Image a world where Rand Paul is running against Mitt Romney. Paul defeated Romney in the last election and Romney is out for blood in the rematch. Sorry, but for folks that live out of Idaho, that’s about the closest comparison that I can come up with to describe the State Senate race here.
The Rand Paul-like character in the race is Scott Herndon. Herndon is a real conservative. He is everything Tom McClintock is not. Herndon’s deeds match his words, and he is a leader; two things McClintock has never been. Herndon will vote against any bill if there is pork or hidden spending increases in it. Unlike Congress, he will only vote to approve money when he agrees where all of it will be spent. If a bill has extra stuff in it, Herndon will not support it. Oh, and unlike other folks in office, Herndon reads every bill and can tell you what he likes or doesn’t in each one.
In Idaho, the Legislature is a part-time one, and the legislative session is about 90-days. Things move at a very fast pace. A bill might be introduced on Monday and be heard in committee on Wednesday. It’s a furious pace in a short time. Anything being fast tracked is probably in need of additional scrutiny. I liken it to juggling chainsaws.
The Mitt Romney type character up here is Jim Woodward. Jim is a RINO. He thinks Idaho’s abortion restrictions are a problem and seems to want abortion as a form of birth control like it was under Roe v Wade. He voted to support DEI (Diversity, Inclusion, Equity) in academia and business. He pretends to want limited government and lower taxes, but the thrust of his campaign is hitting Herndon both for not spending enough money and Herndon’s reluctance to expand the scope and reach of government.
Were he in California, Woodward would be a proud moderate but in Idaho, he is a chameleon masquerading as a conservative. In a meeting of conservatives, you can sense that Woodward is choking on his own bile just being in the same room as them. But it’s what he must endure to win.
Woodward is supported by a coalition of Democrats, liberal Republicans, and others. One thing they have in common is that they really hate Christians. They have a website that attacks Herndon mercilessly for his faith and values. Started in 2022, this site is North Idaho Republicans.
A week ago, their poorly maintained website had several pages with text that was gibberish (plug text intended to be replaced by actual content). Thankfully, they at least finally took them down. Their Facebook page is their real portal and has more current content.
Here’s some gems from their website.
Conservatives want Dystopian Future
A March 5th post begins with praise for California’s Child Protective Services. Yes, really! Remember, this is a website claiming to be a group of conservative Republicans and they start out praising California (mistake number one) for a government system that is broken (mistake number two).
On the whole, the post seems to lack continuity and substance. In fact, the author has to invent facts out of thin air. Her (I can tell whoever wrote this is female and liberal by the content) entire article is speculation and thus wholly untrue. It is an attack on Herndon and Christians and what harm she thinks they might do in the future. It’s really a classic strawman argument used as a vehicle to trash conservatives. Here are a few parts:
… their Christian Nationalist agenda and make good on their promises to abolish anything they view as an affront to domininist ideologies.
Herndon and his Abolish Abortion arsonist allies …
… a combination of fear porn and forcing some bizarre pseudo-christian version of Sharia Law down people’s throats.
… the laws of the new Christian state …
The full rant can be found here.
Only Republicans can vote in Republican Primaries
Another thing the North Idaho group dislikes is the Republican effort in the state to say that you must be registered as a Republican for one year before voting in a Republican election. This allegedly conservative group wants Democrats to be able to change registration to select who wins on the Republican ticket. If you oppose any version of “Operation Chaos” or any other means of non-republican involvement in Republican Primary elections, then in their eyes, you are evil.
Yep, just like other groups I can think of, Woodward and his ilk invoke Ronald Reagan as their role model but somehow not Reagan’s beliefs. They only invoke Reagan to claim that others in the GOP must work for what they want. Bipartisanship is always a one-way street. Funny how that happens.
These guys have open hostility to Christianity. Christians started the Republican Party to oppose slavery.
If the North Idaho Republican group wants people in elected office, that claim to be Christian but don’t let it affect their politics, then they should be voting for Joe Biden or Nancy Pelosi. Heck, they’re in the wrong political party. No wonder they’re so uncomfortable as Republicans.
Fake Racism Incident
Note: below I have underlined a few places in quotations for emphasis.
A few weeks ago, the North Idaho Republicans also opened their pie-holes about racism in Coeur d’Alene, but the truth is that the incident—in which they blamed people that they lump in with Scott Herndon—never happened. Zero evidence.
Now, almost two weeks since the incident occurred, there remains no evidence to support these claims.
Anatomy Of A Hate Hoax: One Week And Still NO EVIDENCE of Alleged “Racist Incident” in Coeur d’Alene With Utah Basketball Team
However, this didn’t stop the false narrative from making national news.
According to Stewart’s Task-Force [Tony Stewart of the Kootenai County Task Force on Human Relations], the University of Utah Women’s Basketball team “encountered a truck displaying a Confederate flag as the driver began spewing appalling racial slurs at them, including the “N” word.”
According to the Kootenai Co human rights task force, the players were going to dinner when they were followed by a driver yelling the N word at them.
The truck that allegedly accosted the players while they were on their way to a restaurant supposedly waited around for TWO HOURS for the team to eat dinner, and then harassed the team again on their way back to the Coeur d’Alene resort. The team was only staying in Coeur d’Alene because the NCAA “dropped the ball” and forgot to reserve the team a hotel 45 minutes away in Spokane.
The allegations of this “Racist Incident” were first made public by Utah Women’s Basketball Coach Lynn Roberts, shortly after her team lost a game against Gonzaga at the NCAA March Madness Tournament.
Please note this steaming pile disguised as a press release.
Recent events in downtown Coeur d’Alene, involving the totally unacceptable verbal harassment of female athletes from the University of Utah and the University of California-Irvine, underscore the importance of the need to commit to uphold moral values and true freedom.
NIR firmly disavows these flashbacks of 1920’s Klan-like and 1990’s Aryan Nations-like activities, underscoring that genuine freedom cannot coexist with bigotry, harassment, and intimidation. Unfortunately, once again the destructive influence of some within the local Republican community is having truly negative effects on our community.
Press Release: North Idaho Republicans Denounces Racism and Bigotry
Please note in the above that this republican group is saying that they know for a fact that a fellow Republican, who simply must be from the camp they oppose, is responsible for this incident—although, it never happened. Also, if you don’t agree with them then you must be a Nazi.
Not done making asses of themselves, the author of the release then inserts a quote from himself.
Former Idaho Lt. Governor Jack Riggs voiced his concern, stating, “The empowerment of racism within our ranks threatens the very essence of our community and the integrity of the Republican Party.
Again, the guy with the rebel flag must be a Republican, but not one of ours.
Seems like this might be the classic strawman argument in action.
Oh, the gift that keeps give, this Riggs guy is a real nutjob:
“As Republicans, we must do more than merely point to ‘platform statements’ on racism; we must act decisively to root it out where it exists within our organization,” Riggs added. “This means holding our party leaders accountable and ensuring that their actions reflect the values we profess to hold. There is simply no place for racism anywhere.”
In this paragraph, he now blames the Republican leadership of Idaho Republicans for the incident. This tells you that he’s not part of said leadership, but he deserves to be our master.
I will have more on the website of the North Idaho Republicans shortly.
Woodward and Abortion
These North Idaho whiners aren’t really Republicans. They don’t like abortion restrictions and think we need more DEI, transgender books for elementary school kids, and rainbow stuff.
Their boy, Jim Woodward got a plug of sorts from the UK Guardian newspaper. Apparently, he regrets his previous stand as a prolife Republican and wishes to moderate his positions. The following was written by a freelance writer in Montana, about the uphill struggle to undo the prolife laws in Idaho and once again make abortion lethal through all nine months of pregnancy. Towards the end of this advocacy piece, you will find these paragraphs:
Then another guest arrives: Jim Woodward, a Sandpoint Republican who served in the Idaho state senate from 2019-2022. He voted yes on all anti-abortion bills, but lost his seat in the 2022 election to Scott Herndon, a far-right abortion abolitionist who believes abortion should be treated as homicide and punished with jail time or even the death penalty. In the 2023 session, Herndon tried to remove Idaho’s rape and incest exception and called rape “an opportunity to have the child … if the rape actually occurred”. (Herndon declined to be interviewed for this story.)
Woodward is running to retake the seat this year. He says he and many other anti-abortion legislators didn’t foresee the ramifications of the bills they voted for. Part of his platform, which promises to reclaim his community from extremism, is to somewhat ease legislative language that doesn’t take the mother’s future health into account and calls for felony convictions for physicians. He didn’t hesitate to accept [Jen Jackson] Quintano’s invitation to the viewing party. “We should be able to talk about all of these things, and do it in a nice way,” he says. Two days later, he shares stories from the Nightline episode with attendees at a campaign meet and greet.
‘Idaho’s seen as a war zone’: the lone abortion activist defying militias and the far right
For those of you that don’t pay attention to legal issues, taking the mother’s health into consideration, as Woodward states above, is how we got almost 50 years of abortion being legal for all nine months of the pregnancy and the main form of birth control in the United States. Clearly Woodward wants to go back to Roe v Wade (and Doe v Bolton) as the law of the land.
Please note that Woodward was willing to vote prolife as long as he knew that only the Supreme Court had the power to overturn Roe. He was defeated by Herndon just a month before Roe was struck down. Now that voting prolife has real world implications, he wants to relax the restrictions that he once voted for. Conclusion, he only voted that way because he was expected to do so to get elected. It was never how he truly felt about the evil of abortion.
Black Lists and Black-balling
As I was poking around the North Idaho Republican website, I clicked on a curious button (Visit NIRPAC.ORG) and was transported to the alt world of their banned and blacklisted enemies list.
On one part of their main website, they quote Ronald Reagan saying he could work with someone that agrees with him 80 percent of the time. I guess if you really believe and agree with Reagan on abortion then the offer to work with you doesn’t apply. Oh, for those that don’t know, while in office, Reagan wrote a book condemning abortion. He is the only US President to write a book on the subject and did so while in office.
On the web page that you jump to for NIR PAC, you will see a button with the curious name of Non-Republican Sites.
There is this curious sentence followed by a list of blacklisted groups and websites.
But North Idaho Republicans ALSO chooses to NOT be associated with the following Non-Republican Network sites.
The list is composed of conservative groups composed mostly of Republicans. Some of the URLs in their list are broken.
Here are the names:
Idaho Common Ground which has no active URL
About: I am a Christian, conservative woman who was ‘forced’ to be a stay at home mom when my job required masks, and when my kids’ school ‘forced’ masks on their students to be able to step on campus. My kids are now homeschooled, btw. As the wife of a small business owner, I saw exactly how our liberties could be taken away when we weren’t paying attention, and 2020 helped me understand my red line, my morals, my history, and it made me become even more Conservative than I’ve ever been before. The craziness of 2020 is why I decided to stand up and let my voice be heard. I am the Vice President of the Northwest Property Owners Alliance, a proud member of the Kootenai County Republican Women Federation, Republican party, the Society for Professional Journalism, Candlelight Christian Fellowship in Coeur d’Alene…
No new content since November 2023.
Mission: The North Idaho Freedom Fighters (NIFF) believe in our God-given right to pursue lives of fulfillment, purpose, and happiness. As sons and daughters of the United States Constitution, we will fight to defend our rights and liberties from the evils of tyranny and oppression. Dedicated to preserving America’s freedoms, we will unify and strengthen our community until our republic is once again returned to the citizens of these United States of America.
About: Redoubt News is a news and opinion online publication featuring the Christian conservative culture around, and important to, the American Redoubt. The goal of Redoubt News is to inform and educate citizens on important news stories from a perspective of individual liberty.
Mission: IFF’s mission is to defeat Marxism and socialism by building a culture of liberty around America’s founding principles so that Idahoans can prosper.
About: Idaho Freedom Action (IFA) is a 501(c)(4) nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving freedom in the Gem State. Through direct action, IFA supports policies that strengthen free markets, individual liberty and state sovereignty and opposes those that would bring Idaho down a path of socialism.
We love our state, and while we welcome anyone who wants to make a positive contribution to our Idaho communities, we’re not interested in radically transforming what or who we are to become more like the places our new residents are leaving behind. That’s why we are mobilized to fight the big policy battles facing Idaho, from reckless tax-and-spend proposals to the hostile woke takeover of education.
Idaho Freedom Action is the state’s premier free market advocacy organization. Armed with the scholarly products of Idaho Freedom Foundation (IFF), IFA is fighting every single day to hold accountable politicians who seek to change Idaho in ways that forsake our heritage and undermine our ideals.
About: The John Birch Society is a non-partisan civics and education organization. We are concerned Americans from many races, religious beliefs, and national origins. Since we were founded on December 9, 1958, we have been men and women of good character, humane conscience, and religious ideals who have worked together to safeguard the Constitution.
Northwest Property Owners Alliance
About: We will continue to take up property and privacy concerns in defense of property owners in the Northwest (Idaho, Washington, Oregon, and Montana.) We strive to keep property owners appraised of local and regional issues affecting them.
Mission: Our mission at Health Freedom Idaho is to promote and protect the inherent right of every individual, parent, and guardian in Idaho to choose their own path towards health and wellness. We advocate for access to healing and healthcare treatments, information, and services of their choice, while defending the rights of practitioners to practice. Through the development of state statutes and rules, we honor the unalienable human right to self-determination in all aspects of health. We empower citizens by providing education and advocacy on the laws and factors impacting their right to access healthcare.
About: We promote and support our local patriot community. The PEN supports Veterans, active military, law enforcement, first responders and all American Patriots in business. We live and work in the Inland Northwest and we are committed to providing our Patriot community with this valuable service. The Patriot Economic Network was born out of our need to find local goods and services while at the same time supporting fellow Patriots in business.
About: Citizens Alliance of Idaho was started by a group of Idaho citizens who wanted to see some type of positive change in Idaho politics. In wanting to be a voice of reason in a hyperpolarized environment, the best natural starting point was to focus on the only two documents that every Idahoan has agreed to live by: The Idaho State Constitution and the U.S. Constitution. These are the only two documents that provide the rules for how legislators agree to govern along with the expectations of the citizens they represent. We couldn’t think of a more fair and civic-minded roadmap.
Summation
So, there you have it, all the people that North Idaho Republicans refuses to work with. If you believe in following the Constitution, want accountable government, property rights, religious or health freedom, following the Christian faith, or opposing Marxism, you’re not welcome. Funny but last I checked, Ronald Reagan believed and supported all these things too.
I might have more on these guys as circumstances develop.