Posted on 05/22/2012 2:04:59 PM PDT by Jean S
Edited on 05/22/2012 2:08:50 PM PDT by Admin Moderator. [history]
Did Scott Walker Lie Under Oath to Congress?
John Nichols
When Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker met with a billionaire campaign donor a month before he launched his attack on the collective-bargaining rights of public-sector workers and public-school teachers, he engaged in a detailed discussion about undermining unions as part of a broader strategy of strengthening the position of his Republican party.
After he initiated those attacks, Governor Walker testified under oath to a Congressional committee. He was asked during the April 2011 hearing to specifically address the question of whether he set out to weaken unions—which traditionally back Democrats and which are expected to play a major role in President Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign—for political purposes. Walker replied: “It’s not about that for me.”
During the same hearing, Walker was asked whether he “ever had a conversation with respect to your actions in Wisconsin and using them to punish members of the opposition party and their [union] donor base?”
Walker replied, not once but twice, that the answer was “no.”
So, did the governor of Wisconsin lie, under oath, to Congress? The videotape of Walker talking with Diane Hendricks, the Beloit, Wisconsin, billionaire who would eventually give his campaign more than $500,000, surfaced late last week. Captured in January 2011 by a documentary filmmaker who was trailing Hendricks, the conversation provides rare insight into the governor’s long-term strategy for dividing Wisconsin. And the focus of the conversation and the strategy is by all evidence a political one.
In the video, Walker is shown meeting with Hendricks before an economic development session at the headquarters of a firm Hendricks owns, ABC Supply Inc., in Beloit. After Walker kisses Henricks, she asks: “Any chance we’ll ever get to be a completely red state and work on these unions?”
“Oh, yeah!” says Walker.
Henricks then asks: “And become a right-to-work [state]?”
Walker replies: “Well, we’re going to start in a couple weeks with our budget adjustment bill. The first step is we’re going to deal with collective bargaining for all public employee unions, because you use divide and conquer.”
After describing the strategy, Walker tells the woman who asked him about making Wisconsin a “completely red state”: “That opens the door once we do that.”
In a transcript of raw footage from the conversation, Hendricks asks Walker if he has a role model. Walker replies that he has high regard for Indiana Governor Mitch Daniels, who early in his term used an executive order to strip collective-bargaining rights away from public employees and who, more recently, signed right-to-work legislation. Walker described the use of the executive order to undermine union rights as a “beautiful thing” and bemoaned the fact that he would have to enact legislation to achieve the same end in Wisconsin.
Within weeks, the woman who asked Walker about his strategy to make Wisconsin “a completely red state” wrote a $10,000 check to support his campaign. (She would eventually up the donation to $510,000, making Hendricks the single largest donor in the history of Wisconsin politics.) Within a month, Walker had launched the anti-union initiative that the two had discussed as a part of that “red-state” strategy, provoking mass protests that would draw the attention of Congress.
Testifying under oath to the US House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, Walker said in his formal statement and in response to questions from committee members that his efforts to restrict the collective-bargaining rights of unions— including moves to prevent them from collecting dues, maintaining ongoing representation of members and engaging effectively in political campaigns—had nothing to do with politics.
Walker was asked specifically about a Fox News interview with Wisconsin state Senate majority leader Scott Fitzgerald, in which Fitzgerald said of the anti-union push: “If we win this battle, and the money is not there under the auspices of the unions, certainly what you’re going to find is President Obama is going to have a much difficult, much more difficult time getting elected and winning the state of Wisconsin.”
Congressman Chris Murphy, D-Connecticut, asked Walker about Fitzgerald’s statement. “I understand you can’t speak for [Fitzgerald] but you can opine as to whether you agree with your state Senate leader when he says this is ultimately about trying to defeat President Obama in Wisconsin. Do you agree?”
“I can tell you what it is for me,” Walker answered. “It’s not about that. It’s ultimately about balancing the budget now and in the future.”
Under questioning from other members of the committee (especially Ohio Congressman Dennis Kucinich and Iowa Congressman Bruce Braley), however, Walker admitted that many of the moves he initiated had no real impact on the state budget.
They did have the impact of weakening unions in the workplace and in the politics of the state, however.
It was in that context that Congressman Gerry Connolly, D-Virginia, pressed Walker on the matter of political intentions.
“Have you ever had a conversation with respect to your actions in Wisconsin and using them to punish members of the opposition party and their [union] donor base?
“Never had such a conversation?” Connolly pressed.
“No,” said Walker.
The videotape from several months earlier, in which Walker speaks at length with his most generous campaign donor, suggests a very different answer to the questions from Murphy and Connolly. Indeed, the videotape shows Walker having just such a conversation.
Anyone know how the 4 Senators and AG under recall are doing in the polls? Isn’t their recall election held the same time as Walker’s?
No one reads the Nation, liberals don’t even read this rag. Heck, the Milwaukee Journal just endorsed Walker and saw no reason to recall him.
The GOP won’t have any hearings on this no matter who requests it.
Logic isn’t their strong suit.
RATS are just transferring their fear of Sarah to fear and loathing of Walker.
Won’t work this time. Scott isn’t a household name: you can’t Alinsky somebody nobody has ever heard of.
Even carefully edited (its the Nation), the transcript does not say it was about politics. He said: “That [making Wisconsin all red] opens the door to limiting unions.” Duh.
Rep. Gerald Connelly (D-VA) is a marxist thug and used threats and political thuggery to intimidate the people of Fairfax Virginia. He beat his way into Congress.
May he drop dead now!
The key word is PUNISH. The questioner asked if the intent was to apply punitive action to the opposition. The intent of Walker’s actions is to bring fiscal (and political, BTW) sanity to the state, not to punish the opposition.
The questioner is an idiot.
So is the writer, IMO.
Wisconsin: Hit piece on Gov. Walker ping
FReep Mail if you want on, or off, this Wisconsin interest ping list.
PS Received my absentee ballot in the mail today and have already filled it out. Will drop it off at City Hall tomorrow morning. BTW, I noticed that it doesn’t even require a stamp. For others voting by mail, don’t forget to get somebody to witness your ballot. A lot of people forget to have the witness sign, and their ballots are NOT counted.
It's not the AG, it's the Lt. Gov. who is under recall. Yes, the recalls are all on the same day. I don't have any current poll figures for the Senators. It all depends upon turn out. It looks like the turn out will be heavy -- Presidential level.
“restricting collective bargaining rights” means
opening up and protecting individual’s bargaining rights -— to negotiate and compete with these union-thug cartels.
As such, he is not beyond an outright lie, much less a simple misrepresentation.
I wouldn't trust the SOB to tell me the color of his daddy's Holsteins.
Circulation peaked at 187,000 in 2006 but by 2010 had dropped back to 145,000 in print though digital subscriptions had risen to over 15,000.....The Nation has lost money in all but three or four years of operation and is sustained in part by a group of more than 30,000 donors called The Nation Associates....
Did you see the National Review cover? It was awesome. Slay the beast. Beautiful.
Then I would suppose that the vote percentage for the other recall candidates will be basically the same for Walker, assuming that their districts are representative of the whole state.
That all strings together on a Rube Goldberg operation of a line of logic. They have to make the (very long) leap to even insinuate the intent was to harm opponents. The “divide and conquer” comment was clearly in a political context.
That attempt at a “hail Mary” pass just thudded on the ground after all of one yard. That article likely got 3X the readership it normally would, just by appearing here. The communist propaganda organ “Nation” garners all the interest of a Piers Morgan interview.
Try again, lefties. Maybe accuse Walker of an extramarital affair... or a sexual assault. Oh wait, that won`t work either, since it`ll endear him to democrats.
Desperation. Even the national Democratic Party has abandoned the recall.
The videotape of Walker talking with Diane Hendricks, the Beloit, Wisconsin, billionaire who would eventually give his campaign more than $500,000, surfaced late last week. Captured in January 2011 by a documentary filmmaker who was trailing Hendricks.
Who was this DOCUMENTARY FILMMAKER? And why are they following around a conservative billionare? Do they work for Obama? The DNC? Unions?
This is getting very serious people.
It’s a compound question and it goes to his motive. It’s chilling that they could ask this question. Imagine hauling Obama before congress and asking him a comparable question.
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