GOP U.S. House Candidate Daines Says ‘Time to Downsize Federal Government
BUTTE – Republican congressional candidate Steve Daines called Friday night for stopping growth in the federal government and halting tax increases.
“The economy won’t start growing again until the government stops growing,” Daines told the Montana Republican Party convention in a dinner speech. “We cannot raise taxes on job creators.”
Daines is the lone announced Republican candidate for the congressional seat being vacated by six-term Rep. Denny Rehberg, who is challenging Democratic Sen. Jon Tester in 2012.
On the Democratic side, state Rep. Franke Wilmer of Bozeman and Missoula City Council member Dave Strohmaier have entered the race, and state Sen. Kim Gillan of Billings is expected to jump in soon.
Daines originally declared for the Senate in November, but switched to the House race shortly before Rehberg announced in February he would take on Tester. In 2008, Daines ran for lieutenant governor on the unsuccessful ticket headed by Roy Brown of Billings.
So far this campaign, Daines said he has visited 50 counties and 62 communities in his pickup truck.
“There is great uncertainty in our country,” he said. “But one thing we can say with certainty is we face a crossroad as to which path forward will lead our nation to greater freedom and prosperity.”
Daines said he offers a different background to the race.
“I’m not a career politician,” he said. “I’ve been a job creator for 27 years. … I’ve not just talked about creating jobs. I’ve actually done it, creating hundreds of jobs and hundreds of high-paying jobs right here in Montana.”
The best way to create jobs, Daines said, is to provide small businesses with the right incentives to expand and grow “instead of creating doubt and uncertainty.”
Daines has been a top executive for RightNow Technologies, a Bozeman software company, but is now working there only on a part-time basis so he can campaign. The company is Bozeman’s largest commercial employer with 1,000 employees and has added 100 new workers, since January, he said.
Daines said he lived in China for six years for a previous job and travels to the Asia Pacific region a half-dozen times annually.
Despite the challenges faced by the United States, no Americans would want to swap places with anyone in the world, he said.
“But there are some that don’t see it that way,” he said. “They think that free markets are unfair. They believe in an ever-expanding government that wants us to be more like the rest of the world than the other way around.”
This country faces a series of challenges, Daines said, including an unemployment rate in the 9 percent range that has become the new normal and a national debt of $14.3 trillion.
He criticized the 2009 federal stimulus program , which cost $800 billion, as a failure because it didn’t create sustainable jobs and increased the national debt.
“The best way to move our economy forward is by introducing fiscal responsibility and accountability in Washington,” he said.
Daines advocates an amendment to the U.S. Constitution to require that the federal budget be balanced every year.
It should no longer be the case of what the federal government must do for people, but what the federal government must let go of and move down to the state, he said.
Just as businesses had to lay off people when the economy struggled, “it’s time to downsize the federal government,” he said.
Looking at his campaign, Daines said he has raised more than $500,000 so far, with 80 percent of the money coming from Montana.
Missoulian State Bureau reporter Charles S. Johnson can be reached at (406) 447-4066 or at chuck.johnson@lee.net.
Read more: http://m.missoulian.com/news/state-and-regional/article_76372a28-9952-11e0-b0b8-001cc4c002e0.html#ixzz1Ru7G8xqY
Source: http://m.missoulian.com/news/state-and-regional/article_76372a28-9952-11e0-b0b8-001cc4c002e0.html
Processing your request, Please wait....
