Pence’s Wrong Priorities Backfire in Indiana

Pence’s Wrong Priorities Backfire in Indiana

Backlash Builds Over Pence’s Focus on Social Agenda

He’s at it again. 

Indiana Governor Mike Pence has taken his eye off the ball on the economy — and is once again generating severe backlash for pushing a harmful social agenda. One year after signing his discriminatory RFRA bill, Pence is coming under harsh criticism for signing a bill that further restricts a woman’s right to choose.

With the reaction to Pence’s experiments in extremism, it’s no wonder he tried to create the JustIN state-run news service. 

Here’s what real Indiana news outlets are saying about Pence’s latest move:

Indianapolis Star Columnist Matt Tully: Pence’s attack on women’s rights, and on Indiana (4/8/16)

“Our horribly misguided and miscast governor waged a war on women’s rights and continued to damage the state so many of us love so dearly.”

 “The outcry is the result of Indiana having a governor who thinks first and foremost not about what is best for the long-term health of this state, but about his personal ideological views.”

“Too often, the stench of Pence’s 12 years as a partisan social-issues champion in Congress has polluted everything else he’s done as governor. Time and again, he has committed the one foul a governor should never commit: He has recklessly hurt his state despite knowing his actions would do so.”

Indianapolis Star: Will enough GOP women stick with Gov. Mike Pence? (4/8/16)

“Christie Luther Hurst, a dedicated Republican, is feeling blindsided.

“When she cast her vote in 2012 for Mike Pence to become governor, she said, “I voted for him thinking, ‘Oh, he’s a Republican. He’ll do the right thing.’” […]

“But what the Indianapolis woman said she got from her governor was the incendiary Religious Freedom Restoration Act — and now, an inflammatory abortion law.

“‘And now I’m just embarrassed,’ said Luther Hurst, 36.”

Evansville Courier & Press Column: Pence is who he is; vote accordingly (4/7/16)

“Pence promised then that creating Indiana jobs and raising the Hoosier standard of living — not social issues — were his top priorities.”

“In his time in office, whenever the governor has faced a choice between uniting and dividing — education policy, same-sex marriage, the misnamed Religious Freedom Restoration Act, the hasty and ill-considered ban on Syrian refugees, this new abortion law — he has chosen to take actions and speak words that divide rather unite.”

 Fort Wayne Journal Gazette Editorial: Abortion law’s political fallout likely to linger (4/10/16)

“The problems with the law were evident from the moment it was passed […] even some pro-life Republican women defected as the bill was pushed through.”

###