Bill Stouffer

According to his July campaign finance report filed yesterday, State Senator Bill Stouffer raised over $17,000 for his campaign for Missouri Secretary of State but burned through over $8,000.

All of the campaign's payments went to consulting firm Axiom Strategies. In the end, he was left with right around $14,000 in the bank. 

Here is information on  money raised, spent and his cash on hand:

Yesterday, the Post-Dispatch reported that Sen. Bill Stouffer isn't all that concerned with violations of voting laws when they're committed by known Republicans, even though he's spent much of the past year manufacturing fears about voter impersonation fraud to justify his party's plan to limit voting for people who just might vote for Democratic candidates.

Today, an editorial in the Post-Dispatch calling on Gov. Jay Nixon to veto legislation that would put the GOP voter suppression plan into place includes the following:

We're quite confident Mr. [Todd] Akin is who he says he is. And we're fairly confident that, given time, he could obtain a valid drivers license with a current address on it.

But, given the new voter ID requirements Missouri lawmakers seek as law, wouldn't Mr. Akin's votes of the past several years, by definition, be fraudulent if he knowingly voted in the wrong jurisdiction?

"That is true," Mr. Stouffer told us.

Guess what: Bill Stouffer, the man who lead the charge this session to reduce voting rights on behalf of his fellow Republicans doesn't care that about voting laws when they limit the peculiar habits of wealthy Republican voters in St. Louis County (like Todd Akin).

And you thought all that fraud talk from Republicans in the voter suppression debate who don't have any evidence voter impersonation fraud to justify their onerous proposal was genuine and sincere. Silly you!

Sen. Bill Stouffer says his efforts to gut the voter-approved Puppy Mill Cruelty Prevention Act will allow "Missouri's best breeders to stay in business." 

A less fortunate byproduct of the GOP-led repeal effort is that Missouri's worst breeders will also be allowed to stay in business. 

Last year, Republican State Senator Bill Stouffer (R-Napton) introduced legislation to require drug testing for Missourians on Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) because, as he put it, “those receiving help from the state should help themselves.” As it turns out, Stouffer knows something about receiving government assistance, as he has been the beneficiary of over $700,000 in federal farm subsidies since 1995.

Small Government Lawmakers on the Government Dole (Partial List)*

• State Sen. William Herbert Stouffer - $768,154.45
• State Rep. John W Cauthorn - $435,920.99
• State Rep. Thomas L Loehner - $104,891.99
• State Sen. Robert Mayer - $ 38,963.01

Last week, Secretary of State candidate Bill Stouffer introduced legislation (SB317) to exempt MFA from state security registration requirements.  The Securities Division in the Secretary of State's office is charged with protecting Missouri investors from fraud -- why is Stouffer trying to carve out an exemption just for for MFA that that doesn't help investors?  

Unrelated fact: Stouffer served on the corporate board of MFA from 1979 to 1995, and was chairman of their board for eight years. 

UPDATE: The Star has more. 

So tweets the Post-Dispatch's Tony Messenger.  Bill Stouffer's consultant his unsuccessful primary against now-Congresswoman Vicky Hartzler was Jeff Roe, though it's not clear yet if the candidate will continue to retain Roe's services.

Stouffer's most recent filing with the Federal Election Commission show that he still owes Roe almost $74,000 in unpaid direct mail, robocall and staff fees.

Sen. Bill Stouffer (R-Napton) is still bent out of shape that the U.S. Constitution protects our right to choose our U.S. Senators. Fortunately, a fascist local NPR reporter was at a recent Cooper County meeting to write down the silly things Stouffer is saying. 

Stouffer began his speech with historical discourse on how he believes the 17th amendment adversely affected Americans. The 17th amendment was a populist reform that allowed citizens to directly elect senators, as opposed to being elected by state legislatures.

“When you eliminate the direct election of senators, you’ve lost that check.”

Stouffer argues that this change took away a state power that kept the federal government in check.  But the discourse quickly devolved into tea partiers expressing their dissatisfaction with the current situation.

"If you don’t believe we’ll get the 17th amendment repealed, then we aren’t going to."

Earth to Bill: Ain't nobody repealing the 17th Amendment.  Let's move on now. 

The Post-Dispatch editorial page has an impressive snapshot this weekend of the things our legislators are focusing on that do little or nothing to improve the lives of working Missourians.  The Editorial Board calls them "mean" pieces of legislation -- "[A] truly mean bill creates hardship for classes of people without sound public purpose. A truly mean bill is based on prejudice, not fact. A truly mean bill is gratuitously nasty." 

BOTTOM LINE: The Mean Girls & Boys Club is after the working poor, immigrants (legal and illegal), non-English speakers, children, more children, the poor, the disabled, the elderly, non-Christians, workers rights, their own colleagues and maybe cancer patients.

And Missouri wonders why it has trouble attracting jobs.

Bills that made the cut include the push to gut the state's voter-approved minimum wage law, provide drivers' tests in English only, deregulate child labor, drug test TANF recipients in a poorly-conceived manner and disenfranchise tens of thousands of Missourians to help GOP electoral efforts.  

The best part of the editorial, though, may be the R.J. Matson cartoon embedded here.  Some of the likenesses are fantastic, and others are a little harder to figure out.  But based on the article and art, here is the cast in the cartoon above, from left to right: Kevin Elmer (R-Nixa), Brad Lager (R-Savannah), Bill Stouffer (R-Napton), Jane Cunnigham (R-Chesterfield), Jack Goodman (?) (R-Mt. Vernon), Jerry Nolte (R-Gladstone), Steve Cookson (R-Fairdealing), Doug Funderburk (R-St. Peters), Kevin Engler (R-Farmington), Stanley Cox (R-Sedalia), Maria Chappelle-Nadal (D-University City).  

The Senate Financial and Governmental Organizations and Elections committee voted "do pass" on three voter suppression bills this afternoon without amending them, though a combined bill -- perhaps with early voting or no-fault absentee voting provisions -- is expected to be worked out before legislation is debated by the full Senate. 

Sens. Kevin Engler (R-Farmington) and Bill Stouffer (R-Napton) both have proposals (SJR 9 and SJR 2) to amend the state constitution to allow for unnecessary and expensive laws that would require government-issued photo IDs when voting.  (Stouffer's language says voters "may" be required to show such identification; Engler's says they "shall.") Stouffer has a third bill (SB 3) that would put the new requirements into law, provided that the constitution is amended to allow the GOP-friendly suppression they desire. 

The Missouri Senate's Financial & Governmental Organizations and Elections Committee announced yesterday that they'll be hearing three bills on Monday designed to skew the state's voter rolls in favor of Republicans. Committee Chairman Kevin Engler (R-Farmington) and Sen. Bill Stouffer (R-Napton) are each proposing their own a constitutional amendments (SJR 9 and SJR 2) to create the framework for new government-issued photo ID requirements, and Stouffer has also sponsored a resolution to actually enact those requirements (SB 3) if one of the constitutional changes are approved.

As Rep. Chris Kelly (D-Columbia) said last year when debating similar voter suppression efforts, this is a "solution looking for a problem." The stated goal of GOP proponents is to protect democracy against unspecified voter impersonation fraud, but it's really about creating new and unnecessary hurdles to voting for populations who just happen to tend to support Democratic candidates. 

Last year, for example, House sponsor Stanley Cox (R-Sedalia) claimed that there are "countless examples of voter fraud" in Missouri.  And when pressed to provide examples, he couldn't quite count any.  So, GOPers changed their tune and decided that it's actually "impossible" to know if any fraud is going on, so we should go ahead on disenfranchises thousands and thousands of voters just in case.  

Editorial boards around the state have condemned these cynical efforts by Republicans in previous years, and are expected to do so again this year.    Here's a sampling, from the Sedalia Democrat in April 2010:

VOTER PHOTO ID BILL MISGUIDED, UNNEEDED

Rep. Stanley Cox has convinced enough Missouri House members to support his misguided voter photo identification mandate. We must hope he is less successful if this measure goes before the state’s voters....

Missouri’s Department of Motor Vehicles estimates the number of eligible voters who do not have state-issued ID at about 200,000. The enacting legislation would require taxpayer money be used to provide IDs for Missouri residents who cannot afford them. When you add in mandatory notification costs (public service announcements), cost to create the IDs and system upgrades, among other expenses, this proposal is estimated to hit the state for about $7 million a year the first three years it would be in force, according to the fiscal breakdown of the bill provided by the House Committee on Legislative Research Oversight Division. This at a time when we cannot provide adequate funding for our schools — which is an actual, documented problem in our state.

The misinformation continues: State Senator Bill Stouffer wants to repeal The Puppy Mill Cruelty Prevention Act because he says it will hurt dogs.  "Proposition B lowers the standards we already have so we need to at least bring it back up to where it was," he told KSPR.

Personally, I think Prop B opponents should stick to the talking points outlined by the ironically-named "Alliance for Truth," specifically those related to how the measure is "one more step to making us us a communist, socialist society" and the "stacking of humans." 

But if Stouffer wants to say up is down, that's fine too.

Farrah Fite, Communications Director for Missouri Senate Majority Caucus, tweets out the new GOP leadership team:

• Sen. Rob Mayer, President Pro Tem
• Sen. Tom Dempsey, Majority Floor Leader
• Sen. Jack Goodman, Asst. Majority Floor Leader
• Sen. Bill Stouffer, caucus chair
• Sen. Eric Schmitt, caucus secretary
• Sen. Mike Parson, caucus whip

Vicky Hartzler says Bill Stouffer is lying about her record with his recent TV ad accusing her of supporting 31 different tax increases in the House of Representatives, and hits back with criticism of Stouffer's support for a $7.2 billion sales tax increase for rebuilding Interstates 70 and 44.

State Sen. Bill Stouffer has a new campaign ad muddying the waters in his CD4 primary battle against former Rep. Vicky Hartzler. Stouffer, who has promised not to "shy away" from his support for a $7.2 billion sales tax increase for rebuilding Interstates 70 and 44., claims that Hartlzer supported 31 tax increases in the Missouri House.

State Sen. Bill Stouffer explains in the News-Leader today that people who think that citizens should be able to serve openly and honestly in the armed forces "do not understand the mission of our military." 

Obviously, Stouffer knows more about the military than you, me, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff or the Secretary of Defense.  I mean, the guy has pictures of airplanes on website and a B-2 bomber lapel pin!  He knows!

UPDATE: It looks like there's a new version of this article, but the incorrect version is still up at News-Leader.com, and I'm told the incorrect version ran in the print version of today's Star.

The Associated Press: 

Federal campaign finance reports show Skelton reported raising $159,000 during the first quarter this year. Former state lawmaker Vicky Hartzler raised $94,000 from January through March, and state Sen. Bill Stouffer raised $43,000.

All three campaigns reported they had about $300,000 available in their bank accounts. Hartzler has $296,000 on-hand, which is about $10,000 more than Skelton and $25,000 more than Stouffer.

Ike Skelton actually raised $432,673 in the first quarter of 2010.  He has $1,232,078 cash on hand.

Jeff Parnell filed to run for Congress in the Fourth Congressional District yesterday, saying "there are simply too many inept politicians in the race for me to stay out."  Parnell was the GOP candidate against Rep. Ike Skelton in 2008.  

Parnell obviously isn't a fan of Skelton, but he probably isn't making friends in the Bill Stouffer and Vicky Harztler camps with his "inept politicians" dig.  Politico:

Jeff Parnell, who was Skelton's 2008 opponent, told POLITICO he entered the campaign on the final day of filing because "while it is a personal sacrifice, there are simply too many inept politicians in the race for me to stay out."

Sen. Bill Stouffer (R-Napton), one of six conservative Republicans to vote against the Senate's autism insurance bill (SB618), has words of comfort for the families he voted against.  Fear not, struggling families, because "the free market system works."  Via The Turner Report:

I cannot vote to let state government dictate what coverage insurance companies can offer. The free market system works. Letting government in, so they can tell insurance providers who they can and cannot cover, is not a good fix to a situation.

SB618 passed 26-6 on March 18. Last year, however, when the Senate passed Rupp's SB167 by a 29-2 vote, Stouffer has happy to support a similar assault on freedom bipartisan solution.

Politico's Dave Catanese posted a series of interesting tweets on Saturday about Tom Schweich's campaign for State Auditor.  In chronological order:

• 8:38 PM - Bad buzz about Schweich from even those who support him. He's steamed he has a primary when he cut a deal. Ala [Florida Governor Charlie] Crist, welcome to the NFL.
   
• 9:14 PM - GOPer says Schweich needs to learn from @RoyBlunt in approach. Roy takes his licks, but smiles, brushes off like Jay-Z. Schweich gets mad.
   
• 9:32 PM - Schweich should devote a speech to his $500 contrib. to @clairecmc. Say if the GOP wants to b party that excludes indys, it won't prevail.
   
• 9:41 PM - No, @allenicet [primary opponent Allen Icet] doesn't inspire. But Schweich is turning people off. RT @davesmith3: @davecatanese is @alanicet really crushing it THAT much?