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For two days Representative Steve Hodges has failed to fully represent his constituents. Out of the 40 votes held in the last two days, Hodges only showed up to vote four times, making us question if he was purposely missing key votes on Medicaid Expansion and our state’s $25 billion budget. On Tuesday, Hodges missed or avoided every vote, and yesterday Hodges missed or avoided 26 votes. Although Hodges continues to neglect his legislative responsibilities, he still collected his taxpayer provided per diem the last two days.

“Steve Hodges clearly has misplaced priorities that fail to serve his voters well in the 149th District. By choosing to only vote 10 percent of the time in the last two days while still accepting his taxpayer funded per diem, he has shown he lacks the character and values Missourians need in their elected leaders. This lack of respect for voters and their hard earned tax dollars is certainly not what Missouri wants from their state or federal representatives.”

- Shane Schoeller, Executive Director, Missouri Republican Party

“Representative Steve Hodges’ actions on Tuesday were inexcusable. Taking a pass for an entire day while key legislation like Medicaid expansion and the state budget was voted on is the worst brand of politician, an absentee representative. Hodges passing on voting for or against Medicaid expansion was a veiled attempt to avoid voting along party lines for Medicaid expansion. Taking the state per diem, while not representing his constituents shows a disregard of his responsibility to those he represents. It’s appalling to me, that while Missourians struggle, he would take taxpayer money, yet do no work for it. This type of behavior shows Hodges is unworthy of representing his home district, much less the Missouri 8th Congressional District,” said Ed Martin, Chairman of the Missouri Republican Party.

“I’m excited that Shane will be joining the Missouri Republican Party team,” said Ed Martin.  “Shane is a passionate and articulate messenger for the Republican Party.  He knows politics and understands the state, and he will bring to the Party an invaluable knowledge of the General Assembly.  With Shane’s leadership, I am confident that we will achieve success in 2014 and beyond.”

Earlier this month, Schoeller penned an op-ed in the Missouri Times discussing the Republican Party’s path forward (read it here).

“I am honored to have the opportunity to work with Chairman Ed Martin, our elected Republicans and grassroots activists across our great state to lead the Republican Party forward,” said Schoeller. “We must effectively communicate to all Missourians that our best days are ahead by electing Republicans committed to economic growth and prosperity for our state, and our nation. Together, we can build on our historic veto-proof majorities in the Missouri General Assembly, retain our clear majority in our federal congressional delegation, and restore Republican leadership in Missouri’s statewide offices.”

Schoeller, the Republican nominee for Secretary of State in 2012, brings grassroots, political, and elective experience to the Missouri GOP.

Schoeller served three terms in the Missouri General Assembly, including two years as Speaker Pro Tem of the Missouri House of Representatives.  In addition to his experience as an elected official, Schoeller has also served as a field representative for Senators Ashcroft and Bond.  Later he became a legislative assistant to then-Congressman Roy Blunt and chief administrative aide to Secretary of State Matt Blunt.

Missouri Republican Party Chairman Ed Martin responded to President Obama’s State of the Union address this evening:

“Today marks the 1,386^th day since Democrats passed a budget—and during that time, our nation has racked up $5.3 trillion more in debt.  Tonight was the perfect opportunity for President Obama to outline realistic solutions to our fiscal problems, but instead, he focused solely on increasing the size of federal government.  In fact, his speech did not include a single specific government program that the President proposes to cut.

“It’s not surprising that Obama would bury his head in the sand.  In fact, several of his allies, including Nancy Pelosi, have recently argued that we don’t have a spending problem at all. That attitude is further evidence that Washington is broken, and it shows yet again why it is so important that we have strong leaders—leaders such as Jason Smith—who are willing to stand up against the Democrats’ extreme liberal agenda.”

“Jason Smith is part of the next generation of leadership for the Republican Party. A committed conservative, Jason will take his common-sense record to Washington, fighting for lower taxes, a balanced budget, restrained spending, and protecting innocent life. He will be a strong voice against the extreme Obama agenda—from the President’s efforts to infringe on the 2^nd Amendment, to his insistence on increasing taxes rather than reducing spending, to the avalanche of onerous federal regulations he has pushed on job creators.

“Of course, Jason will also carry on Jo Ann Emerson’s tradition of excellent constituent services for the people of the 8^th District. We look forward to making Jason Smith the next Congressman from Missouri.”

The Democrats’ nominee, Steve Hodges, talks like a conservative, but he’s just another tax-and-spend politician.

The good news is, Republican Jason Smith is just the candidate we need.That’s why he’s doing everything he can to seize the momentum for 2014 right now in 2013.

Please agree to sign your Statement of Opposition to Speaker Pelosi!

“Governor Bobby Jindal has an impressive record of conservative accomplishment in Louisiana, and we are excited that he will once again address Missouri’s committed activists and volunteers,” said Ed Martin, Chairman of the Missouri Republican Party. “Governor Jindal brings a unique perspective on how we move forward as a party.  At a time when Republicans are searching for answers, it is important that we hear and consider every idea.”

Currently in his second term in office, Gov. Jindal has amassed an impressive conservative record: he has cut the state budget by 26%, signed the largest income tax cut in state history, championed some of the strictest ethics requirements in the nation, and enacted historic education reform.  In October 2011, Gov. Jindal was re-elected to his second term with an overwhelming 66% of the vote.  Throughout 2012, Gov. Jindal traveled the country on behalf of the Romney-Ryan ticket.

The 2013 Missouri Lincoln Days celebration will take place February 15-17 in St Louis, MO.  US Senator John Barrasso (WY) will keynote the Friday evening banquet. For additional details or to register, please visit www.mogop.org/lincolndays.

A high-resolution image of Gov. Jindal is available here.

The Associated Press has the story:

“State records reviewed Thursday by The Associated Press show that Nixon received $10,000 from St. Louis-based World Wide Technology Inc. on Monday, the same day that Nixon proclaimed in a televised address that large political donations were eroding the public’s trust in elected officials.

“Additional state records reviewed by the AP show that World Wide Technology has been paid nearly $42 million by Missouri over the past three years under a statewide contract to provide networking services that is up for potential renewal Feb. 28…

“[S]ome Republican lawmakers suggested the contribution creates the appearance of impropriety and highlights the hypocritical nature of Nixon’s call for lawmakers to reinstate “strict campaign contribution limits.”
Pay-to-play allegations have dogged Jay Nixon throughout his career:

* While he was Attorney General, Nixon was repeatedly criticized for accepting campaign contributions from entities that he was facing in court—from the tobacco industry, to Blue Cross, to his former advisor Chuck Hatfield, and more.

* In the late 1990s, then-Attorney General Nixon came under fire for outsourcing tobacco litigation to trial lawyer donors, including Tom Strong, who raked in more than $111 million in fees after just 5 months of work.

* As governor, Nixon has repeatedly rewarded campaign contributors with plum government positions.

* Last year, Nixon came under fire for receiving massive amounts of money from law firms seeking a lucrative state contract.

It’s not surprising that Jay Nixon has been caught saying one thing and doing another.  Throughout his career, Nixon has accepted contributions from entities he faced in court, outsourced lucrative state work to campaign donors, rewarded donors with plum government positions, and accepted huge contributions from those seeking to do business with the state.  Every time Nixon engages in pay-to-play, the public’s trust in government erodes a little bit more.

Transcript:

Good evening. Thank you for joining me.

I am Tim Jones, Speaker of your Missouri House, and it is an honor to speak with you tonight.

Last November, the people of Missouri sent record numbers of Republicans to Jefferson City to govern and to advance an ambitious policy agenda, an agenda focused on strengthening our state’s economy, reforming our education system, and creating opportunity for all Missourians.

Missourians also gave their support to Governor Nixon, a self-proclaimed independent, fiscal conservative who has proudly reaffirmed his intention to work with Republicans to keep tax burdens low, government small, and the bureaucratic red tape to a minimum.

It was a governor our state rarely saw during his first term in office, but after seeing his newfound approach to governance, I am cautiously optimistic about working with him in the years ahead.

Moments ago, you heard the governor outline HIS priorities for the upcoming year.

While some of the common ground with Republicans he discussed on the campaign trail is still there, many of his new proposals, ones that would create a bigger, more intrusive government bureaucracy threaten to create a chasm that no amount of bipartisanship can bridge.

And in the past, as in tonight, the Governor has articulated grand concepts but provided little detail.

Many in the legislature, on both sides of the aisle, are concerned about the governor’s pattern of retreating behind rhetoric instead of leading and engaging with us to find solutions.

So I challenge the governor, for the good of all Missourians, to break from his past pattern of ivory tower executive isolation, roll up his sleeves and work with us to find common ground.

I welcome his participation.

In the months ahead, Republican leadership in the House and Senate will work with the governor on the issues the people of Missouri entrusted us to address when they elected us to office.

We have profound differences but we will focus on the places where we may find agreement.

Areas like the critical task of improving our state’s aging and failing infrastructure.

We must work together to make sure our roads and bridges, the essential transportation routes vital to economic development, are maintained, repaired and, when necessary, rebuilt.

We also believe it is important to review the effectiveness of our existing state programs, including Missouri’s 61 tax credit programs.

Many of these programs accomplish a worthwhile goal, but oversight and accountability are required.

We will eliminate the credits that do not work, cap programs at a reasonable level to provide budget certainty, and ensure that taxpayers are protected.

And if the Governor’s leadership is absent, as it has been many times over the past four years, or when the proposals he pushes are radically different from the campaign promises he made, we will not hesitate to use our historic majorities that the people entrusted us with to pursue our agenda to reform and transform our state.

A prime example is the governor’s call to expand the welfare state by adding 300,000 Missourians to the Medicaid roles.

It’s a call that has come courtesy of Obamacare and Washington, D.C. It’s a call the Republican-led legislature will not answer.

Eight years ago, Republican leadership made the difficult but desperately needed decision to reign in a welfare system that was growing at an unsustainable rate.

It was a decision that saved the state billions of dollars and staved off almost certain bankruptcy.

Today we are faced with a similar decision.

On one side we have a governor and a federal government that believes bigger government is the answer.

They want to take us down a fiscally irresponsible path that will saddle future generations of Missourians with a bill they cannot afford.

It’s a path Republicans will not follow.

Why should we pour billions of dollars of your hard-earned tax money into a broken system? That would defy basic economic sense.

We will not follow the lead of out-of-touch bureaucrats whose reckless spending has pushed our nation to the brink of financial disaster.

Instead, Republican leadership will propose a plan to transform our Medicaid system, to repair a broken system so that it works as intended by providing quality care to the neediest Missourians.

Republicans have always stood for providing opportunity to those who are truly in need. And that is where your hard earned tax dollars should be spent.

Our commitment is to stay true to the will of the people who have consistently voted with large majorities against the economy-crippling provisions of Obamacare, to find ways to keep the size of government small and to steer our state away from the same kind of fiscal cliff our federal government cannot seem to avoid.

We also call on Governor Nixon to stand in support of the many Missouri hospitals that provide care to the un- and underinsured.

The federal government’s decision to cut the dish payments that reimburse hospitals for the care they offer is one that we must oppose together.

This ploy by the White House to force the hands of states like ours to expand Medicaid must be rejected, and we must develop a Missouri solution that will allow hospitals to continue to provide care, one that doesn’t require a massive expansion of government that Missouri taxpayers simply cannot afford.

Instead of adding more bloat to the bureaucracy, our efforts this year must focus on strengthening Missouri’s economy, a goal that requires both short-term and long-term solutions.

In the short-term, we can improve our business climate and attract new employers and new jobs by making Missouri’s employment law standards comparable to national standards.

Over the past several years, Missouri’s courts have made misguided rulings that have created uncertainty in our legal environment.

The result is that compliance is now more difficult for existing employers, and potential businesses are discouraged from setting up shop in a state where frivolous lawsuits are far too common.

It is time to put Missouri employers on a level playing field with their competitors around the country, to provide certainty in the legal system that allows businesses to focus on growing their businesses, creating jobs rather than worrying about unnecessary lawsuits.

We also must work to protect one of our largest employers in Missouri – the health care industry.

It is critical that we correct a misguided court decision that opens the door for endless lawsuits with unlimited damages, a decision that will drive doctors out of the state, destroy jobs and reduce Missourians’ access to care.

One of our top priorities for this legislative session will be to reform our medical malpractice system so we can close the floodgate of lawsuits that threaten to drive the cost of medical malpractice insurance through the roof and, of course, increase the cost of care.

Last year, Kansas enacted sweeping tax reforms that made their state extremely attractive to business and upheld their medical malpractice protections for their health care industry.

These are the latest shots in what has been a prolonged—and very successful—effort to poach Missouri companies and Missouri jobs—the ongoing economic “border war.”

And if we do not respond to these very real threats, the war could turn into a rout.

So we must immediately review our tax code and enact fiscally-responsible policies that ensure we remain competitive with our neighboring states.

We must also begin to take steps to secure our future.

We must protect our state’s education funding and give parents, teachers, and school boards the tools they need to ensure the Missourians of today are prepared for the jobs of tomorrow

It would be shortsighted and irresponsible for Missouri’s leaders to place the temporary benefits of entitlement funding ahead of lasting benefits of education, yet that is exactly what Governor Nixon has done over the past several years.

With each speech he has made, the governor has promised the people of Missouri that he will put education first.

But as his rhetoric has been replaced with reality, Missourians have seen just how empty his promises are.

Each year it has been the legislature that has shown real leadership on the vital issue of education.

In each of the last three years, we’ve sent the governor budgets that placed an emphasis on funding both K-12 and higher education.

Each year, he has responded by withholding millions of dollars from our schools.

It was last year the governor asked us to take our funding for K-12 education to record levels, which we did.

At the same time, he asked that funding once again be cut for higher education.

The legislature, despite an incredibly difficult budget, made a commitment to not only provide record levels of funding to our elementary and secondary education system, but also to reverse the $106 million cut the governor had proposed for our colleges and universities.

And how did the governor respond to our decision?

By withholding more than $9 million, effectively cutting higher education funding for a third straight year.

And yet, despite his claims that these cuts had to be made to balance the budget, he was able to find nearly $6 million of your tax money to buy a brand new plane.

Pledging your commitment to our children and then failing to support them flies in the face of good governance and leadership.

Missouri children, our future leaders, deserve more.

When it comes to leadership on the issue of education, Governor Nixon has been absent and actively worked against the legislature’s efforts to invest in what he claims is his top priority.

What’s worse, this has happened at a time when Missouri’s two largest school districts are failing, as our universities are struggling to find ways to prepare our young people for the jobs of the future.

Our children, whether they are born in Springfield, St Louis or Sedalia, Kansas City, Camdenton or Cape, Poplar Bluff, Palmyra or anywhere in between, deserve access to the highest quality education.

But our schools will not be able to provide this level of education if their funding is consistently slashed to the bone to fund an ever-increasing, bloated entitlement system full of waste, fraud and abuse.

Our antiquated, overly bureaucratic system is the antithesis of innovation and excellence.

Teachers should be rewarded for their performance and encouraged to boldly engage in the technological innovation that will create the highly-skilled workforce of tomorrow that we so desperately need.

Finally, we must work to ensure that parents are provided the opportunity to be involved in their children’s education.

Education cannot just begin and end at the schoolhouse door.

It must continue at home, and parents should take an active role in ensuring their children are learning what they need to succeed.

This can be accomplished by providing parents more power to intervene in failing school districts and force the necessary changes to ensure access to an effective education.

This year we also must work to improve and better fund our system of mental health.

Families across Missouri and across our great nation continue to mourn the loss of the young people at Sandy Hook Elementary who were so tragically taken from us, our thoughts and prayers continue to be with those families who suffered through this difficult time, but the solution to prevent such tragedies from happening again in the future does not involve trampling on the Second Amendment rights of our citizens.

Instead, we must place an emphasis on creating a mental health system that makes care accessible and effective, so that those who might do us harm have the opportunity to receive the kind of help that can put them on a path to triumph rather than tragedy.

You can count on Republicans to develop policy solutions that will protect your children—but also protect your rights as Americans.

You sent us to Jefferson City for results, and Republicans in the General Assembly are committed to leading a government worthy of the citizens it serves.

Whether it is education innovation or labor reform, saving our healthcare industry or balancing our budget with fairness and equity, the truth has no agenda and the challenges before us shall require bold leadership and transformational ideas.

And if our governor is not up to the demands these times require, your General Assembly is prepared to provide the leadership that is so desperately needed.

While our counterparts in DC may believe that government has all the answers and that bigger government is better, here in Missouri we believe that government is not the ruler of the people, it is the people who should rule over their government. Only then will all the people find the freedom and opportunity that will lead them to prosperity.

In the coming months, I look forward to working with my colleagues in the Senate, and I hope to work successfully with Governor Nixon, to achieve the vision I have outlined this evening—restoring our infrastructure, strengthening our education system, and creating a job-friendly pro-growth business environment.

Together, we can achieve these goals, and create a better future, full of opportunity for all Missourians.

A place where future generations work, raise their families, and are proud to call home.

Thank you for listening this evening.

May God bless you, and may God continue to bless the Great State of Missouri.

For years, Claire McCaskill has vocally criticized earmarks, even going so far as to say that voting for bills packed with earmarks would make her ‘part of the problem.’  But consistent with her say-one-thing-but-do-another approach to legislating, she has voted for bills containing thousands of earmarks costing billions of dollars.  Now, facing criticism over this contradiction, McCaskill has an entirely new position.

Under fire from Republicans for voting for bills packed with earmarks, McCaskill’s office yesterday defended her votes, admitting that “she wasn’t going to sit out the entire legislative process on bills critical for Missouri if they had earmarks in them.”

But this stands in stark contrast to McCaskill’s statements just a few years ago, when she stated that voting for bills packed with earmarks—even if they benefited Missouri—would make her “part of the problem.”

From the St Joe News-Press, December 23, 2007:  Specifically, the omnibus bill, which passed 76 to 17 on Tuesday, irked Ms. McCaskill because of the inclusion of so many earmarked projects. True, some of the money would go to her Missouri constituents. But a process that allows the spending of tax dollars with little legislative scrutiny offends the sensibilities of the former state auditor.  “If I go along with it,” she told the News-Press, “then I’m part of the problem.”

“Throughout her career, Claire McCaskill has criticized earmarks here in Missouri.  But in Washington, she has supported earmark-laden bills and even voted against efforts to remove the most egregious earmarks from legislation.  Now, she is finally admitting that she has been, in her words, ‘part of the problem’ all along,” said Ed Martin, Chairman of the Missouri Republican Party.

Claire McCaskill’s earmark hypocrisy goes beyond just voting for bills that include earmarks.  She has also repeatedly opposed efforts to strip controversial earmarks from legislation.  A few examples:

* On March 23, 2007, McCaskill voted against an amendment to block the inclusion of earmarks in a spending bill.

* On October 18, 2007, McCaskill voted to protect a $2 million earmark to honor Rep. Charles Rangel with a public policy center, a conference center and a library.

* On October 23, 2007, McCaskill voted to kill an amendment to strike $3.7 million in earmarks for the AFL-CIO.

* On March 13, 2008, McCaskill voted against an amendment to redirect over $2 million in earmarks for Berkeley, CA, to the Marines.

* On March 4, 2009, McCaskill voted to preserve earmarks associated with the PMA Group, a corrupt lobbying firm.

* On March 4, 2009, McCaskill voted against an amendment to kill 11 earmarks, which included $200,000 for tattoo removal in California, $1.8 million for manure management research in Iowa and $3.8 million to preserve part of the old Detroit Tigers stadium.

* On March 19, 2009, McCaskill voted against an amendment to kill earmarks for a birthday party in Florida, historic shipwreck exploration and a study of Alexander Hamilton’s boyhood estate in the Virgin Islands.