Scott Brown is Not a RINO

Some in the Tea Party movement are angry at Republican Massachusetts Sen. Scott Brown and are thinking about abandoning their support for Brown in the likely event that he seeks reelection in 2012. Tea Partiers are upset that Brown, along with Republican Maine Sens. Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins, is supporting Democratic financial reform legislation that will come up for a vote in the U.S. Senate this week. This is not the first time that Brown’s reach across the aisle has been perceived as a betrayal by some Tea Partiers.

While the financial overhaul bill is, in fact, a bad piece of legislation, Tea Partiers need to take a step back, take a deep breath, and take a look at the facts. While Brown has occasionally voted with Democrats, he is by no means a RINO and he was unquestionably a better choice than his special election opponent, Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley.


Last month, according to the Washington Post, Brown voted with Republicans sixteen times and with Democrats only once on legislation that involved a partisan split. In fact, of the 145 votes between February 9 and June 28 in which a partisan divide has existed, Brown has voted with Republicans 114 times and with Democrats just 31 times. While conservatives would undoubtedly prefer that Brown had voted with Republicans every single time, they shouldn’t let the perfect become the enemy of the good, especially when the perfect is impossible (as it so often is). Consider some of the positions Brown has taken on the issues:

*    On June 15, he voted for the Vitter Amendment to H.R. 4213, the American Jobs and Closing Tax Loopholes Act of 2010, to ensure that new revenues to the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund will be used for the fund’s purposes rather than a budget gimmick to offset deficit spending.
*    On June 10, Brown voted on a motion to proceed to S.J. Res. 26, which disapproved the Environmental Protection Agency’s rule declaring greenhouse gases an environmental danger under the Clean Air Act. In doing so, he was joining Republicans in trying to prevent the Obama administration from circumventing Congress to implement economy-crippling global warming policy.
*    On May 18, Sen. Brown voted for the Gregg Amendment to S. 3217, prohibiting taxpayer bailouts of fiscally irresponsible state and local governments.
*    Scott Brown has consistently supported Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn’s numerous attempts to pay for extension of unemployment benefits rather than adding to the deficit.
    On March 25, Brown voted with Republicans against the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010, after already fulfilling his campaign promise to become the 41st vote that would sustain a Republican filibuster against ObamaCare. Brown’s election forced Democrats to improperly use the budget reconciliation process to ram their takeover of health care through the Senate.
*    Along with voting against ObamaCare, Brown voted for a number of Republican amendments that would have undermined the government takeover of health care or at the very least shielded Americans from some of its worst effects. These amendments included the Vitter Amendment to repeal ObamaCare; the Ensign Amendment to strike the penalty for failure to comply with the individual mandate; the Hutchison Amendment to allow states to opt out of ObamaCare; the Bunning Amendment to permit individuals to opt out of Medicare Part A; the Roberts Amendment to strike the medical device tax; and the LeMieux Amendment to enroll members of Congress in Medicaid.
*    Also on March 25, Sen. Brown voted for the Bennett Amendment to H.R. 4872, which would have allowed D.C. voters to decide the definition of marriage following the District’s decision to legally recognize same-sex unions.
*    On March 26, Brown voted for the Lieberman Amendment to H.R. 1586 to reauthorize the D.C. opportunity scholarship program.
*    On March 4, he voted for the Burr Amendment to H.R. 4213, the Tax Extenders Act of 2009, to provide federal reimbursement to state and local governments for a limited sales, use, and retailers’ occupation tax holiday. That same day, he voted for his own amendment to the same bill to institute a six month payroll tax holiday.
*    On February 9, Brown voted against cloture on President Obama’s nomination of labor union favorite Craig Becker to the National Labor Relations Board. Brown’s vote against cloture has thus far prevented Becker’s confirmation.

Would Martha Coakley have consistently voted against ObamaCare? Coakley has sued, so far successfully, to overturn Section 3 of the Defense of Marriage Act. Does anyone really believe that she would have voted to allow D.C. voters to define marriage? Would Coakley be worried about ensuring that the Oil Spill Liability Trust Fund is spent properly, or that taxpayers aren’t forced to bail out fiscally irresponsible state and local governments, or that unemployment benefit extensions are paid for rather than added to the deficit? Would she vote for school choice in D.C.? Would she have voted against executive overreach by opposing the EPA’s rule on greenhouse gases or voting against the confirmation of Craig Becker? Would Martha Coakley have done anything other than vote with Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid 100% of the time?

We know the answers to these questions. We also know that whomever the Democrats find to run against Scott Brown in 2012 will be just as much of a foot soldier for the Obama-Pelosi-Reid far left socialist agenda as Coakley would have been.

Electing a conservative like South Carolina Sen. Jim DeMint isn’t a possibility in a state like Massachusetts, or in Maine for that matter. Conservatives need to ask themselves: Do they want a moderate Republican who will rarely vote with Democrats and often vote with Republicans to represent Massachusetts in the U.S. Senate? Or would they prefer a far left Democrat who always votes with Democrats, unless of course the Democratic legislation in question isn’t liberal enough? If they would prefer a moderate Republican in Massachusetts – considered an impossibility not so very long ago, you will remember – over a socialist Democrat, they better continue supporting Scott Brown. Withholding their support or, God forbid, backing a primary challenge from the right, will only hand victory to a Coakleyesque Democrat in 2012.