Core of Conviction : My Story (9781101563571)

by Bachmann, Michele

  Okay, I thought now, because I’m the official Republican nominee, I will get real help from the state GOP. But once again, I was naive. I had beaten a long-sitting member of the senate and some of the other members weren’t amused.

  And of course, the Minnesota senate hadn’t been Republican since the early seventies. Even Ronald Reagan couldn’t carry our state in 1984, even as he won the other forty-nine. Indeed, Minnesota has given its votes to the Democrats in twelve of the last thirteen presidential elections, and 2000 was no exception—Al Gore won the Gopher State that year.

  Meanwhile, my Democratic opponent in November was positioning himself as a moderate. That was typically what liberal Democrats did in Minnesota for the general election. For my part, I campaigned as a far right conservative. And if the traditional media weren’t interested in reporting on that message, happily I had newer media that were eager to cover my insurgent candidacy. I was on talk radio that fall, in particular the Jason Lewis show on KSTP-AM, 1500. And so I won—by almost twelve points, in fact. The voters of the 56th state senate district had put their trust in me, and I was determined to represent them and their view. The first Minnesota Tea Partier had been elected!

  So two months later, in January 2001, as a newly sworn-in member of the 82nd Minnesota legislature, I set to work on the agenda I had campaigned for—improving education, of course, and also protecting life, lowering the tax burden, reducing spending, and improving the overall business climate. I expected that the Democrats would oppose much of what I had in mind, but I had not expected blowback from fellow Republicans.

  I had become familiar with St. Paul politics as an education activist. I had appeared with politicians, debated with politicians, even testified before them in the state legislature. So I knew that sometimes politicians would talk a good conservative game at home, and then play the go-along-get-along game in St. Paul, thus letting the liberals have their way. I knew that the public picture was not always the true picture.

  Yet even so, once I could see legislative workings from the inside, I saw that the problem was much worse. I would introduce bills to do what Republicans should do—what they had promised to do—and I’d find that support for dismantling big government wasn’t a given. I introduced bills to eliminate the state inheritance tax and the state capital gains tax; I sought to guarantee needed taxpayer protections in a formal taxpayer bill of rights. After all, Minnesota had one of the highest tax burdens in the nation, and it was hurting us. We weren’t just losing jobs to countries overseas, such as Mexico or China; we were losing jobs to states next door, such as the Dakotas.

  Yet for the most part, these reform efforts gained little traction, primarily because I was a fiscal and social conservative serving in an ultraliberal-dominated, Democratic-controlled state senate. I quickly noticed a pattern: The issues that some Republicans campaigned for in their districts seemed far less important to them once they got to St. Paul. And that’s when I learned a basic truth: Not all Republicans wanted to fight, and even fewer were willing to take on issues that seemed “messy”—that is, issues that the liberal media championed. In the senate, stubborn and entrenched liberals were the norm, so discouragement went with the territory. Indeed, in the three decades that Republicans had been in the minority in St. Paul, for some a mind-set of passive acceptance had set in. Some would see the liberals feasting on political pork—which is to say, feasting on our tax money—and so would be careful not to upset the liberals in hope of a little project for their district. In return for such docile behavior, the liberal leadership would usually drop some little morsel onto the floor so that hungry Republicans could scamper after it. The general rule for Republicans was “Don’t ever say anything bad about the Democratic leadership.” Indeed, this behavior was so endemic that the minority leader of the senate Republicans actually became a Democrat. And in a few years, the Democrats made him their majority leader! In other words, in the case of some Republican members, little or no difference, philosophically, could be detected between them and the ultraleft liberals.

  So a committed conservative in the state senate back then not only had to oppose the dominant liberal Democrats but also had to overcome the lethargy of prolonged service in the minority. Fortunately, we had some steadfast fighters on our side. One such fighter was state senator Warren Limmer of nearby Maple Grove. He’s always been true blue—or, I should say, true red. Together we would fight the good fight, with the help of other stalwart members.

  For a while I served on the Jobs, Housing and Community Development Committee. Once again, as with Goals 2000, nice-sounding names—who could be against “jobs, housing and community development”?—were used as cover for the usual bankrupt, and bankrupting, liberalism. In addition to the standard routine of waste, fraud, and abuse, I discovered that the bureaucrats we were supposed to be watching had a bookkeeping problem, not because they were corrupt but because they couldn’t keep track of their money. Some bureaucrats admitted that they were off by some $75 million; they literally didn’t know which number was correct. But instead of fixing the problem, the bureaucrats just asked for more money. In that committee, we routinely listened to government emissaries, all saying, let’s have more spending, spending, spending. Liberal members of the committee used that time to cultivate relationships with lobbyists; a few of us just voted no and threw up our hands.

  So you can see how easy it was to be swayed by the business-as-usual nature of the state legislature. If you wanted to make friends and move up, you had to do things their way.

  But for some legislators, when pressure is applied, they grow stronger in their convictions. That was true for some of us on the right, and it was also true for some on the left. For example, during my first term in the state senate, I met U.S. senator Paul Wellstone. He was a firebrand leftist, but he had an honest heart. He was not cynical; he was sincere. He told you where he was coming from, and if you disagreed with him, he would respect that disagreement, and do his best to beat you. He was true to his ideology until he and his wife were tragically killed in a plane crash.

  Indeed, we are all subject to fate and the forces of history. On a bright Tuesday morning in September 2001, the course of American history was changed by those nineteen evil hijackers. Nearly three thousand Americans died, and the lives of three hundred million were altered forever. I was at home on 9/11, and as the news unfolded, I thought immediately of my brother living near New York City and my stepbrother working at the Pentagon. It turned out they were both fine, thank God.

  Yet we all knew that more brave Americans would die during the coming global war on terrorism. I was proud of President George W. Bush for traveling to the ruins of the World Trade Center, showing solidarity with those firefighters and rescue workers. And I was proud too when he appeared before a joint session of Congress and declared that Uncle Sam would go on the offensive against the terrorists, as well as against the regimes that harbored them. As we watched the president on TV, I said to Marcus, “There is a strong man.” I saw in his eyes the resolve of a patriot committed to protecting his country. At that moment, he completely grew into his young presidency and assumed full command. America was a safer and better place because of his stout heart and conviction.

  Yet at the same time, back in Minnesota, we still had our work to do. I had always opposed wasteful spending, but now, during wartime, it seemed all the more horrible that we were spending money on foolish projects. We needed that money for the military, I said to myself, or else we needed it as savings in our pockets. We needed fiscal prudence and safety, not the same old money wasting.

  So I will admit I was disappointed to see President Bush work with Democratic senator Teddy Kennedy and future House Speaker John Boehner to push through the No Child Left Behind Act, which the president signed into law in early 2002. No Child Left Behind was an updated Goals 2000, imposing new mandates on all fifty states—the same federal government good
intentions leading to the same downward educational results. We made progress toward the repeal of the Profile of Learning in our state, and yet in the United States as a whole, we were handing local classrooms over to the federal bureaucracy.

  Still, in 2002 we scored some successes. For example, we passed the Woman’s Right to Know Act, which requires that twenty-four hours before an abortion takes place the pregnant mother be given important information; she is to be told the gestational age of her unborn child, she is to learn about the medical risks associated with the abortion procedure, and she is to receive an in-depth explanation of the abortion procedure itself, including the baby’s ability to feel pain during the termination of its life.

  As I have often said, the one issue that we absolutely have to get right is life. As Jesus told us in Matthew 25:40, “Verily I say unto you, inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have done it unto me.” And surely the least among us is an unborn child.

  Enacting Woman’s Right to Know was landmark progress. Yet it was still not the best response to the tragedy of abortion; the best response is a constitutional amendment protecting life as part of a renewed national reverence for the life culture. But at the same time, Right to Know was significant progress, because very few mothers, if any, truly don’t want their own children. I felt gratified that we had managed to secure this protection. We pro-life activists had come a long way since the eighties, when we would stand in prolonged vigils outside St. Paul–Ramsey Medical Center in St. Paul. In those days, Marcus and I would take our little children with us, to stand out there in the cold with Pro-Life Action Ministries. They might not always have understood what was going on—at their tender age, it was probably best they didn’t—but when I gazed at them and held their tiny little hands, I remembered why I was there.

  Meanwhile, the liberal establishment made it clear it was aiming to get rid of me. In the wake of the 2000 census, Minnesota redistricted its legislative seats, and in 2002 I was thrown into the same senate district as a ten-year female Democratic incumbent, the chair of the powerful Environment Committee. She was a strong candidate boasting a strong fund-raising base among liberal-leaning environment and education constituencies. And of course, given my opposition to the Profile of Learning, the teachers’ unions and their allies were out in force. She had money from the party and the lobbyists—the special interests. I was their foe and thus their target. Those words helped me too; I knew I would have to rely, once again, on God. For my part, I did what I always did: I worked hard. Door to door, driving around, introducing myself to folks in my new district. Yet of course, my opponent faced a challenge too—she was a liberal. For my part, I focused on commonsense conservative issues, including opposition to the Profile, and in November I won by more than nine points.

  So in 2003 I was sworn in for my second term in the state senate. And we were joined by a new governor to replace Jesse Ventura; “The Body” had wisely decided not to seek reelection. The new chief executive was Republican governor Tim Pawlenty; finally, a few months later, we were able to repeal the Profile.

  That same year, 2003, brought sad news. My father died in August. The word came early in the morning. It was a mile-maker moment. He had traveled a hard road in life, and sometimes he had made it harder for himself and for others, but he was my dad and I will always honor him.

  Meanwhile, perhaps the biggest news to confront me in the legislature didn’t come from Minnesota but from a different state altogether—Massachusetts. On November 18, 2003, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court ruled that same-sex couples had a legal right to marry and the court further ordered the Massachusetts state legislature to pass a law to that effect. How dare the court order legislators to pass a law in conformity with their personal morality and opinion of a bare majority of justices—the vote was four to three—not in conformity with the majority of people in the Bay State. America had always agreed that marriage should be reserved for one man and one woman. In addition, our Constitution prefers that the courts should interpret the law, not make the law. Otherwise, legislators are irrelevant, as is the will of the people.

  Of course, at the same time, I wasn’t completely surprised by the Massachusetts ruling, because I knew that judges had gotten in the habit of legislating from the bench. I could see why judges might like to run the whole government; the only problem was, it’s unconstitutional. Indeed, in the U.S. Constitution, the judicial branch is listed third, in Article III. Thomas Jefferson said that the courts were to be the least powerful of the three branches of government. The federal branches are equal, but at the same time, James Madison chose to enumerate the powers of the judiciary after those of the other two branches. But here we were now, confronting a whole new vista of judicial activism, and who was to say it would stop with Massachusetts? Minnesota had a “DOMA” statute, modeled after the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act that was passed with strong bipartisan support in the U.S. Congress and signed by President Clinton. But even so, I could see the possibility that the Minnesota Supreme Court could copy the Massachusetts ruling. That meant there was only one sure way to stop such a ruling: Pass a constitutional amendment in the state of Minnesota.

  And so I began working on the most controversial issue of my time in the state senate. Working with my colleague Warren Limmer and other like-minded senators and house members, in January 2004 I put into the hopper a bill to start the process of amending the state constitution. Such an amendment would have to pass both houses of the state legislature and then be ratified by popular vote across the state. In other words, my proposing a marriage amendment was a first step. Yet the liberals and the left were opposed even to the hint of a move that might undo their judicial oligarchy. And so the fury against me personally was ferocious. If you can think of a bad name, I was called it—many times.

  The Democratic leadership of the state senate was opposed to my amendment, and that was their right. Yet in addition, they used every possible maneuver to stop me from proceeding with the bill—and that was not right. That is, they were desperate to prevent a simple up-or-down vote, first in the committee they controlled, then in the legislative body as a whole. And when I walked into the chamber, enough Democrats would leave so that a quorum was no longer present; when I tried to speak, they would rule me out of order. Once, when I was speaking, they cut off my microphone in midspeech.

  So what did my side do? We just kept working at it. We counted our votes in the senate; we built grassroots support around the state. And that’s what really scared the liberal establishment. They were afraid we had the votes to pass the amendment—votes from most Republican legislators, from some of the Democratic legislators, and, most crucial, from the people of Minnesota.

  For two years in a row, we conservatives had staged big rallies in front of the state capitol; the people of the state wanted a chance to vote on the bill. But the liberals were against us. Liberal dominance in the state senate prevented us from moving the bill. Seven years later, in 2010—after the Minnesota senate and house both went Republican for the first time in thirty-eight years—the bill was passed by both chambers and so will be on the ballot in 2012. After seven years of persistence, the people of Minnesota will finally get the chance to vote on an amendment stating the traditional definition of marriage. And as in thirty-three other states, I’m confident that the voters of Minnesota will define marriage as one man and one woman. The conservative profamily activists of Minnesota and their representatives deserve the credit for this achievement. It was their heart and their soul that stood strong. They persisted, and finally moved this effort toward a popular conclusion. Yet at the same time, the marriage fight reminded me of something important: Effective politics isn’t just a matter of accumulating votes inside a legislative chamber. Nor is politics just a matter of building a popular movement outside a legislative chamber. Instead, effective politics is both—the inside game and the outside game. That wa
s the model we employed on the marriage issue, and it was the model I would use again when I came to Washington, D.C.

  Meanwhile, in early 2005, after I had gained clout within the state senate, I was appointed to be an assistant minority leader. Yet within a few months, my new spot in the Republican leadership put me in uncomfortable cross fire. A fight was brewing over the state budget. That fight led to a partial government shutdown, and in the resulting tumult, a compromise solution was reached that included a seventy-five-cent increase in the cigarette tax. The measure wasn’t called a “tax increase,” it was dubbed instead a “health impact fee.” I did my best to remove the cigarette “fee” from the overall compromise, but after the tax increase was locked in, I faced an agonizing choice: The compromise legislation also contained a strong pro-life provision—recognizing fetal pain—and so the compromise had the strong support of Minnesota Citizens Concerned for Life, a key pro-life ally. In other words, to vote against the tax increase was to vote against the fetal pain provision, and I just couldn’t do that. The power brokers had cleverly wired the bill so that conservatives had to choose one value or the other. I believe you can recover money, but you can’t recover life; so I chose life. It was a difficult moment, but I made the right decision.

  Having made that difficult vote, I immediately proposed a stand-alone bill to strip out the tax increase without affecting the important pro-life provision. But of course, the power brokers wanted nothing to do with that.

  I have always told myself, my family, my colleagues, and my constituents that I would consistently vote my conscience, and that’s what I did. And so, of course, that made me expendable; I was soon out of the GOP leadership.