FRC Issues Inaccurate, Anti-Conservative Voter Guide

The Family Research Council, a pro-family organization I have supported for at least 20 years, emailed a South Dakota Voter Guide to their constituency in South Dakota Friday.

While I would normally consider this a good thing, I was gravely disappointed in the voter guide because it misrepresented Mike Rounds’ position on the issues (no, I don’t give a flying flip what he says, I care about his record, because his record is an infinitely better indicator of what he would actually do if elected). Further, the voter guide completely omitted the most conservative, most pro-family candidate in the entire race (afraid he might take votes away from RINO Rounds, eh?).

So I sent this email (below) to FRC Friday night, because they need to know they aren’t pulling the wool over everyone’s eyes.

And I’m making my email to FRC an “open letter” now, because YOU deserve to know when groups we trust try to mislead us–even if they believe they are deceiving us for the greater good. When groups choose the “lesser of two evils” and try to dress up that evil, they aren’t holding our leaders accountable.  These groups deserve, these groups need to be held accountable by us. And if we don’t them accountable, then the whole system will rapidly become corrupt through and through.

Just as “Republicans” who betray Republican principles tarnish the GOP brand and cause a lack of faith in the brand, so pro-family groups who try to “polish the turd” of these “Republicans” tarnish their own reputations and cause a lack of faith in the pro-family brand.

The radical Left has already done enough damage to faith in traditional American principles; if we on the Right also undermine those principles with faithlessness, then our whole way of life is doomed.

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I received your South Dakota Voter Guide email today and reviewed the guide with great interest.

You list Mike Rounds as pro-life, yet he vetoed South Dakota’s first attempt to ban abortion in 2004, and was nowhere to be found in support of South Dakota’s second attempt to ban abortion two years later. In other words, he did a great job of telegraphing to the pro-abortion constituency—and to the general public—that saving innocent human life isn’t really as important as pro-lifers make it out to be, as well as telegraphing to the opposition that the pro-life camp was deeply divided and lacked resolve.

You list Mike Rounds as supporting religious liberty, yet he promoted ObamaCare-esque government health care schemes and fought Republicans who worked to resist the implementation of ObamaCare in South Dakota.

You list Mike Rounds as supporting the repeal of ObamaCare, yet he promoted ObamaCare-esque government health care schemes and fought Republicans who worked to resist the implementation of ObamaCare in South Dakota. He also declared that he was with the “surrender caucus” when Ted Cruz and some others tried to defund this abomination last year.

You list Mike Rounds as opposing federal control of education, yet former Governor Mike Rounds supports Common Core and was instrumental in bringing it to South Dakota.

And this isn’t even getting into the other ways in which he has betrayed conservative principles, that weren’t addressed at all on your voter guide.

What’s more, you didn’t even list the only conservative in the race: Gordon Howie, a solid pro-life, anti-ObamaCare, limited government Tea Party Christian conservative. We’ve become accustomed to the Left minimizing and ignoring conservatives; must we now accept that the “Right” will ignore conservatives, too?

But of course you had to leave Gordon Howie off the Voter Guide. After all, if you stacked him against the “official GOP candidate,” the official GOP candidate would look pretty pathetic, wouldn’t he? Did you really think no one would see through this little maneuver?

It’s no wonder conservatives are usually on the losing end of things, these days. We betray our best people, and sell out our principles in order to support the lesser of two evils, believing the Left’s lie that the lesser of two evils will be more attractive to a broad electoral base than the best candidate, the one who would actually do some good.

No, it’s no wonder conservatives have a rap of being “unelectable.” When their own people cowardly refuse to support them and back them, anyone would be “unelectable.” That’s a great way to discourage conservative voters who have feel they have no choice. It’s also a great way to discourage conservative people from running for office, and we wonder why there are so few good people who run for office, these days.

Your email says “We must vote for candidates, not based upon what polls and the political parties tell us.” Yet you have fallen for this fake conservative’s rhetoric and the propaganda of a corrupt GOP establishment desperate to have people believe Mike Rounds is something he is not: a conservative.

Mike Rounds is a self-confessed “pragmatist” who has demonstrated with his actions that he lacks the commitment and resolve to stand firm for conservative values that are under greater and greater assault with each passing week. He has repeatedly proven he will fold when the going gets tough.

I have been a supporter of the Family Research Council for many years and have attended about a half-dozen Values Voter Summits in Washington D.C., but I am sad to say that it appears you are more interested in promoting the establishment-coronated GOP candidate in pursuit of a GOP majority that has shown every indication it will do nothing but sit on its hands even when in control–and do so by being disingenuous about his pathetic record–than in bringing accurate information to the voters of South Dakota.

Christians and pro-family conservatives count on groups like FRC to tell the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about our elected officials. You have let the people of South Dakota down.

Sincerely,

Bob Ellis
Rapid City, South Dakota

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Bob Ellis has been the owner of media company Dakota Voice, LLC since 2005. He is a 10-year U.S. Air Force veteran, a political reporter and commentator for the past decade, and has been involved in numerous election and public policy campaigns for over 20 years. He was a founding member and board member of the Tea Party groups Citizens for Liberty and the South Dakota Tea Party Alliance. He lives in Rapid City, South Dakota with his wife and two children.

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