Ernest Blevins' Issue Positions (Political Courage Test)
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West Virginia State Legislative Election 2022 Political Courage Test
| Pro-life | a) Do you generally support pro-choice or pro-life legislation? | ||
| No | b) Do you support legalizing abortion when the pregnancy resulted from incest or rape? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support the prohibition of public funds for organizations that perform abortions? | ||
| If the heartbeat, or lack thereof, determines death; then the presence of a heartbeat determines life. In the case of risk of life of the mother then there should be the option as if not two would die instead of one. However, if the mother wishes the survivor to be the child then that should be respected. | |||
| No | a) In order to balance the budget, do you support reducing state employee salaries AND/OR pensions? | ||
| No | b) Do you support raising taxes on any income or on any entity, to promote economic growth? | ||
| I support elimination of the income tax, thus cannot support raising the income tax. I support improving state employees' salary as when I was one I discovered how underpaid the department was compared with others across the nation which held when other places' salaries were adjusted to cost of living for Charleston. This will help retain state employees rather than being a stepping stone to other states are getting experience in West Virginia, something I observed several times in my position with the state. | |||
| Yes | a) Do you support capital punishment for certain crimes? | ||
| Yes | b) Should an individual under 18 accused of a violent crime be prosecuted as an adult? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support the enforcement of federal immigration laws by state and local police? | ||
| No | d) Do you support the use of private prisons? | ||
| e) Do you support mandatory minimum sentences for non-violent drug offenders? | |||
| As many murders as we see in West Virgnia that are clearly guilty or confessed, there should be the option of capital punishment vs supporting them for life in prison. | |||
| Yes | a) Do you support state government spending as a means of promoting economic growth? | ||
| Yes | b) Do you support reducing government regulations on the private sector? | ||
| No | c) Do you support an increase of the minimum wage of West Virginia? | ||
| No | d) Do you support providing financial relief to businesses AND/OR corporations negatively impacted by the state of national emergency for COVID-19? | ||
| All of the above has caveats. a. depending on the situation, for one company or for a class of industry? What form of state spending? b. depending on that the regulations are, this is too broad for a simple yes and no. c. I believe the minimum wage should be a state function and not a national function, however, I don't think the state min. wage needs raising with as many jobs as I've are higher than the wage including jobs for teens (I have a teenager making $11+/hour in fast food). d. Covid is over as a significant issue. | |||
| No | a) Do you support adopting federal education standards in West Virginia? | ||
| Yes | b) Do you support state funding for charter schools? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support increasing teacher salaries AND/OR benefits in West Virginia? | ||
| No | d) Should immigrants unlawfully present in the United States who graduate from West Virginia high schools be eligible for in-state tuition at public universities? | ||
| Yes | e) Do you support requiring the State Board of Education submit its rules or policies to the legislature? | ||
| a. West Virginia should adopt its own standards b I support educational choice including charter schools, home schools, etc. c. Teachers are paid well from seeing what is made here and equal to elsewhere. I think other state employees need to be raised before another raise for teachers who have received several raises in recent years. d. If other agencies must have rules approved by the legislature, its good for education to be the same. I like this idea of rules review. | |||
| Yes | a) Do you support state funding for the development of renewable energy (e.g. solar, wind, geo-thermal)? | ||
| No | b) Do you support government regulations of greenhouse gas emissions? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support increasing state funding for clean drinking water initiatives? | ||
| a. As if they are new companies as questioned above, not because they are renewable. I do think that taxpayer funded (or funded by utility companies with higher bills for all) "free" charging stations should be paid for by the electric car owners. b. I think many of the regulations are overreaching, though appropriate ones I can support for pollution reasons. c. yes, bring clean water infrastructure to those that want access to it. I reviewed many projects expanding water lines to service others. | |||
| Yes | a) Do you support the regulation of campaign contributions from corporations, unions, and individuals? | ||
| Yes | b) Do you support the use of an independent AND/OR bipartisan commission for redistricting? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support requiring a government-issued photo identification in order to vote at the polls? | ||
| No | d) Do you support automatic voter registration? | ||
| a. want to remove corporate funds then do not tax companies as individuals (i.e. income taxes), then disallow donations. Also disallow donations from unions as well. Allow individuals to contributions. b. mixed on the commissions, would have to study up on the matter. c. I support IDs to vote and recommend making voter registration cards with a photo and/or placing voter registration info on DL and state IDs. d. one should seek out registration, vs automatic; besides they may wish to retain their voter registration to another place. | |||
| No | a) Do you generally support gun-control legislation? | ||
| No | b) Should background checks be required on gun sales between private citizens at gun shows? | ||
| No | c) Should a license be required for gun ownership? | ||
| I support the 2nd Amendment in full. It protects the right to have a militia and that citizens can be armed for that and for personal defense. | |||
| Yes | a) Should the state government increase funding for treatment facilities to combat opioid abuse? | ||
| No | b) Do you support a government-run (single-payer) healthcare program such as Medicare-for All? | ||
| Yes | c) Should an individual have the right to choose to die through euthanasia? | ||
| Yes | d) Do you support eliminating religious exemptions for vaccinations? | ||
| No | e) Do you support expanding paid family AND/OR medical leave opportunities? | ||
| Yes | f) Do you support lowering the cost of prescription drugs? | ||
| a. yes, we should provide treatment and redemption for those who are addicted. b. no. we have too much insurance involved and a government covering all would make it worse c. torn a bit on this, but open to discussion about it. Mindset and other factors come into play. f. who doesn't want lower prescription prices although much is said about shopping around but that's harder when most are now done by electronics and now allowing to be shopped about by the patient. | |||
| No | a) Do you support the inclusion of sexual orientation in West Virginia's anti-discrimination laws? | ||
| No | b) Do you support the inclusion of gender identity in West Virginia's anti-discrimination laws? | ||
| Yes | c) Do you support greater efforts by West Virginia state government in closing gender, racial and other wage gaps? | ||
| I support efforts to close all wage gaps in state government. | |||
| Eliminate the Income tax. Protect elections with creating districts for each of the electors much like Maine and Nebraska do so that each district has to be won for that rather than a winner takes all for the state. Natural and historic preservation and conservation/management of resources. | |||
| Eliminate the income tax fund with sales taxes such as Florida, Texas, and Tennessee examples (this is better to more than eliminate the car tax since all, including teens, have income tax withheld, but not all have a car). Eliminate the inventory taxes to open up to warehousing, forest harvest, and other business opportunities. |
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