State Senator Chris McDaniel’s primary challenge against incumbent U.S. Senator Thad Cochran is amusing, to be polite.
The Mississippi Republican Party is engaged in a civil war between the (sort of) sane, (somewhat) mainstream faction represented by Cochran and the Tea Party faction represented by McDaniel. Cochran, once a moderate, has shifted his rhetoric and voting record even further to the right in hopes of coming across as conservative enough to Mississippi’s extreme Republican Party base. As a consequence, primary challenges like McDaniel’s cause more gridlock in Washington, D.C., and, therefore, less progress on the policymaking front.
If I’m not mistaken, McDaniel will be visiting Ole Miss for an event on Feb. 13, hosted by Young Americans for Chris McDaniel. So let’s learn a bit about McDaniel, his views and his record.
McDaniel’s biography on his campaign website is actually an incredibly comical read, bless his heart.
“(McDaniel) believes that any compromise of our constitutionally guaranteed rights is a destruction of the promise of the American Dream and the foundations of our country.”
I wholeheartedly agree. That’s why most Americans believe the Constitution protects LGBT Americans from workplace discrimination and ensures same-sex couples the freedom to marry. Doesn’t the Constitution require that the law treat every citizen equally?
McDaniel’s selective reading of the Constitution doesn’t stop there. He also has a track record of supporting voter suppression, such as discriminatory voter identification measures and limiting early voting. He supported the “Personhood” Amendment, which was defeated at the polls by more than 55 percent of Mississippi voters in 2011. McDaniel says he favors small government yet wants more government to combat non-existent in-person voter fraud and more government making health care choices for Mississippi women.
Wait – it gets worse.
“Although the Supreme Court declared Obamacare constitutional, Chris has not let up in his fight to defeat Obamacare. He vocally opposed and voted against legislation aimed at implementing Obamacare’s Medicaid expansion in Mississippi.”
Yes, that’s McDaniel bragging about his opposition to Medicaid expansion – a move that would help hundreds of thousands of Mississippians live happier, healthier, longer lives. Medicaid expansion would literally save lives. McDaniel claims Medicaid expansion would bankrupt Mississippi. He’s just plain wrong.
In fact, states choosing to expand Medicaid receive 100 percent of federal funding to cover the costs for the first three years and no less than 90 percent federal funding for those costs in the years following. You didn’t read that wrong. McDaniel is bragging about rejecting free federal dollars to provide health care to low income Mississippians. Insane, right? He is playing politics with the lives of the needy.
McDaniel has a history of making crazy statements. In a 2006 segment of his radio show, he complained that there aren’t enough Muslim movie villains.
“It’s funny how the movies have portrayed themselves lately and how the video games have portrayed themselves lately,” McDaniel said. “There’s one person that cannot be a villain in Hollywood, ever. One group that cannot be villains. Who is that? (Cohost: The Muslims.) Yeah, isn’t that neat? They’ll go out of their way to find some Russian white guy that’s just nuts, and he’s the terrorist, which I’ve never seen that. But the Muslims, they’ve just disappeared from Hollywood’s radar.”
In another display of intellectual bankruptcy, McDaniel called the Democratic Party “a party of sex on demand” and warned us of a plan by Democrats to make “homosexual marriage and polygamy completely legal in all 50 states.”
McDaniel is a rabid partisan who has no business in the United States Senate. His continued displays of arrogance towards those different than him (Muslims, gays, etc.), and rejection of common sense solutions for Mississippians is unacceptable. McDaniel’s primary challenge against Cochran is unwarranted. Although I disagree with Cochran on most issues, his seniority in the Senate and bipartisan record has benefitted Mississippi. I look forward to hearing McDaniel explain himself in a few weeks.
Sean Higgins is a junior political science major from Brookings, S.D.
