Tonight, three different Republicans, one congresswoman and two senators, offered different responses to President Obama’s State of the Union address.
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Representative Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-Wash) (Official Republican response):
While short on details, the official Republican response sounded positive themes about Republican solutions that would require less government.
McMorris Rodgers emphasized the failures of Obamacare, many Americans’ consensus that the current law is not working and the need for increased coverage. She also insisted that any reasonable immigration reform plan must feature border security first.
Senator Mike Lee (R-Utah) (tea party response):
Senator Lee’s opening remarks criticized government that will “lie to, spy on and even target its own citizens.”
Lee reemphasized aspects of his conservative reform speech given at The Heritage Foundation in October. Key among them, Lee addressed President Obama’s theme of economic inequality by breaking it down into three individual parts:
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immobility among the poor, who are being trapped in poverty by big-government programs;
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insecurity in the middle class, where families are struggling just to get by and can’t seem to get ahead;
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and cronyist privilege at the top, where political and economic insiders twist the immense power of the federal government to profit at the expense of everyone else.
Lee noted, “where does this new inequality come from? From government – every time it takes rights and opportunities away from the American people and gives them instead to politicians, bureaucrats, and special interests.”
Lee discussed education reforms involving more choice, protection for the unborn and stressed federalism on issues like same-sex marriage.
The Utah Senator also touched on his current efforts to reform federal mandatory minimum sentencing laws, “Senator Rand Paul and I are working with some of the most liberal Democrats in Congress to reform the federal criminal-justice system – to help keep violent predators behind bars while creating opportunities for reformed, non-violent offenders to return to the families and neighborhoods that so desperately need them.”
Lee pleaded for government that is smaller and more efficient, and is interested in seeking solutions through individuals and communities as opposed to the president’s state solutions.
Senator Rand Paul (R-Kent.) (independent SOTU response):
When asked about the potential differences between his and Sen. Lee’s speech on Tuesday, Paul told Politico, “I’m not sure there will be much of a difference. Sen. Lee and I are very close, and I’m sure I’ll like his message as well …I don’t see [the Paul rebuttal] as competing with the other responses.”
Paul did express similar limited government themes:
In the marketplace, most small businesses fail. If government is to send money to certain people to create businesses, they will more often than not pick the wrong people and no jobs will be created.
Government spending doesn’t work. It doesn’t create jobs. Only the democracy of the marketplace can find those capable of creating jobs.
Paul added:
I believe in an America with a strong safety net, but one that doesn’t suffocate our resolve to better ourselves and our country.
The ticket to the middle class is not higher taxes on the very businesses that must create the jobs.
Economic growth will come when we lower taxes for everyone, especially people who own businesses and create jobs.
We must choose a new way, a way that empowers the individual through education and responsibility to earn a place alongside their fellow Americans in the most prosperous nation ever conceived.
Paul also expressed support for school choice, the Second Amendment and due process as protected by the Fourth Amendment.