(Assemblyman Ed Goedhart) – Although I’m an elected Republican state legislator who you would expect to endorse Pete Goicoechea, the Republican candidate in the Senate District 19 race, I’m supporting the conservative candidate instead. Here’s why….
In 2009, Nevada taxpayers were told they needed to accept a set of “temporary” tax hikes that exceeded $1 billion dollars. We were told those taxes would expire – “sunset” – in 2011. But not only did the Nevada Legislature re-impose $620 million worth of those “temporary” tax hikes, Gov. Brian Sandoval now wants to re-impose them again.
Much to my dismay, Assemblyman Goicoechea – the Republican leader of our caucus – voted to re-impose those “temporary” tax hikes. But worse – much worse – he used the power and influence of his leadership position to persuade a number of other Republican legislators to break the GOP’s platform position of opposing tax hikes, as well.
If elected to the state Senate, Pete Goicoechea is a certain vote for extending those “temporary” tax hikes yet again. And maybe even make them permanent.
But it’s not just the tax-and-spending issues that Pete was bad on in the last session. Depressingly, he received the next-to-lowest conservative rating among all Republicans for the 2011 session; a score closer to the most liberal of Democrats than the more conservative of his Republican colleagues.
This is why, as a sitting Republican legislator, I’m taking the highly unusual step of endorsing a third-party legislative candidate in this race: Janine Hansen.
Desperate times call for desperate measures, and we are, indeed, in desperate times. Unless tax hikes are taken completely off the table, tax hikes will once again be the default position of the 2013 Legislature. Which is why I am only endorsing candidates this year who have signed the Taxpayer Protection Pledge.
Janine has; Pete hasn’t.
In addition, Janine is exceptionally well-qualified. She has served as a conservative “citizen advocate” in Carson City for the better part of 40 years now. She knows the people, she knows the system, she knows the drill and she won’t require any on-the-job training whatsoever.
As for supporting someone who doesn’t belong to the same party I belong to, let me just say that I’m a conservative first; a Republican second. And if the only argument against her is that she is registered as an Independent American rather than Republican…well, I have to say that’s a pretty weak argument.
That said, Janine has assured me that if elected she will caucus with the Republicans to help create a conservative majority in the State Senate. So Republicans lose nothing if she wins, but conservatives gain a great deal.
As such, I encourage you to join me in voting for Janine Hansen in the Senate District 19 race.
(Assemblyman Goedhart represents Assembly District 36, a rural district including Esmeralda, Lincoln, Mineral & Nye and part of Churchill counties)
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