Tonight, Mike Kehoe secured the GOP nomination in the Missouri gubernatorial race. In a predominantly red state, Kehoe has run an extreme campaign that might remind you of the draconian and backwards-looking policy goals of Project 2025.
In response, American Bridge spokesperson Philip Shulman released the following statement:
“Mike Kehoe is a dream candidate for Project 2025 and the Heritage Foundation as they will be instrumental in implementing an extreme right-wing agenda that will attack health care access, public education, and push Christian nationalism on all Missourians regardless of their actual faith. Make no mistake — Missouri under Mike Kehoe will be a test lab for how far right-wing extremism will go if given the chance.”
Here’s what you need to know about Mike Kehoe:
- Lieutenant Governor Mike Kehoe was exuberant when Roe fell as he and the governor were able to enact a total abortion ban with zero exceptions for rape or incest.
- As a state senator, he ran on banning abortion “from conception.”
- Kehoe claimed he voted against every anti-abortion bill that he could.
- Kehoe thinks some people should be above the law, going so far as to say he would pardon anyone he suspected was being targeted by a “liberal prosecutor.”
- He also broke norms by campaigning on a promise to pardon a specific convict: a former Kansas City police officer who was convicted of manslaughter for killing a Black man on his own property.
- Kehoe is vehemently anti-public school as he took $1 million from the Herzog Foundation, which is an influential “school choice” organization that is pushing for Christian K-12 schools.
- Herzog is integrally tied to Project 2025 and the Heritage Foundation, as well as Focus on the Family, the anti-LGBTQ+ and anti-abortion advocates; and Answers in Genesis, the Young Earth Creationist group that serves as a nerve center for the evolution-denial movement.
- Like many empty-suited Republicans, Kehoe has tried to turn St. Louis and Kansas City into boogeymen, even going so far as to sell two office buildings in the former without consulting city officials.
- This resulted in St. Louis losing 600 jobs.
- Kehoe wants to push Christianity across Missouri, and has wanted to empower businesses to deny services to same-sex couples.
- He previously said marriage equality leads to the “dissolution of families.”
Published: Aug 6, 2024