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Contributors in Minnesota: Jennifer Brooks, Baird Helgeson, Patricia Lopez, Jim Ragsdale, Rachel E. Stassen-Berger and Glen Stubbe. Contributors in D.C.: Kevin Diaz and Corey Mitchell.
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GOP Senate candidate: Cap foreign aid, eliminate 4 agencies
Posted by: Rachel E. Stassen-Berger under Minnesota U.S. senators, Minnesota campaigns, Republicans Updated: May 29, 2012 - 4:10 PM
Republican U.S. Senate candidate Kurt Bills on Tuesday put his backing behind a plan to cut foreign aid down to a tenth of its current size, add means testing to farm subsidies and Social Security payments, eliminate much of the federal funding for the Drug Enforcement Agency's 'War on Drugs.'
"My goal would be to work toward zero subsidies, zero foreign aid," Bills said. For now, he said, he backs the idea of reducing foreign aid to $5 billion, with more than half of that going to Israel, and cutting back farm subsidies so that corporations and better off farmers would be cut off.
Expounding on his policy views in detail for one of the first times before the press, Bills outlined a plan that is drastically different than what now stands. His positions won him backing from Texas Rep. Ron Paul, who support helped him surge to party endorsement, and give him sharp contrasts with Democratic incumbent U.S. Sen. Amy Klobuchar.
Saying the Senate has been neglectful in not putting forward a budget plan, Bills backed U.S. Sen. Rand Paul's budget plan.
"I'll be running on the 'Platform to Revitalize America,'" Bills said, just after he officially filed his paperwork to run. "It's a discussion that needs to go forward."
The freshman state representative from Rosemount said he backs the idea of eliminating the Departments of Education, Commerce, Energy and Housing and Urban Development and parsing out some of their functions to other agencies.
Bills also said he would support a flat tax, as outlined by the Rand Paul plan.
"It's clearly something we can look at doing," Bills said.
The freshman state representative, also said Tuesday that he would not support legalizing now illegal drugs but would cut funding to the Drug Enforcement Agency's efforts to keep drugs from entering the country.
"I would not vote to legalize drugs. I do think the federal government has become too involved in their war on drugs," Bills said. Bills said he would refocus some of the funding he would cut from the DEA to local law enforcement, "if there's some left."
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