Democrat Representatives Keith Ellison (5^th District), Betty McCollum (4^th District), James Oberstar (8^th District), Tim Walz (1^st District) and Collin Peterson (7^th District) all voted for the American Clean Energy and Security Act (ACES). Collin Peterson chairs the House agriculture committee and initially expressed reservations about the bill because of the disproportionate impact it would have on farmers and rural communities. In the end, his Democrat colleagues got him back in the boat, though and he voted to pass the bill.

 

Freshman Republican Erik Paulsen (3^rd District)  voted no and immediately released a YouTube video explaining his reasons.

 

6^th District Republican Michele Bachmann, a staunch opponent of cap-and-trade-style swindles, predictably voted no on ACES, as did Second District Republican John Kline.

 

The Cap and Trade bill passed the U. S. House by a mere 7 votes and is now headed to the Senate for their approval before being passed to President Obama’s eager hands for a speedy signature.

HR 2454, the "Cap and Tax" bill known as ACES was brought to the floor of the United States House of Representatives today. A 300 page amendment to the over 1,000 page bill was brought forward at 3:09 this morning and a final, official copy of the bill was not available to House members during debate on passage of the bill.

House Republicans repeatedly inquired about the whereabouts of a printed copy of the final bill and were rebuffed by the Democrat chair. In short, virtually no one had read the bill being considered for final passage.

Shortly before 6:30 PM CST, a roll call vote on final passage was called. The bill was passed by a vote of 219 – 212. 211 Democrats voted for passage with 43 Democrats voting no. 8 Republicans voted in favor of passage with 168 of them voting no. One Democrat didn’t vote and 2 Republicans didn’t vote.

The cap and trade bill will now move to the U. S. Senate for their consideration. If it passes there, it’s on its way to becoming law by the stroke of President Obama’s pen.

Far more Democrats voted against the bill than Republicans voted for it, which is telling in a broad sense when considered in light of the wishes of the American electorate – most of whom oppose this bill.

One could say that a lack of Republican unity was responsible for the bill’s passage. Had the tiny minority of Republican congressmen who voted in favor of the bill abstained, or voted no, the bill would have failed.

The American people are under assault by officials in the federal government. Under the specious guise of saving the planet, they intend to fleece the people to benefit political allies, powerful money interests and a political agenda that is in direct opposition to the American way of life.

 

By President Obama’s own admission, with a cap and trade scheme like the Waxman- Markey Bill, “electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket.”

 

 

Even if the hotly contested claims of carbon-driven manmade global warming were to be believed, the touted climate benefit of the Waxman-Markey bill is that global surface temperatures will be one tenth of one degree cooler than currently projected in one hundred years. 

ACES comes with an incredible price tag and promises no significant short or long-term benefit to either the American people or the global climate. This bill is nothing but another attempt to at a massive power and money grab by Washington’s elite.

To enrich a few powerful financial beneficiaries, like producers of wind turbines, and carbon trading firms such as the one former vice president and climate-alarmist-in-chief Al Gore profits from, Waxman-Markey is poised to decrease our national gross domestic product by $7 trillion dollars or more and cost another 1.9 million jobs, while adding sharply to the average families’ financial burden. Electricity rates could increase as much as 90% (nearly double what you now pay), Gasoline prices could rise 75%. 

 

 

 

In January, Minnesota Majority joined a coalition of nine non-profit groups with the common goal of finding solutions to Minnesota’s $6.4 billion budget deficit that wouldn’t add to the taxpayers’ burden. Upon learning of the governor’s unallotment plan released on Tuesday, Minnesota Majority’s president, Jeff Davis said, “Mission accomplished.”

 

In April, the Minnesota Budget Solutions Coalition, which Minnesota Majority was a member of, released a policy brief outlining $6.6 billion in suggested budget cuts to solve the deficit without raising new taxes or even requiring “bailout money” from the federal government. The governor’s plan is far more moderate, but the end result is the same. The state’s budget will be in balance and taxes haven’t been increased.

 

“We didn’t get everything, but we’re very pleased with this outcome,” said Davis. 

Minnesota Majority is encouraging people to keep pressure on local governments to prevent the LGA cuts being used as an excuse to hike property taxes. “Counties and cities are screaming bloody murder, but the local government aid payments have only been cut about 3% and many communities were completely exempted from unallotment. While state government is responsibly tightening it’s belt along with Minnesota’s families and businesses, there’s no reason that local governments can’t do the same,” Davis explained. “It’s a matter of priorities. For example, St. Paul threatened to cut fire and police services if they didn’t get funding for a new ice hockey rink downtown.” 

Take Action: Write a letter to the editor about the governor's unallotment plan.

We are the majority – let’s start acting like it.

A new Gallop poll reinforces what we at Minnesota Majority have always known. The American people are center-right philosophically. The poll found that the largest self-identified political group are conservatives at 40%. By contrast, just 21% identify themselves as liberals. 35% said they think of themselves as moderates.

The center-right demographic could be more aptly termed “right-center” based on the breakdown in the Gallop poll’s findings. Politically right and center people account for 75% of the population, with 9% saying they are “very conservative” compared to just 5% who say they are “very liberal.”

With the overwhelming majority of Americans in the center-right category, one has to ask how our nation’s policies have drifted so far to the left. The answer is somewhat complicated, but the key is cohesion. The Republican Party has long been considered the home of modern conservatism, but scores of Republicans who’ve been elected have strayed far from their party’s conservative platform. The conservative movement has become fractured for numerous reasons including divisive internal party politics, infighting and boutique issue organizations.

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, Conservatives had built an incredibly strong national coalition that set aside differences to strive for common goals. That coalition was largely taken for granted, hasn’t been nurtured and worse, factions have been deliberately turned against one another in the interest of short-term power plays. The result is a nation ruled by a small minority, because conservatives have forgotten the importance of working together.

In Minnesota, we’ve seen the power of building coalitions and working together. The Minnesota Budget Solutions Coalition (sometimes informally called the “Budget Hawks”) consisted of 9 non-profit conservative organizations that occasionally consulted with legislators like Representative Steve Drazkowski, who had the initial coalition-building vision and started the different groups meeting together. The coalition’s goal was to solve the state’s $6.4 billion budget shortfall without raising taxes. Now at the end of session, we can clearly say “mission accomplished.”

The “misery tour” of sham legislative budget “listening sessions designed to conjure up justification for tax hikes was deflated by activists rallied and informed by the coalition member organizations.

The Budget Solution Document produced by the group was distributed to tens of thousands of Minnesotans, and to every state legislator and the governor. Some of the ideas offered found their way into bills and became law. The governor’s office is now engaged in unallotment planning. We expect that more of the coalitions ideas will be implemented in that process.

That is the power of working together instead of bunkering down in our separate factionalized camps. We are the majority. Let’s start acting like it by working together and reasserting our influence in the process. If we all pull together, we can move mountains. Let’s start by determining which mountain we can all agree on and start pulling.

Take Action: Join the Majority with a free membership to Minnesota Majority today.

Today, Minnesota Majority announced the discovery of individuals who were deceased prior to November 4, 2008, yet have voter history records on the secretary of state’s files that indicate they voted in the 2008 General Election.

 

Minnesota Majority employed a data enhancement service to flag potentially deceased individuals on Minnesota’s voter registration file. Over 2,800 individuals who voted in the 2008 general election were flagged as being “deceased” prior to the election. Minnesota Majority then selected a sample of a dozen records for additional investigation. A representative drove to addresses listed on voter registration records. Interviews conducted with residents or neighbors confirmed that at least 5 individuals from the sample were deceased, the latest having died in March 2007.

 

Deputy Secretary of State Jim Gelbmann said that the records of the 5 dead voters were erroneously updated with a vote history by election workers and were not examples of fraud.

 

“The first problem with their explanation is that there should not even be deceased individuals on the voter rolls”, said Jeff Davis, president of Minnesota Majority.

 

Minnesota statute 201.13 says that the commissioner of health is to provide the secretary of state with a monthly report of residents who have died. The secretary of state is then responsible for working with county auditors to update voter registration records to flag the records of deceased individuals.

 

“The second problem with the secretary of state’s explanation is that it basically acknowledges the lack of controls in the way in which voter history updates are being captured and recorded,” said Davis. “If the proper controls had been in place, this situation would not have occurred.”

 

Minnesota Majority originally notified Secretary of State Mark Ritchie that there was evidence that a significant number of deceased people were present on the voter registration file in a letter dated October 16, 2008. “Even having been notified of this problem in advance of the election, the secretary appears to have failed to take corrective action,” said Davis. “Bottom line. Election officials have failed to obey the law, thus making our election system vulnerable to errors and abuse.”

 

As to the question of whether any fraud involving dead voters occurred in the past election, Minnesota Majority says this question must still be answered. “There are still 2800 records that need to be reviewed,” said Davis. 

 

On Friday, May 29, Secretary of State Mark Ritchie publically acknowledged that Minnesota’s election records are out-of-balance and that counties were late in reporting their results. “We owe Secretary of State Ritchie thanks,” said Jeff Davis, president of Minnesota Majority and one of the plaintiffs in a lawsuit against the Secretary of State and county election officials. “Secretary Ritchie basically made our case for us.” Ritchie’s statement is an admission in the plaintiff’s interest and admissible as evidence in court.

 

Secretary Ritchie acknowledged in Friday’s Star Tribune that Minnesota’s election records were out-of-balance by 30,000 to 40,000 records. “If the discrepancy is now down to 30,000 votes, at least that’s progress,” said Davis, “But it really doesn’t matter if the number is 3,000 or 30,000. The fact is that counties are very late in meeting their statutorily required obligations and election records still don’t balance – that is the essence of our case.” 

 

Plaintiffs in the case decided to amend their petition based upon Ritchie’s statement and new evidence discovered on Friday. The amended petition expands the list of county officials named in the suit and should minimize or eliminate the need for discovery. “Because the plaintiffs will rely on statements of fact made by the Secretary of State, there should be no dispute about the facts. That both simplifies and strengthens the case, and will probably lower its cost,” said Erick Kaardal, legal counsel in the case.

 

Interviewed for a revised Star Tribune Story posted May 28th, Secretary of State Mark Ritchie admitted that there is a discrepancy between vote totals in the official election canvassing report and votes reported in the statewide voter registration system. He stated "you'll never get a perfect correlation between the two." He acknowledged a mismatch of vote totals, stating his goal was to eventually reconcile the number to within 1,000 and referred the reporter to the counties to "ask about their own numbers."

 

Ritchie's comments are in response to the lawsuit filed against the secretary of state alleging that his office and several county election officials have failed to update the statewide voter registration system with the 2008 election results within the statutorily mandated timeframes.

 

See the Star Tribune Story here.

 

 

DFL Legislators tried to raise taxes up until the very last minutes of the legislative session that officially ended Monday at midnight. House leadership had hoped to enact $1 billion in new taxes and $381 million in new Health and human Services spending over the governor’s objection, but the House Republican Caucus held together, standing firm against the two veto override attempts. The Governor has promised no special session and the legislature is adjourned.

 

In a crafty move, Governor Pawlenty signed spending bills, but vetoed the tax hikes. The end result is an unbalanced budget, but with no possibility of a government shutdown like those that resulted from past budget negotiation impasses. With a budget shortfall to rear its head while the legislature is out of session, the governor will have the executive authority to unallot funding to bring the budget into balance. The budget will therefore be balanced via spending cuts without any tax-hikes.

 

The governor had indicated that he’d be willing to work with the legislature on alternatives to solving the budget, but the governor held firm on his word that tax hikes were out of the question. Democrats in control of the House and Senate were completely unwilling to consider any budget solution that didn’t include tax increases, but the governor’s move, bolstered by a cohesive House GOP caucus rendered the tax-raisers powerless.

 

Take Action: Governor Pawlenty has demonstrated an unwavering commitment to hold the line on taxes and brilliant strategic leadership on the budget issue. Contact Governor Pawlenty’s office now to thank the governor for stopping plans for big tax hikes in their tracks.