhood is a social movement, trying for the first time in 30 years to convince the American public that there exists an actual, God-given right to life for innocent children – no exceptions! Imagine the outcry if a massive body of citizens cried out to stop the slaughter, and the courts or politicians stood by and did nothing! They cannot. Personhood will force the politicians and the courts to change – if we insist our politicians support Personhood, then eventually the courts will follow.
Some defeated folks claim we have no power to change things, and we must accept the world as it is. They have no hope for victory, and they want you to abandon hope also. Their reasoning is all based on political calculation and conventional wisdom. But they forget that Christian social movements changed the world by relying on God’s wisdom! Remember the anti-slavery movement! Remember the civil rights movement! These were not secular in nature – these movements were Christian at their core! They dared to believe God would help them, and they changed the world!
That’s the promise of Personhood. In 2008 Colorado launched this strategy, and in 2010 there are 40 states following the example of our first “failure!” We’ve just now set out! We must press forward and not look back!
Press forward with us! Personhood for the unborn child – NOW!!!
Amendment 62 Co-Sponsors
Leslie Hanks
Colorado Right To Life
Gualberto Garcia Jones
303-456-2800
Personhood Colorado
Thursday, April 8, 2010
Early April Update - Candidate Surveys
CRTL continues to get new responses to our candidate surveys. We've tried to get responses earlier this year, so that you can use this information in your county, congressional district, and state assemblies in order to support candidates who you know are pro-life!
Please help us with this process by asking the candidates to respond to our survey so that you know where they stand. Don't accept simple claims like "I'm 100% pro-life" -- see if they have the guts to put their commitment on paper (and on the Internet).
In mid-March we posted a large amount of information on many races and candidates. This pre-caucus information can be found here (you're likely to find your candidates listed there -- add this posts's information to the info in that older post, and you'll be up to date).
Here's the new information:
Governor of Colorado
CRTL has no additional reason to believe Scott McInnis' claim that he is "100% pro-life". He still has not responded to the survey, and refuses to make concrete commitments. We are distrustful, because he will not go on record with specific promises, most particularly with regard to Amendment 62, the Personhood Amendment.
On the other hand, we retain one major reservation for candidate Dan Maes too, and that is that he believes embryonic stem cell research (ESCR) can be allowed within limited circumstances. Despite his promise to support Personhood, this position is incompatible with the Personhood position, because it means he supports "limited" killing of unborn children. We will continue to dialogue with him on this, and we're hopeful that he will come around to our point of view once he has more time to examine the issue. Please encourage him to do so.
Constitution Party candidate Benjamin Goss has responded to our survey with 7 of 7 questions answered correctly!
U.S. Senate
Not much information to add, here.
Candidate Tom Wiens has promised to respond to the survey, and sounds like he intends to answer properly, but we still have not received his survey (he is petitioning on, and won't be a candidate at the assembly).
We are still concerned about Jane Norton's stated support for abortion exceptions, and she has not yet supported Personhood or responded to the survey. Please encourage her to take a stand on these issues, but for now we do not believe her positions qualify her as pro-life.
Candidates Ken Buck, Cleve Tidwell and Steve Barton are considered pro-life (only Tidwell has returned his candidate survey -- please encourage the others to do so!).
Treasurer Race
We still have not heard from JJ Ament one way or another on Personhood, or on the candidate survey. He claims to be pro-life, but so far this is only a claim. Please encourage him to return the survey.
Candidate Ali Hasan holds positions which support the killing of some unborn children, which means we do not consider him pro-life. At one point he seemed to be trying to run as a pro-life candidate. He remains open to dialogue, though, and we intend to follow through with him.
(Note added May 16: Ali Hasan's recent mailer implies that CRTL supports him, but we do not support any candidate who is not 100% pro-life, which means answering at least 6 out of 7 questions of our survey correctly - Hasan answered only 3 correctly. More info can be found in our earlier candidate survey post here: http://coloradorighttolife.blogspot.com/2010/03/pre-caucus-update-candidate-positions.html - CRTL still has not heard from JJ Ament as to whether he supports Personhood, and have not received his survey, nor have we heard from Stapleton)
We have not heard anything from Walker Stapleton, and have no reason to believe he is pro-life.
Congressional District 2
Candidate Bob Brancato has indicated he intends to respond to our survey, but we have not received his survey yet.
Congressional District 4
Diggs Brown states on his website that he is pro-life, but we believe he has suspended his candidacy.
Cory Gardner and Tom Lucero both responded 7 of 7 to our survey.
Congressional District 7
We have not yet heard from either Ryan Frazier or Lang Sias in this important race. Please encourage them to return their surveys, or at least to take a public stand on the Personhood Amendment, Amendment 62.
Republican candidate Mike Sheely did return his survey, and answered correctly on 7 of 7 questions!
State Senate District 2
Republican candidate Kevin Grantham has responded to our survey, answering 7 of 7 questions correctly!
Grantham faces primary opponents, but we have not heard from them.
State Senate District 3
Republican candidate Alexander Lucero-Mugatu has responded to our survey, responding correctly to 6 of 7 questions. His response to question #2, on rape & incest exceptions, makes us think he does not necessarily support prohibiting abortion for rape or incest (which undermines the Personhood of the unborn child), but we will work with him on these apparent exceptions. For now, it remains a red flag, and we hope that a supporter will be able to speak with him about this.
Mugatu faces a Republican primary, but we have not heard from his opponents.
State Senate District 5
Republican candidate Wayne Wolf has responded to our survey with 7 of 7 questions answered correctly! He did indicate a possible exception for certain regulations, but it sounds like he is very close to our position, and we can work with him on defining specifics.
Wolf faces a Republican primary, but we have not heard from his opponent.
State House District 35
Candidate Edgar Antillon indicated he would be responding to our survey, but we have not received it yet. He says he is pro-life.
State House District 57
Republican candidate Randy Baumgardner responded to our survey, answering 6 of 7 questions correctly (he may have missed question #2 -- we'll follow up with him on this question, regarding exceptions to allow abortion for rape & incest).
As we said earlier, we have heard from dozens more candidates than those listed here -- click the link at the top of the page to see a more comprehensive list (though some information on this list may supersede that information).
From elsewhere....
In addition to these candidates, it might be important to note that Congressional candidate Jeffrey Locke, running for Kansas' 2nd District, has also responded 7 of 7 to our survey (which would normally be covered by American Right to Life, though they have not been able to send surveys yet). Thank you, Jeff Locke!
Please help us with this process by asking the candidates to respond to our survey so that you know where they stand. Don't accept simple claims like "I'm 100% pro-life" -- see if they have the guts to put their commitment on paper (and on the Internet).
In mid-March we posted a large amount of information on many races and candidates. This pre-caucus information can be found here (you're likely to find your candidates listed there -- add this posts's information to the info in that older post, and you'll be up to date).
Here's the new information:
Governor of Colorado
CRTL has no additional reason to believe Scott McInnis' claim that he is "100% pro-life". He still has not responded to the survey, and refuses to make concrete commitments. We are distrustful, because he will not go on record with specific promises, most particularly with regard to Amendment 62, the Personhood Amendment.
On the other hand, we retain one major reservation for candidate Dan Maes too, and that is that he believes embryonic stem cell research (ESCR) can be allowed within limited circumstances. Despite his promise to support Personhood, this position is incompatible with the Personhood position, because it means he supports "limited" killing of unborn children. We will continue to dialogue with him on this, and we're hopeful that he will come around to our point of view once he has more time to examine the issue. Please encourage him to do so.
Constitution Party candidate Benjamin Goss has responded to our survey with 7 of 7 questions answered correctly!
U.S. Senate
Not much information to add, here.
Candidate Tom Wiens has promised to respond to the survey, and sounds like he intends to answer properly, but we still have not received his survey (he is petitioning on, and won't be a candidate at the assembly).
We are still concerned about Jane Norton's stated support for abortion exceptions, and she has not yet supported Personhood or responded to the survey. Please encourage her to take a stand on these issues, but for now we do not believe her positions qualify her as pro-life.
Candidates Ken Buck, Cleve Tidwell and Steve Barton are considered pro-life (only Tidwell has returned his candidate survey -- please encourage the others to do so!).
Treasurer Race
We still have not heard from JJ Ament one way or another on Personhood, or on the candidate survey. He claims to be pro-life, but so far this is only a claim. Please encourage him to return the survey.
Candidate Ali Hasan holds positions which support the killing of some unborn children, which means we do not consider him pro-life. At one point he seemed to be trying to run as a pro-life candidate. He remains open to dialogue, though, and we intend to follow through with him.
(Note added May 16: Ali Hasan's recent mailer implies that CRTL supports him, but we do not support any candidate who is not 100% pro-life, which means answering at least 6 out of 7 questions of our survey correctly - Hasan answered only 3 correctly. More info can be found in our earlier candidate survey post here: http://coloradorighttolife.blogspot.com/2010/03/pre-caucus-update-candidate-positions.html - CRTL still has not heard from JJ Ament as to whether he supports Personhood, and have not received his survey, nor have we heard from Stapleton)
We have not heard anything from Walker Stapleton, and have no reason to believe he is pro-life.
Congressional District 2
Candidate Bob Brancato has indicated he intends to respond to our survey, but we have not received his survey yet.
Congressional District 4
Diggs Brown states on his website that he is pro-life, but we believe he has suspended his candidacy.
Cory Gardner and Tom Lucero both responded 7 of 7 to our survey.
Congressional District 7
We have not yet heard from either Ryan Frazier or Lang Sias in this important race. Please encourage them to return their surveys, or at least to take a public stand on the Personhood Amendment, Amendment 62.
Republican candidate Mike Sheely did return his survey, and answered correctly on 7 of 7 questions!
State Senate District 2
Republican candidate Kevin Grantham has responded to our survey, answering 7 of 7 questions correctly!
Grantham faces primary opponents, but we have not heard from them.
State Senate District 3
Republican candidate Alexander Lucero-Mugatu has responded to our survey, responding correctly to 6 of 7 questions. His response to question #2, on rape & incest exceptions, makes us think he does not necessarily support prohibiting abortion for rape or incest (which undermines the Personhood of the unborn child), but we will work with him on these apparent exceptions. For now, it remains a red flag, and we hope that a supporter will be able to speak with him about this.
Mugatu faces a Republican primary, but we have not heard from his opponents.
State Senate District 5
Republican candidate Wayne Wolf has responded to our survey with 7 of 7 questions answered correctly! He did indicate a possible exception for certain regulations, but it sounds like he is very close to our position, and we can work with him on defining specifics.
Wolf faces a Republican primary, but we have not heard from his opponent.
State House District 35
Candidate Edgar Antillon indicated he would be responding to our survey, but we have not received it yet. He says he is pro-life.
State House District 57
Republican candidate Randy Baumgardner responded to our survey, answering 6 of 7 questions correctly (he may have missed question #2 -- we'll follow up with him on this question, regarding exceptions to allow abortion for rape & incest).
As we said earlier, we have heard from dozens more candidates than those listed here -- click the link at the top of the page to see a more comprehensive list (though some information on this list may supersede that information).
From elsewhere....
In addition to these candidates, it might be important to note that Congressional candidate Jeffrey Locke, running for Kansas' 2nd District, has also responded 7 of 7 to our survey (which would normally be covered by American Right to Life, though they have not been able to send surveys yet). Thank you, Jeff Locke!
Updated Information Coming
Please "watch this space!"
We will be posting updated information on candidates who have responded to our Candidate Survey, as well as more information on the Personhood Amendment (on the ballot as Amendment 62) to counter some disinformation being distributed against it.
We'll have this up within 24 hours so you'll be able to use it at your County Assembly.
We will be posting updated information on candidates who have responded to our Candidate Survey, as well as more information on the Personhood Amendment (on the ballot as Amendment 62) to counter some disinformation being distributed against it.
We'll have this up within 24 hours so you'll be able to use it at your County Assembly.
Wednesday, March 24, 2010
Personhood Works, Regulations Don't
(reposted from Look on the Right Side - the author has said that anyone may re-post this with attribution, so please do in order to spread this important truth)
This is a more coherent recap & expansion on my earlier blog post on regulations, and why they undermine the Personhood of the unborn child -- "How We Compromise Ourselves."
I do not question the well-meaning intentions of those legislators who support, or even write, compromise legislation which tries to put limits on abortion in circumstances where a total abortion ban is not realistically possible. We can argue later about which is more "politically realistic" (I think Personhood is, still). But the fact that I believe in the good intentions of the pro-life regulators does not mean that I don't care whether they stop pushing regulations -- I do! -- or that I approve of what they're doing -- I don't! -- or that I will always continue to support regulation-minded legislators if they continue to ignore warnings about the unintended consequences of what they do.
I think the main thing “pro-life regulators” need to understand is that, whether or not Personhood is "practical" in a legal sense (which is the main objection of those pro-lifers who oppose the Personhood strategy, including Archbishop Charles Chaput and Clarke Forsythe of AUL), our primary problem as pro-lifers is that we've been making the wrong argument -- one which won't "change peoples' hearts" (which everybody agrees is the goal, and yet incrementalists are convinced they DO have the right argument).
The regulations may teach some people about the Right to Life, but more often (esp. for wishy-washy or "moderate" citizens, who are the ones we need to convince in order to succeed in passing legislation or electing legislators) regulations only suggest a "moderate" solution exists for what they are led to believe is a policy question -- where do you draw the line?
Let me restate that.
Regulations clearly “suggest” to a citizen observer that there’s a policy question, to which there are “extreme” solutions (to right or left) and “moderate” solutions. Typical American citizens being who they are, almost all of the people in this category (i.e. the moderate, middle-of-the-road people who don’t often think about policy issues, but when they do they try to find a middle ground, striving never to seem “extreme”) will seek the middle ground – the moderate way – and won’t see the larger implications of the issue at hand.
The argument pro-lifers need to make -- and Personhood makes this argument 100% of the time, while regulations may succeed in making it only 30% of the time -- is that there is an actual Right to Life which is inalienable as a principle, and may not be violated for any reason. That message comes through with Personhood, and it's making progress.
I’ll restate that too.
Personhood “suggests” to a citizen observer that abortion is most certainly NOT a policy question with a spectrum of possible solutions, but is rather a question of principles. Two principles, as it happens – either pro-life or pro-abortion. When the abortion “question” is posed as a principle, and not as a policy question, Americans are actually more likely to choose life instead of death.
Polls show something like 80-90% of Americans believe “there is a God,” even if most of them may not call themselves Christian or correctly follow the teachings of the true God. Believing in God suggests an absolute moral standard, and when the abortion question is measured against an absolute moral standard, very few Americans want to be caught on the wrong, or immoral, side. Since they’re forced to choose between a principle of “abortion is right and moral” versus “abortion is always wrong” one option stands out as more correct and more moral than the other.
That’s the “practical” reason why pro-lifers must reject regulations and embrace the Personhood strategy. The Personhood strategy accomplishes what we want to accomplish – a changing of hearts and minds in society – whereas regulations are far less effective in accomplishing the change we want.
Our message always gets muddled when we're talking about regulations, because every regulation inherently denies there is a Right to Life (if there were an inalienable, inviolable Right to Life, then there's nothing to regulate!).
Consider this line from the text of Roe v. Wade: "Endnote 54: When Texas urges that a fetus is entitled to Fourteenth Amendment protection as a person, it faces a dilemma. Neither in Texas nor in any other State are all abortions prohibited. Despite broad proscription, an exception always exists. The exception contained in Art. 1196, for an abortion procured or attempted by medical advice for the purpose of saving the life of the mother, is typical. But if the fetus is a person who is not to be deprived of life without due process of law, and if the mother's condition is the sole determinant, does not the Texas exception appear to be out of line with the Amendment's command?"
The US Supreme Court in 1972/73 didn't simply lay a roadmap for pro-lifers by noting that if you establish Personhood in law, you can protect the unborn as Persons. They also highlighted the logical error in the "pro-life with exceptions" mentality.
The key point is this: The Supreme Court logically concluded that because Texas had an exception to their anti-abortion statute*, Texas could not simultaneously argue that an unborn child was a Person under their law, because the two concepts – a regulation vs. a principle – are contradictory. The regulation always denies the principle, so if there exists a regulation, then the principle must not be the law of the land. It’s simple logic.
Ed Hanks
* A note on "life of the mother exceptions": Many pro-lifers get stuck on the “life of the mother” exception, because it’s the most compelling of the “hard cases” exceptions some regulations are meant to address (how many times have we heard politicians recite the line, "I oppose abortion except for rape, incest, and the life of the mother"?). But we need not fall victim even to the life of the mother objection. The Personhood movement cares deeply about the lives of both, mother and child, especially since if the mother dies before the baby comes to term, the child will obviously die too. However, that doesn’t mean we need a “life of the mother exception” in law. Instead, the anti-abortion statute should be absolute. The life of the mother is saved by a doctor trying to save both lives (and thereby “do no harm”), not by a doctor trying to kill one patient in order to save the other. It’s the same concept as separating cojoined twins. The goal should always be to preserve both lives. This is not always possible, because of relative viability, and so sometimes one of the patients dies. The measure of crime or not is intent. If ever the doctor attempts to kill one patient, rather than save him/her, that’s where it becomes homicide.
This is a more coherent recap & expansion on my earlier blog post on regulations, and why they undermine the Personhood of the unborn child -- "How We Compromise Ourselves."
I do not question the well-meaning intentions of those legislators who support, or even write, compromise legislation which tries to put limits on abortion in circumstances where a total abortion ban is not realistically possible. We can argue later about which is more "politically realistic" (I think Personhood is, still). But the fact that I believe in the good intentions of the pro-life regulators does not mean that I don't care whether they stop pushing regulations -- I do! -- or that I approve of what they're doing -- I don't! -- or that I will always continue to support regulation-minded legislators if they continue to ignore warnings about the unintended consequences of what they do.
I think the main thing “pro-life regulators” need to understand is that, whether or not Personhood is "practical" in a legal sense (which is the main objection of those pro-lifers who oppose the Personhood strategy, including Archbishop Charles Chaput and Clarke Forsythe of AUL), our primary problem as pro-lifers is that we've been making the wrong argument -- one which won't "change peoples' hearts" (which everybody agrees is the goal, and yet incrementalists are convinced they DO have the right argument).
The regulations may teach some people about the Right to Life, but more often (esp. for wishy-washy or "moderate" citizens, who are the ones we need to convince in order to succeed in passing legislation or electing legislators) regulations only suggest a "moderate" solution exists for what they are led to believe is a policy question -- where do you draw the line?
Let me restate that.
Regulations clearly “suggest” to a citizen observer that there’s a policy question, to which there are “extreme” solutions (to right or left) and “moderate” solutions. Typical American citizens being who they are, almost all of the people in this category (i.e. the moderate, middle-of-the-road people who don’t often think about policy issues, but when they do they try to find a middle ground, striving never to seem “extreme”) will seek the middle ground – the moderate way – and won’t see the larger implications of the issue at hand.
The argument pro-lifers need to make -- and Personhood makes this argument 100% of the time, while regulations may succeed in making it only 30% of the time -- is that there is an actual Right to Life which is inalienable as a principle, and may not be violated for any reason. That message comes through with Personhood, and it's making progress.
I’ll restate that too.
Personhood “suggests” to a citizen observer that abortion is most certainly NOT a policy question with a spectrum of possible solutions, but is rather a question of principles. Two principles, as it happens – either pro-life or pro-abortion. When the abortion “question” is posed as a principle, and not as a policy question, Americans are actually more likely to choose life instead of death.
Polls show something like 80-90% of Americans believe “there is a God,” even if most of them may not call themselves Christian or correctly follow the teachings of the true God. Believing in God suggests an absolute moral standard, and when the abortion question is measured against an absolute moral standard, very few Americans want to be caught on the wrong, or immoral, side. Since they’re forced to choose between a principle of “abortion is right and moral” versus “abortion is always wrong” one option stands out as more correct and more moral than the other.
That’s the “practical” reason why pro-lifers must reject regulations and embrace the Personhood strategy. The Personhood strategy accomplishes what we want to accomplish – a changing of hearts and minds in society – whereas regulations are far less effective in accomplishing the change we want.
Our message always gets muddled when we're talking about regulations, because every regulation inherently denies there is a Right to Life (if there were an inalienable, inviolable Right to Life, then there's nothing to regulate!).
Consider this line from the text of Roe v. Wade: "Endnote 54: When Texas urges that a fetus is entitled to Fourteenth Amendment protection as a person, it faces a dilemma. Neither in Texas nor in any other State are all abortions prohibited. Despite broad proscription, an exception always exists. The exception contained in Art. 1196, for an abortion procured or attempted by medical advice for the purpose of saving the life of the mother, is typical. But if the fetus is a person who is not to be deprived of life without due process of law, and if the mother's condition is the sole determinant, does not the Texas exception appear to be out of line with the Amendment's command?"
The US Supreme Court in 1972/73 didn't simply lay a roadmap for pro-lifers by noting that if you establish Personhood in law, you can protect the unborn as Persons. They also highlighted the logical error in the "pro-life with exceptions" mentality.
The key point is this: The Supreme Court logically concluded that because Texas had an exception to their anti-abortion statute*, Texas could not simultaneously argue that an unborn child was a Person under their law, because the two concepts – a regulation vs. a principle – are contradictory. The regulation always denies the principle, so if there exists a regulation, then the principle must not be the law of the land. It’s simple logic.
Ed Hanks
* A note on "life of the mother exceptions": Many pro-lifers get stuck on the “life of the mother” exception, because it’s the most compelling of the “hard cases” exceptions some regulations are meant to address (how many times have we heard politicians recite the line, "I oppose abortion except for rape, incest, and the life of the mother"?). But we need not fall victim even to the life of the mother objection. The Personhood movement cares deeply about the lives of both, mother and child, especially since if the mother dies before the baby comes to term, the child will obviously die too. However, that doesn’t mean we need a “life of the mother exception” in law. Instead, the anti-abortion statute should be absolute. The life of the mother is saved by a doctor trying to save both lives (and thereby “do no harm”), not by a doctor trying to kill one patient in order to save the other. It’s the same concept as separating cojoined twins. The goal should always be to preserve both lives. This is not always possible, because of relative viability, and so sometimes one of the patients dies. The measure of crime or not is intent. If ever the doctor attempts to kill one patient, rather than save him/her, that’s where it becomes homicide.
Tuesday, March 16, 2010
Pre-Caucus Update - Candidate Positions on Personhood & Life Issues
Note: 2014 Candidate Information (the information below is obsolete - from 2010)
Warning! -- Colorado Right to Life pulls no punches! You will see relatively conservative Republican candidates called out on these pages for not being sufficiently pro-life. If we ignore Democrats, and focus on Republicans, it's only because Democrats can be assumed to be pro-abortion unless otherwise noted, and because Republican candidates have a higher responsibility to support individual freedoms such as the Right to Life, and also because too many voters assume Republicans are pro-life.
One thing Colorado Right to Life has emphasized over the last few years is that candidates will lie about being pro-life -- voters CANNOT assume a Republican is pro-life, even if they say they are.
If a candidate says they’re pro-life, ask if they support the Personhood Initiative – that’s a good rule of thumb, because if they don’t support Personhood, then they do not believe in a God-given Right to Life from the moment of their biological development (i.e. conception/fertilization) and thereafter.
There are many levels of “pro-life” which candidates use, some of which are no more genuine than Bill Ritter or John Kerry, who may be “personally pro-life” but they’re politically supportive of abortion in at least some cases. Any candidate who believes abortion is okay for any reason is “pro-abortion with exceptions.”
Therefore, please note: The fact that a candidate self-identifies as “pro-life” or even the fact that we refer to them as “reasonably pro-life” or “substantially pro-life”, or having a “pro-life voting record” does NOT mean that CRTL endorses them, or even approves of them. There are many candidates who are in agreement with us on 80 or 90% of issues but who differ with us substantially on one or more issues which contradict their "pro-life" claims. Someone who supports embryonic destruction (i.e. Embyronic Stem Cell Research) is NOT pro-life -- they support the killing of some unborn children!
If a candidate says they support Personhood, and answers 6 out of 7 of our survey questions correctly, but have a reservation or opposition on one item, we may still consider them pro-life and worthy of support, or we may believe that one issue is such a “deal-breaker” so that we will not support them. We may even recommend pro-life voters not vote for them!
Unfortunately, pending discussions, this may be the case for one or more candidate for Governor of Colorado – as it stands now, neither leading candidate has provided sufficient assurances they will protect all unborn children, though we hope to get at least one of them to bring their views into accord with ours.
Remember that we cannot always say a candidate isn't pro-life just because they have not answered our candidate survey – last election there were several clearly pro-Personhood candidates who did not respond. Excuses are many, including that they did not receive the e-mail or letter, did not see it (we only send return-receipt for major office candidates, and then only late in the campaign), don’t respond to surveys as policy (not uncommon, and reasonably understandable) or just don’t have time to respond to surveys.
Our surveys this year were sent to legislative candidates late, because we have been 100% focused on the Personhood Initiative, which is almost on the ballot but not quite. We have not surveyed all offices at all levels (not sheriff or commissioner candidates, for instance), including candidates for Secretary of State, etc.
We also have not sent to very many third-party candidates yet, because most of them do not face primary opposition (i.e. their candidacy can safely be judged later).
Personhood – support for the God-given Right to Life from the beginning of a human’s biological development until natural death – is CRTL’s only real standard for judging a candidate’s qualifications, though we do challenge candidates on several questions which relate closely to Personhood but which may be considered separate issues.
(candidate names are in no particular order -- being listed first does NOT mean we favor them!)
Candidates Whose Positions We Know (More or Less):
Governor
John Hickenlooper (D) is known to be pro-abortion.
Scott McInnis (R – Former Congressman) is the establishment candidate who the GOP thinks is “the man to beat Hickenlooper,” and he’s running as a pro-life candidate. However, CRTL has a deep skepticism as to whether his pro-life stand is sincere. He claims to have a “pro-life voting record,” but many in the pro-life movement remember him as a pro-choice candidate on at least some issues (he was what we call “pro-abortion with exceptions” when in Congress).
National Right to Life (NRTL – no current affiliation with Colorado Right to Life) scored him at 94% or 100% in each of his last 5 terms in office, however, NRTL is known to “rig” their scorecards to support Republicans even if they are substantially pro-abortion. For instance, no candidate was ever scored up or down by NRTL based on their support of a Human Life Amendment – a candidate could have (and many did) voted against every instance when an HLA (basically, Personhood) was brought to a vote, and NRTL would still consider them “pro-life.” NRTL rarely considers support for embryonic stem cell research or chemical abortifacients as a disqualifier for 100% ratings. Scott McInnis also missed several of the votes NRTL scored (avoiding being graded down), and McInnis supported at least some taxpayer funding for abortions under military health plans, etc. Pro-life activists remember times when McInnis refused to support certain proposed pro-life legislation.
McInnis claims to have “changed” over the years, as he’s grown older and has grandchildren, etc. Pro-life campaign workers have vouched for him (but they would – they’re employed by him, and campaigns carry a certain degree of “hero worship” with all volunteers).
In speaking with a CRTL activist at a recent meeting, McInnis gave these cryptic responses: 1) he will not sign the Personhood petition (“we’re not signing petitions”), 2) he won’t publicly endorse Personhood, 3) he does support Personhood (this was a private statement to an activist – not an official statement), and he has told others to support Personhood. What you make of that odd mix depends on how much you trust his sincerity. Why he would “support Personhood” but not sign the petition or endorse it is confusing. And why he would tell others to support it while not endorsing it himself is also strange.
As the campaign moves forward, it’s possible he will agree to speak with CRTL officially, and perhaps he will change his mind. As it is, we must regard his “pro-life credentials” as suspect, and perhaps motivated by his election-year need for support from pro-lifers who have shown impressive strength in recent elections.
Dan Maes (R) is considered by many to be McInnis’ most realistic conservative rival. He has signed the Personhood petition, and he has responded to CRTL’s survey, which is a promising sign just by itself. However, there are some potentially major “issues” with his survey responses and other statements.
Maes answered 6 of our 7 questions correctly, and genuinely appears to support a Right to Life from conception to natural death. However, we’re concerned by statements such as “Roe v. Wade is the law of the land” and we’re puzzled by his survey answer on Embryonic Stem Cell Research (ESCR), where he answered “No” to whether he would oppose it.
In a phone conversation to clarify with a CRTL activist, Maes said he is opposed to ESCR except for those embryos already slated for destruction (i.e. similar to Pres. Bush’s quirky position of “no new embryos” but allowing medical experimentation on “existing lines”). CRTL has explained to him that this is like saying “you can’t imprison more Jews, but you can experiment on the ones already sentenced to death.”
Hopefully, he will reply back on that issue, and we very much hope that he will change his mind on that survey question and will become a “7 of 7” candidate – fully supportive of Personhood.
A wrong answer on ESCR, of course, means that the candidate doesn’t fully understand the concept of Personhood, which should protect any existing embryos from destructive medical experimentation, whether they’re “slated for destruction” or not.
Maes is new to the political scene, and as with many legislative candidates may not have had time to solidify his answers on all nuances of every policy. CRTL will work with him on this, but cannot recommend pro-lifers support him unless this matter is cleared up.
Republican candidate Yoon Mager’s website suggests she is “pro-abortion with exceptions” – i.e. that she supports some regulations or limits on abortion, but is otherwise supportive of the option.
Constitution Party candidate Ben Goss is known to be a strong supporter of Personhood, and has signed the Personhood petition. He hasn’t had time to reply to the CRTL issue survey.
There are other Republican candidates who we cannot find information on, or who do not have properly available contact information.
Secretary of State
This is an office where candidates will typically not take a position on anything but job-related skills. However, CRTL has reason to believe that both Republican candidates – Nancy Doty and Scott Gessler – are at least substantially pro-life, and presumably open to Personhood. We don’t have commitments from either. If either would like to fill out our survey, we welcome their responses.
Democrat incumbent Bernie Buescher is known to be pro-abortion.
Treasurer
This is another office where candidates usually stick to non-controversial job-skill-related competition, but this year an exception has occurred. There are three Republican candidates for Treasurer, and two of them have gotten into an exciting public contest to establish who is more pro-life!
Both JJ Ament and Ali Hasan claim to be pro-life. Ali Hasan has signed the Personhood petition, and has publicly recommended that “everyone” should sign it. JJ Ament asked for information on the Personhood Initiative, and a CRTL activist is awaiting a callback as to whether he will support the measure or not (he still has 2 days before it’s too late to sign the petition, too!). Ament seemed like he was very open to supporting Personhood, and just wanted to examine the particulars. His father, a well-known politician, was known to be pro-choice, but there’s nothing which says his son can’t be pro-life. We’ll let you know when we hear from him, for sure.
However, Ali Hasan has changed his mind also. Ament claims that until several months ago, Hasan supported all but late term abortions. CRTL has evidence that this is so, because Hasan responded to CRTL’s survey in 2008 (listed as Muhammad Ali Hasan in HD 56), answering only 2 of the 7 questions correctly. At that time, he said he respected our organization and was willing to dialogue with us on the issues – perhaps he’s given his positions some thought and has sincerely changed those positions which were at odds with ours. We hope this is so, but as with any candidate who claims to have abruptly changed his position on a controversial issue at election time, we should carefully consider before extending support. (*** see 6:30 update, below, for clarification on his position from Ali Hasan)
CRTL intends to work with both candidates (and Mr. Stapleton too, though we have not heard from him) on these issues.
This office is historically important because the Treasurer often becomes a stepping stone to the Governor's Office (Govs. Lamm, Romer and Owens, for instance).
Attorney General
Republican incumbent John Suthers says he is pro-life, but he publicly opposes the Personhood Initiative, preferring incremental regulatory limits.
Suthers’ office also did not cooperate with a request from pro-life groups to investigate Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains for failure to report teenage and pre-teen patients as possible rape cases (it is state law that underage pregnancies should be reported if there is a possibility that sexual abuse was involved).
US Senate
Michael Bennet (D) is clearly pro-abortion, supports federal funding, Obama’s health care, etc.
Tom Wiens (R) has a pro-life voting record, has attended CRTL functions in the past, and will probably support Personhood, though when approached about it he asked for information and said he would look at it – we expect him to support Personhood, based on past experience, but he has not confirmed yet (please ask him to!).
Ken Buck (R) is a strong candidate we consider very strongly pro-life and pro-Personhood, based on conversations with him. He is on record as supporting Personhood, though we are still waiting for him to return his candidate questionnaire.
Jane Norton (R) was non-committal when asked about Personhood, avoiding commitments on several occasions. We are trying to meet with her, but have not gotten on her schedule yet.
As a cabinet officer in the Owens administration, she did end taxpayer funding for abortion services, and we commend her for that.
However, she is known to support abortion in cases of rape, incest or to save the life of the mother (exceptions which CRTL opposes – see ), which automatically puts her at odds with the Personhood position of a Right to Life for every child from the beginning of biological development.
http://www.adcorepublicans.com/2010/01/candidate-survey-%E2%80%93-jane-norton-united-states-senate/
Cleve Tidwell (R) has responded to our survey, and answered correctly on 7 of 7 questions – he is strongly pro-Personhood. His responses to some other surveys on these issues are not as solid, but if he seems to do well in the next few days we will spend time with him to confirm his answers.
Steve Barton (R) has signed the Personhood petition, endorses Personhood, and appears to be strongly pro-Personhood.
1st Congressional District
Diana DeGette (D) is one of the most pro-abortion women in Congress. We believe there is a candidate named George Lilly running against her (Republican or Constitution Party), but we cannot find contact information.
2nd Congressional District
Again, Democrat incumbent Jared Polis is known to strongly support abortion.
Two Republicans and a Libertarian are known to be running also, but their positions on life issues are unknown. They may not have had time to respond – please help us with the process of garnering information if you know more than we do about their positions, or if you know them and can ask them to respond.
3rd Congressional District
Democrat incumbent John Salazar supports abortion.
Scott Tipton (R) has not had time to respond to our survey (he did not respond at all in 2008, though – a bad sign). Please encourage him to respond to the survey and prove our doubts wrong!
Bob McConnell (R) has responded to CRTL’s survey, and he answered 6 of 7 questions correctly – his only reservation was on the matter of supporting “regulatory” laws (which CRTL believes actually undermine the concept of Personhood, even though many pro-lifers believe regulations “save some babies”). This is a long-term discussion, and CRTL has been trying to educate the pro-life movement over a number of years, but many politicians still believe regulations are pro-life. On this particular matter, we believe strongly in a candidates’ good intentions, and we will attempt to work with the candidate to change their opinion eventually.
4th Congressional District
Democrat incumbent Betsy Markey defeated pro-Personhood Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave in 2008 using a pro-abortion, anti-social-conservative platform.
We first sent surveys to CD4 candidates in November, and both Cory Gardner (R) and Tom Lucero (R) quickly answered back with pro-Personhood “7 of 7” survey responses. Neither candidate indicated any reservations or exceptions to their support of Personhood – CRTL believes it is very promising to have two (and perhaps more) such strongly pro-life candidates in this race!
Cory Gardner also has a pro-life voting record (Tom Lucero has not been in a position to vote on life issues), Gardner was one of the standout legislators who have attended CRTL functions (legislative luncheons) in the past, and who supported Personhood at a press conference in 2008.
Gardner does have a record of supporting abortion regulations – i.e. “pro-life” legislation which means well but which may have unintended consequences – but as with other candidates this is something we regard as a matter of education and we will continue to work with Gardner on this.
He has indicated he will not support regulations in the future, and we will hold him to that.
The other two Republican candidates – Diggs Brown and Dean Madere – had not announced when we sent our first surveys, and they may not have had time to respond. Neither indicates a pro-life stance on their websites (if you know differently, please let us know).
Mike Nelson is a Unity Party candidate, and he responded to our survey that in no uncertain terms he supports “abortion rights” 100%. He is clearly hostile to the concept of Personhood.
5th Congressional District
To the best of our knowledge, pro-Personhood Congressman Doug Lamborn is running without primary opposition this year. While he has not yet responded to our survey, he has supported Personhood (Human Life Amendment) legislation at the national level and we are confident his support will continue.
6th Congressional District
Incumbent Republican Mike Coffman ran on a strong pro-Personhood platform in 2008, and we have no reason to believe that has changed
7th Congressional District
Democrat incumbent Ed Perlmutter is pro-abortion.
Republican Ryan Frazier has not responded to CRTL’s candidate survey, even after repeated requests over 5 months’ time. He is believed to be either pro-choice or not sufficiently pro-life in his stands, but we would love to hear if someone has evidence to the contrary. We’d love it even more if someone would ask him to return his survey!
There are other Republican candidates running, but they may not have had time to respond since many of them only entered recently.
Pro-Personhood candidate Jimmy Lakey, who quickly responded in November with a “7 of 7” survey record, has unfortunately decided not to continue in the race.
State Senate District 1
State House District 28
Update (6:30) - From Ali Hasan, to clarify his position (which sounds like it is similar to his "2 or 3 out of 7" position from 2008) -- we appreciate his honest answer, and will continue to dialogue with him in coming years. Thank you.
Here are my important stances:
1. Personhood - I did sign the Personhood petition, for the sake of getting that initiative onto the ballot.
2. Planned Parenthood - I do not support subsidizing abortions by sending money to Planned Parenthood.
3. Euthanasia - I am completely against all forms of euthanasia.
I hope that helps - peace and love to you and God Bless!
Ali Hasan
Republican Candidate for State Treasurer
Warning! -- Colorado Right to Life pulls no punches! You will see relatively conservative Republican candidates called out on these pages for not being sufficiently pro-life. If we ignore Democrats, and focus on Republicans, it's only because Democrats can be assumed to be pro-abortion unless otherwise noted, and because Republican candidates have a higher responsibility to support individual freedoms such as the Right to Life, and also because too many voters assume Republicans are pro-life.
One thing Colorado Right to Life has emphasized over the last few years is that candidates will lie about being pro-life -- voters CANNOT assume a Republican is pro-life, even if they say they are.
If a candidate says they’re pro-life, ask if they support the Personhood Initiative – that’s a good rule of thumb, because if they don’t support Personhood, then they do not believe in a God-given Right to Life from the moment of their biological development (i.e. conception/fertilization) and thereafter.
There are many levels of “pro-life” which candidates use, some of which are no more genuine than Bill Ritter or John Kerry, who may be “personally pro-life” but they’re politically supportive of abortion in at least some cases. Any candidate who believes abortion is okay for any reason is “pro-abortion with exceptions.”
Therefore, please note: The fact that a candidate self-identifies as “pro-life” or even the fact that we refer to them as “reasonably pro-life” or “substantially pro-life”, or having a “pro-life voting record” does NOT mean that CRTL endorses them, or even approves of them. There are many candidates who are in agreement with us on 80 or 90% of issues but who differ with us substantially on one or more issues which contradict their "pro-life" claims. Someone who supports embryonic destruction (i.e. Embyronic Stem Cell Research) is NOT pro-life -- they support the killing of some unborn children!
If a candidate says they support Personhood, and answers 6 out of 7 of our survey questions correctly, but have a reservation or opposition on one item, we may still consider them pro-life and worthy of support, or we may believe that one issue is such a “deal-breaker” so that we will not support them. We may even recommend pro-life voters not vote for them!
Unfortunately, pending discussions, this may be the case for one or more candidate for Governor of Colorado – as it stands now, neither leading candidate has provided sufficient assurances they will protect all unborn children, though we hope to get at least one of them to bring their views into accord with ours.
Remember that we cannot always say a candidate isn't pro-life just because they have not answered our candidate survey – last election there were several clearly pro-Personhood candidates who did not respond. Excuses are many, including that they did not receive the e-mail or letter, did not see it (we only send return-receipt for major office candidates, and then only late in the campaign), don’t respond to surveys as policy (not uncommon, and reasonably understandable) or just don’t have time to respond to surveys.
Our surveys this year were sent to legislative candidates late, because we have been 100% focused on the Personhood Initiative, which is almost on the ballot but not quite. We have not surveyed all offices at all levels (not sheriff or commissioner candidates, for instance), including candidates for Secretary of State, etc.
We also have not sent to very many third-party candidates yet, because most of them do not face primary opposition (i.e. their candidacy can safely be judged later).
Personhood – support for the God-given Right to Life from the beginning of a human’s biological development until natural death – is CRTL’s only real standard for judging a candidate’s qualifications, though we do challenge candidates on several questions which relate closely to Personhood but which may be considered separate issues.
(candidate names are in no particular order -- being listed first does NOT mean we favor them!)
Candidates Whose Positions We Know (More or Less):
Governor
John Hickenlooper (D) is known to be pro-abortion.
Scott McInnis (R – Former Congressman) is the establishment candidate who the GOP thinks is “the man to beat Hickenlooper,” and he’s running as a pro-life candidate. However, CRTL has a deep skepticism as to whether his pro-life stand is sincere. He claims to have a “pro-life voting record,” but many in the pro-life movement remember him as a pro-choice candidate on at least some issues (he was what we call “pro-abortion with exceptions” when in Congress).
National Right to Life (NRTL – no current affiliation with Colorado Right to Life) scored him at 94% or 100% in each of his last 5 terms in office, however, NRTL is known to “rig” their scorecards to support Republicans even if they are substantially pro-abortion. For instance, no candidate was ever scored up or down by NRTL based on their support of a Human Life Amendment – a candidate could have (and many did) voted against every instance when an HLA (basically, Personhood) was brought to a vote, and NRTL would still consider them “pro-life.” NRTL rarely considers support for embryonic stem cell research or chemical abortifacients as a disqualifier for 100% ratings. Scott McInnis also missed several of the votes NRTL scored (avoiding being graded down), and McInnis supported at least some taxpayer funding for abortions under military health plans, etc. Pro-life activists remember times when McInnis refused to support certain proposed pro-life legislation.
McInnis claims to have “changed” over the years, as he’s grown older and has grandchildren, etc. Pro-life campaign workers have vouched for him (but they would – they’re employed by him, and campaigns carry a certain degree of “hero worship” with all volunteers).
In speaking with a CRTL activist at a recent meeting, McInnis gave these cryptic responses: 1) he will not sign the Personhood petition (“we’re not signing petitions”), 2) he won’t publicly endorse Personhood, 3) he does support Personhood (this was a private statement to an activist – not an official statement), and he has told others to support Personhood. What you make of that odd mix depends on how much you trust his sincerity. Why he would “support Personhood” but not sign the petition or endorse it is confusing. And why he would tell others to support it while not endorsing it himself is also strange.
As the campaign moves forward, it’s possible he will agree to speak with CRTL officially, and perhaps he will change his mind. As it is, we must regard his “pro-life credentials” as suspect, and perhaps motivated by his election-year need for support from pro-lifers who have shown impressive strength in recent elections.
Dan Maes (R) is considered by many to be McInnis’ most realistic conservative rival. He has signed the Personhood petition, and he has responded to CRTL’s survey, which is a promising sign just by itself. However, there are some potentially major “issues” with his survey responses and other statements.
Maes answered 6 of our 7 questions correctly, and genuinely appears to support a Right to Life from conception to natural death. However, we’re concerned by statements such as “Roe v. Wade is the law of the land” and we’re puzzled by his survey answer on Embryonic Stem Cell Research (ESCR), where he answered “No” to whether he would oppose it.
In a phone conversation to clarify with a CRTL activist, Maes said he is opposed to ESCR except for those embryos already slated for destruction (i.e. similar to Pres. Bush’s quirky position of “no new embryos” but allowing medical experimentation on “existing lines”). CRTL has explained to him that this is like saying “you can’t imprison more Jews, but you can experiment on the ones already sentenced to death.”
Hopefully, he will reply back on that issue, and we very much hope that he will change his mind on that survey question and will become a “7 of 7” candidate – fully supportive of Personhood.
A wrong answer on ESCR, of course, means that the candidate doesn’t fully understand the concept of Personhood, which should protect any existing embryos from destructive medical experimentation, whether they’re “slated for destruction” or not.
Maes is new to the political scene, and as with many legislative candidates may not have had time to solidify his answers on all nuances of every policy. CRTL will work with him on this, but cannot recommend pro-lifers support him unless this matter is cleared up.
Republican candidate Yoon Mager’s website suggests she is “pro-abortion with exceptions” – i.e. that she supports some regulations or limits on abortion, but is otherwise supportive of the option.
Constitution Party candidate Ben Goss is known to be a strong supporter of Personhood, and has signed the Personhood petition. He hasn’t had time to reply to the CRTL issue survey.
There are other Republican candidates who we cannot find information on, or who do not have properly available contact information.
Secretary of State
This is an office where candidates will typically not take a position on anything but job-related skills. However, CRTL has reason to believe that both Republican candidates – Nancy Doty and Scott Gessler – are at least substantially pro-life, and presumably open to Personhood. We don’t have commitments from either. If either would like to fill out our survey, we welcome their responses.
Democrat incumbent Bernie Buescher is known to be pro-abortion.
Treasurer
This is another office where candidates usually stick to non-controversial job-skill-related competition, but this year an exception has occurred. There are three Republican candidates for Treasurer, and two of them have gotten into an exciting public contest to establish who is more pro-life!
Both JJ Ament and Ali Hasan claim to be pro-life. Ali Hasan has signed the Personhood petition, and has publicly recommended that “everyone” should sign it. JJ Ament asked for information on the Personhood Initiative, and a CRTL activist is awaiting a callback as to whether he will support the measure or not (he still has 2 days before it’s too late to sign the petition, too!). Ament seemed like he was very open to supporting Personhood, and just wanted to examine the particulars. His father, a well-known politician, was known to be pro-choice, but there’s nothing which says his son can’t be pro-life. We’ll let you know when we hear from him, for sure.
However, Ali Hasan has changed his mind also. Ament claims that until several months ago, Hasan supported all but late term abortions. CRTL has evidence that this is so, because Hasan responded to CRTL’s survey in 2008 (listed as Muhammad Ali Hasan in HD 56), answering only 2 of the 7 questions correctly. At that time, he said he respected our organization and was willing to dialogue with us on the issues – perhaps he’s given his positions some thought and has sincerely changed those positions which were at odds with ours. We hope this is so, but as with any candidate who claims to have abruptly changed his position on a controversial issue at election time, we should carefully consider before extending support. (*** see 6:30 update, below, for clarification on his position from Ali Hasan)
CRTL intends to work with both candidates (and Mr. Stapleton too, though we have not heard from him) on these issues.
This office is historically important because the Treasurer often becomes a stepping stone to the Governor's Office (Govs. Lamm, Romer and Owens, for instance).
Attorney General
Republican incumbent John Suthers says he is pro-life, but he publicly opposes the Personhood Initiative, preferring incremental regulatory limits.
Suthers’ office also did not cooperate with a request from pro-life groups to investigate Planned Parenthood of the Rocky Mountains for failure to report teenage and pre-teen patients as possible rape cases (it is state law that underage pregnancies should be reported if there is a possibility that sexual abuse was involved).
US Senate
Michael Bennet (D) is clearly pro-abortion, supports federal funding, Obama’s health care, etc.
Tom Wiens (R) has a pro-life voting record, has attended CRTL functions in the past, and will probably support Personhood, though when approached about it he asked for information and said he would look at it – we expect him to support Personhood, based on past experience, but he has not confirmed yet (please ask him to!).
Ken Buck (R) is a strong candidate we consider very strongly pro-life and pro-Personhood, based on conversations with him. He is on record as supporting Personhood, though we are still waiting for him to return his candidate questionnaire.
Jane Norton (R) was non-committal when asked about Personhood, avoiding commitments on several occasions. We are trying to meet with her, but have not gotten on her schedule yet.
As a cabinet officer in the Owens administration, she did end taxpayer funding for abortion services, and we commend her for that.
However, she is known to support abortion in cases of rape, incest or to save the life of the mother (exceptions which CRTL opposes – see ), which automatically puts her at odds with the Personhood position of a Right to Life for every child from the beginning of biological development.
http://www.adcorepublicans.com/2010/01/candidate-survey-%E2%80%93-jane-norton-united-states-senate/
Cleve Tidwell (R) has responded to our survey, and answered correctly on 7 of 7 questions – he is strongly pro-Personhood. His responses to some other surveys on these issues are not as solid, but if he seems to do well in the next few days we will spend time with him to confirm his answers.
Steve Barton (R) has signed the Personhood petition, endorses Personhood, and appears to be strongly pro-Personhood.
1st Congressional District
Diana DeGette (D) is one of the most pro-abortion women in Congress. We believe there is a candidate named George Lilly running against her (Republican or Constitution Party), but we cannot find contact information.
2nd Congressional District
Again, Democrat incumbent Jared Polis is known to strongly support abortion.
Two Republicans and a Libertarian are known to be running also, but their positions on life issues are unknown. They may not have had time to respond – please help us with the process of garnering information if you know more than we do about their positions, or if you know them and can ask them to respond.
3rd Congressional District
Democrat incumbent John Salazar supports abortion.
Scott Tipton (R) has not had time to respond to our survey (he did not respond at all in 2008, though – a bad sign). Please encourage him to respond to the survey and prove our doubts wrong!
Bob McConnell (R) has responded to CRTL’s survey, and he answered 6 of 7 questions correctly – his only reservation was on the matter of supporting “regulatory” laws (which CRTL believes actually undermine the concept of Personhood, even though many pro-lifers believe regulations “save some babies”). This is a long-term discussion, and CRTL has been trying to educate the pro-life movement over a number of years, but many politicians still believe regulations are pro-life. On this particular matter, we believe strongly in a candidates’ good intentions, and we will attempt to work with the candidate to change their opinion eventually.
4th Congressional District
Democrat incumbent Betsy Markey defeated pro-Personhood Congresswoman Marilyn Musgrave in 2008 using a pro-abortion, anti-social-conservative platform.
We first sent surveys to CD4 candidates in November, and both Cory Gardner (R) and Tom Lucero (R) quickly answered back with pro-Personhood “7 of 7” survey responses. Neither candidate indicated any reservations or exceptions to their support of Personhood – CRTL believes it is very promising to have two (and perhaps more) such strongly pro-life candidates in this race!
Cory Gardner also has a pro-life voting record (Tom Lucero has not been in a position to vote on life issues), Gardner was one of the standout legislators who have attended CRTL functions (legislative luncheons) in the past, and who supported Personhood at a press conference in 2008.
Gardner does have a record of supporting abortion regulations – i.e. “pro-life” legislation which means well but which may have unintended consequences – but as with other candidates this is something we regard as a matter of education and we will continue to work with Gardner on this.
He has indicated he will not support regulations in the future, and we will hold him to that.
The other two Republican candidates – Diggs Brown and Dean Madere – had not announced when we sent our first surveys, and they may not have had time to respond. Neither indicates a pro-life stance on their websites (if you know differently, please let us know).
Mike Nelson is a Unity Party candidate, and he responded to our survey that in no uncertain terms he supports “abortion rights” 100%. He is clearly hostile to the concept of Personhood.
5th Congressional District
To the best of our knowledge, pro-Personhood Congressman Doug Lamborn is running without primary opposition this year. While he has not yet responded to our survey, he has supported Personhood (Human Life Amendment) legislation at the national level and we are confident his support will continue.
6th Congressional District
Incumbent Republican Mike Coffman ran on a strong pro-Personhood platform in 2008, and we have no reason to believe that has changed
7th Congressional District
Democrat incumbent Ed Perlmutter is pro-abortion.
Republican Ryan Frazier has not responded to CRTL’s candidate survey, even after repeated requests over 5 months’ time. He is believed to be either pro-choice or not sufficiently pro-life in his stands, but we would love to hear if someone has evidence to the contrary. We’d love it even more if someone would ask him to return his survey!
There are other Republican candidates running, but they may not have had time to respond since many of them only entered recently.
Pro-Personhood candidate Jimmy Lakey, who quickly responded in November with a “7 of 7” survey record, has unfortunately decided not to continue in the race.
State Senate District 1
Sen. Greg Brophy (R) has a strong record of supporting Personhood (though like all other current pro-life officeholders, he also supports regulating abortion – we will continue efforts to change his mind). He has not returned his candidate survey yet, but we hope someone will remind him!
State Senate District 2
In a 3-way Republican primary, we do not yet have information on 2 of the candidates (Matt Heimerich and Talon Canterbury), but candidate Kevin Grantham’s website cites a pro-Personhood “life at fertilization” stand. If you know any of these candidates, please encourage them to return their CRTL surveys as soon as possible!
State Senate District 6
Unfortunately, Republican candidate Ellen Roberts (state representative) has a very bad record on abortion issues, having opposed CRTL’s position on several bills in the 2007-2008 legislation session. She is clearly NOT pro-life!
State Senate District 7
Republican candidate Steve King (state representative) voted in favor of “emergency contraception” (i.e. an abortifacient like Plan B or RU-486, which is intended to kill an already-conceived human child) in 2007. It’s his only black mark we’re aware of (we have not yet calculated the 2009-2010 legislative scorecard), but it’s not a good sign.
Senate District 9
This district features a primary contest between two Republicans of decidedly opposite persuasions.
Rep. Kent Lambert (R) is running for Sen. Schultheis’ senate seat. Lambert is one of the strongest pro-life votes in the legislature, and is pro-Personhood. Sadly he, along with all other current pro-life legislative officeholders, is still supporting regulations, but we hope he will change his mind if he wins this seat. We are hopeful.
His opponent, Thomas McDowell’s, only reason to run seems to be that he has a chip on his shoulder about pro-life legislators like Lambert and Schultheis, and he’s made opposition to Christians and socially conservative positions a centerpiece of his campaign.
Senate District 13
Sen. Scott Renfroe (R) is running for re-election. We believe Renfroe is the only current legislator who has run an actual pro-Personhood bill. Renfroe is very supportive of Personhood, and even took time from his busy day to oversee the petitions being turned in to the Sec. State’s office in 2008. Pro-life issues are central to his political philosophy.
Senate District 15
Two Republicans and two Democrats are running for this seat.
Rep. Kevin Lundberg is known as a strong leader of Colorado’s pro-life contingent in the legislature. Again, he’s not yet renounced regulations, but in 2008 he was honest about his continuing support for regulations, but also strongly supported Personhood. We remain hopeful that he will change his mind about regulations. He answered correctly on 6 of 7 questions (i.e. except for regulations) in 2008, and we’re waiting to hear from him on his 2010 survey.
Senate District 16
Two Republicans and two Democrats are running for this seat also.
One of the Republican candidates is former CRTL board member Tim Leonard, who has also run for Governor previously on the Constitution Party ticket. In the past, Leonard has supported Personhood, and we expect that he will continue to do so. We do await his candidate survey responses.
Senate District 22
Sen. Mike Kopp supports Personhood, but also supports regulations. We hope to work with him in the coming year on that issue.
Senate District 30
Sen. Ted Harvey supports Personhood, but also supports regulations. We hope to work with him in the coming year on that issue.
Remember – because CRTL believes “pro-life” regulatory measures promote the impression that abortion is approved by the state, and may have unintended consequences which could support abortion and undermine the concept of a Right to Life, CRTL does not believe “pro-regulation” legislators fully understand the Personhood concept, though we still believe they are sincere and well-meaning in their pro-life convictions.
There may be other senate candidates whose websites indicate a pro-life or pro-Personhood position. We have not had much time to research this, as we’ve been focused on the ballot initiative signature gathering process. If you have information on a candidate, please let us know by e-mailing office@coloradorighttolife.org.
State House District 5
This is a very odd race. Four Democrats are competing against each other in a primary. One of them is JJ Swiontek, who ran in 2008 as a Republican and who at that time answered the CRTL survey with a “7 of 7” pro-Personhood record! http://www.coloradorighttolife.org/Candidate%20Questionnaire.html
Now, we cannot be confident that he still holds those positions – has his conversion to the Democrat Party changed his outlook? But it’s at least possible that one of the Democrat candidates is still pro-Personhood. Whether his opinions have changed or not, it is a reasonable choice for him to run as a Democrat, since this district is heavily leaning in that direction, and because he has a fair chance to win in a 4-way race, even if most Democrats don’t trust him because of his party switch.
This will be an interesting one to watch!
State House District 14
Dr. Janak Joshi is the Republican candidate for this seat. His website indicates that he is pro-life because he is a doctor – if only more doctors felt that way!
We have no information as to whether he supports the Personhood Initiative. If you have information, we would welcome your help. Also, please encourage him to return his CRTL candidate survey so we can establish his positions for sure.
State House District 15
Rep. Mark Waller (R) is running for re-election. In the 2008 race his pro-life credentials were not very well established (his opponent in the primary was pro-Personhood), but he claims to be pro-life. He seems ambivalent about the Personhood Initiative, and we have no reason to believe he is now, or ever will support it.
Please encourage Rep. Waller to return his CRTL survey, and to support (or even sign) the Personhood Initiative.
State House District 17
There is a clear contrast here between two Republican candidates. Kit Roupe is well known to be “pro-choice” (pro-abortion) by her own admission.
Her opponent, Mark Barker, has signed the Personhood petition, supports Personhood, and regards it as one of the most important principles to be upheld by an officeholder. We do not yet have Barker’s candidate survey (he has not had much time to respond), but we expect to get a favorable reply back soon. Please encourage him to return the survey when he can.
State House District 18
Republican candidate Karen Cullen seemed unfamiliar with pro-life concepts, and didn’t exactly jump to call herself pro-life when quizzed at a candidate forum a week ago. She also flatly refused to support the Personhood Initiative (a Constitutional amendment) because she believes in “a clean Constitution.”
It is possible that she was entirely misunderstood, and she may believe she is pro-life. If so, it is important that she establish this by returning her candidate survey. Also, we hope that she will be open to dialogue, and will realize the relative moral importance of maintaining a “clean Constitution” versus saving the lives of tens of thousands of unborn children who are being murdered. Perhaps some people who know her can talk her into changing her mind!
Rep. Jim Kerr (R) is running for re-election. He has always called himself pro-life, and seems to have been sincere in meaning well. While CRTL has been concerned that he was not strongly pro-life in the past, and he did also support the 2007 “emergency contraception” legislation, we are encouraged to note that he signed the 2010 Personhood Initiative petition (one of at least 4 legislators to join the 2010 effort who did not publicly support the 2008 effort!) which seems to indicate he has shifted to be more solidly pro-life. Please pray for Jim and his stance on these issues, and encourage him to return his CRTL candidate survey.
State House District 32
Here is another clear contest between philosophies within the Republican Party.
Candidate Andrew Goad (R) has said “I would not vote to make abortion illegal,” and to all appearances is running as a pro-abortion candidate (perhaps supporting some limits).
Opponent Kaarl Hoopes (R) has signed the Personhood Initiative petition, and appears to be very strongly pro-life.
Neither candidate has had much time to return their candidate surveys, but if you know them please encourage them to do so.
State House District 44
Republican Minority Leader Mike May’s departure has caused a busy primary to replace him. We understand candidate Dustin Zvonek has decided not to run for this seat, leaving three Republican primary contenders.
The candidates have not had much time to respond to the CRTL candidate survey, but one candidate – Chris Holbert – quickly returned his survey with “7 of 7” pro-Personhood answers marked. We hope to hear soon that some or all of the others are as strongly pro-life.
State House District 46
The only Republican running in this district is Steven Rodriguez, who quickly answered CRTL’s survey with a “7 of 7” pro-Personhood response.
State House District 49
Rep. BJ Nikkel (R) is running for election to a seat she was appointed to mid-term – 1 year ago. She is one of the “new faces” on the steps of the Capitol at pro-life events, and she is supporting Personhood. We haven’t received her survey yet, but we’re hopeful that she will develop into a strong pro-life leader.
Nikkel has a primary opponent – Ray Walter, who we have no information on. Conventional wisdom from the history of Republican politics suggests that if he’s running against a pro-life candidate, there’s a likelihood he is pro-choice, but without more solid information it’s unfair to make a judgment to that effect. We would welcome any more information, pro or con.
Please encourage both candidates to return their candidate surveys.
State House District 65
Rep. Jerry Sonnenberg (R) is running for re-election, so far unopposed. He is another of the strongly pro-life legislators who is pro-Personhood.
Remember – because CRTL believes “pro-life” regulatory measures promote the impression that abortion is approved by the state, and may have unintended consequences which could support abortion and undermine the concept of a Right to Life, CRTL does not believe “pro-regulation” legislators fully understand the Personhood concept, though we still believe they are sincere and well-meaning in their pro-life convictions.
There may be other house candidates whose websites indicate a pro-life or pro-Personhood position. We have not had much time to research this, as we’ve been focused on the ballot initiative signature gathering process. If you have information on a candidate, please let us know by e-mailing office@coloradorighttolife.org.
If you have any questions about this information -- or if you have information to add -- please contact Donna at Colorado Right to Life (303-753-9394) or at office@coloradoRTL.org. Please don't be angry with her, if that's why you're calling, because she didn't collect or post this information. We are very interested in correcting any errors of fact or judgment on these pages, so please help us make this as correct as it can be (we will require verification of some type if your information contradicts the information we have).
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