Expand Federal Involvement in Education     Vote Result Date: 12/9/2015

Conservative Position: No     Thune Vote: Yes

This vote was to reauthorize No Child Left Behind through 2020. No Child Left Behind represented an unprecedented expansion by the federal government into education. Overall this reauthorization legislation is a missed opportunity for a Republican controlled congress to empower parents and put children first. Education is an issue that is near and dear to families and represents and opportunity for Republicans to lay down a bold contrast of family first policies. Conservatives believe education decisions should be made by state and local officials, yet this bill retains the fundamental mandate requiring states to concoct uniform standards in reading and math that would be applied statewide throughout all jurisdictions. The bill keeps the plethora of federal testing requirements that have been the driving force behind the adoption of Common Core. Likewise, it does nothing to address the duplicate and wasteful programs funded by the Department of Education, but in reality actually expands education control into preschool programs. Instead of renewing the 2001 law with minor changes, conservatives should be implementing sweeping reforms that allow states to drive innovation in their own school districts.

1,300 Page $305 billion Highway Bailout Bill     Vote Result Date: 12/4/2015

Conservative Position: No    Thune Vote: Yes

This 1,300 page bill was introduced, “debated”, and voted on within 72 hours, making it virtually impossible that any member of Congress actually read it. It is accurate to assume that Congress is blindly spending $305 billion with little knowledge of its implications. Additionally this bill bails out the Highway Trust Fund to the tune of $70 billion. While the Republican controlled Congress makes the argument the bill is paid for, that is fraudulent claim as the payfors are budget gimmicks designed to hide the true cost of the bill. Besides continuing Congress’ reckless spending spree the bill, also renews the once shuttered crony capitalist Export Import Bank.

Raise Debt Limit by $1.5 Trillion and Increase Spending    Vote Result Date: 10/30/2015

Conservative Position: No    Thune Vote: Yes

The Bipartisan Budget Agreement of 2015 (H.R. 1314) represents the convergence of everything that is wrong in Washington and is a prime example of the engendered permanent growth of the federal government. This bill married a blank check of approximately $1.5 trillion in debt suspension with a two-year budget plan that placed the final nail in the coffin of the 2011 Budget Control Act, which cut government spending for the first time in years. At a time when spending is already slated to increase by another $250 billion in 2016, this deal busts the budget caps by $112 billion. In classic Enron-style accounting, the hodgepodge of “offsets” are either notional, intangible, or scheduled to take effect almost ten years from now and in typical Washington fashion, unlikely to ever come to fruition. In addition, this bill bails out the broken Disability Insurance program with $150 billion from Social Security retirement benefits – without enacting any durable and verifiable reforms that address the systemic flaws in the program which have made this program a dependency-inducing Ponzi scheme rife with fraud. Finally, this budget bill fails to exact a single policy concession from Obama on the major issues of our time – immigration enforcement, Planned Parenthood, EPA regulations, the Iran deal, etc. – and takes the power of the purse off the table as leverage against any potential executive overreach for the remainder of the Obama presidency.

Fund Planned Parenthood and Obama’s Priorities     Vote Result Date: 9/30/2015

Conservative Position: No    Thune Vote: Yes

Republicans took back the Senate last fall with the premise of stopping Obama by using their Constitutional right of the power of the purse to defund key parts of Obama’s agenda. Over the 2015 summer an undercover group released numerous videos depicting Planned Parenthood engaging in the sale and harvest of organs of aborted babies. Conservatives responded with calls to halt federal funds to private organizations like Planned Parenthood that engage in this behavior. Additionally conservatives called on Congress to with hold funding for President Obama’s disastrous Iran deal, which puts America and her allies at risk, and to continue efforts to defund Obama’s executive amnesty. This vote was on final passage of a spending bill that fully funds Obama’s priorities, including abortion, until December 11, 2015. Between now and December 11th, Planned Parenthood is estimated to commit 70,000 abortions. Preceding this vote, Republicans engaged in a series of show votes to give the appearance of fighting against public funding of abortion, however this vote was the critical vote in the Senate to cut off those federal funds. From a spending and budget perspective this spending bill maintains the excessive burn rate of taxpayer dollars and lacks any spending reforms.

Obamatrade — Fast Track Authority for TPP    Vote Result Date: 6/23/2015

Conservative Position: No     Thune Vote: Yes

This vote was to advance the procedural provision known as Trade Promotion Authority (TPA). TPA grants a special fast-track status to trade deals negotiated by the president and as such has been dubbed Obamatrade. While conservatives generally support trade agreements as important tools for lowering tariffs and trade barriers, and TPA is often needed in order to effectively negotiate with other countries, this particular TPA was problematic for a number of reasons. Typically, a TPA is passed at the beginning of negotiation cycles so that Congress directs the president to negotiate along specific parameters. In this case, the three primary treaties that would receive fast-track status under this TPA have already been negotiated in secret for years. There is no reason to pass fast track authority without releasing more details about these trade agreements to the public. Moreover, given this president’s penchant for implementing major policies without Congress, there was a widespread fear that Obama would use these trade agreements to pursue liberal policies, such as changes to our immigration system, labor laws, and global warming regulations. For example, according to WikiLeaks, one of the impending trade deals – the Trade in Service Agreement (TISA) – contains an entire immigration section, including a provision prohibiting US authorities from conducting in-person interviews for certain visa categories. Additionally, the main trade deal – the Trans Pacific Partnership – contains a “living agreement” provision, which could enable Obama to expand the scope of the agreement during the final months of his presidency or add countries like China to the agreement. Finally, GOP Leadership negotiated a deal to advance Trade Promotion Authority and in exchange for Democrat votes, promised to renew the crony capitalist Export-Import Bank and a failed government handout program known as Trade Adjustment Assistance, a subsidy bailout for labor unions.

$500 Billion Healthcare Bill     Vote Result Date: 4/15/2015

Conservative Position: No     Thune Vote: Yes

This vote was on H.R. 2, the Medicare Access and Chip Reauthorization Act which is expected to increase the nation’s debt by $500 billion over the next 20 years. This bill was cobbled together in a backroom deal by Speaker Boehner and Minority Leader Pelosi. Overall H.R. 2 is a massive health care spending bill that replaces the existing Medicare payment system for health care providers, known as the Sustainable Growth Rate (SGR), with a new bureaucratic pay scheme that would automatically increase reimbursements every year. Although everyone agrees that the SGR was a flawed system, this bill merely replaced one top-down bureaucratic price-control system with a new one, albeit with a more generous reimbursement rate and no way to pay for the increased spending. With this bill Congress failed to address the underlying problems in healthcare entitlements and in true back room deal fashion, included several extraneous provisions designed to buy votes.

Fully Fund Obama’s Executive Amnesty     Vote Result Date: 2/27/2015

Conservative Position: No     Thune Vote: Yes

While considering HR 240, the FY 2015 Department of Homeland Security funding bill, in the Senate, newly elected Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) worked with Democrats and liberal Republicans to re-instate funding for Obama’s executive amnesty. Despite promises from Senate Republicans during the 2014 midterm campaign to stand up to President Obama, HR 240 would fully fund Obama’s fall 2014 unconstitutional executive amnesty. This vote is on final passage of HR 240 and is the last opportunity for Republican’s to stop funding for full implementation of President Obama’s illegal executive amnesty for the remainder of the year.

To be fair, Thune voted with conservatives on some issues.  Enough to give him a current rating of a whopping 48%.

Senator Thune is widely heralded as a staunch conservative.  His voting record betrays that designation.

Something has changed with Senator John Thune.

Follow the voting records of Senator Mike Rounds (31%) and Congresswoman Kristi Noem (42%)

“It’s not about right or left, it’s about Right or Wrong.”

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