Tim Pawlenty

God-Given Rights

Pawlenty is an evangelical Christian who isn't shy about citing faith as one of his guiding principles.

"Our response to the challenge we face will be to rise and fight for our principles," he told CPAC attendees in February 2009. "The principles of limited government, individual freedom, individual responsibility, faith in God, and sanctity of life."

Explaining in the speech why conservatives believe what they do, he said, "It all starts with acknowledging that God is our creator. And it is from God that we receive our values."

He went on to note that the Declaration of Independence emphasized that individuals were granted their rights from their creator. "It doesn't say God gave them to government who in turn gave them to us," Pawlenty said. "It says God gave them to us as certain unalienable rights."

Health-Care Reform and 2012 Presidential Hopes

Pawlenty proved to be a much-needed Republican voice during the 2009-2010 health-care debate. In November 2010, he joined a federal court filing in Florida against the cost of the bill to states that was allowed to go to trial.

In the debate over health reform, Pawlenty saw both a chance for Republicans to foment a comeback, and a route to distinguish himself from other potential 2012 Republican presidential candidates.

Pawlenty opposes the president's public insurance option as well as possible tax increases on businesses. The fiscal conservative also believes that health care's effect on the federal budget would result in a "massive spending disaster."

"People are ticked off and scared," he said. "You have a situation where a good chunk of the country is waking up to the fact that Obama is proposing things that are out of step with common sense, out of step with the notion that the government isn't going to run everything."

Instead Pawlenty supports reducing costs by spreading insurance pools across state lines, increasing competition in private insurance markets, requiring insurers to cover people with preexisting conditions and incentivizing doctors and hospitals to reduce the cost of patient visits.

Pawlenty's more measured stance on health-care reform set him apart from his possible 2012 Republican rivals, like Sarah Palin, whose sensationalized Obama's end-of-life "death panels" in a Facebook post, and Mitt Romney, who signed universal health care into law as Massachusetts governor, only to have the program struggle financially.

Abortion and Gay Rights

As governor, Pawlenty has taken several actions that have earned him the praise of anti-abortion rights groups. In 2003, he signed the "Women's Right to Know" law, which required women seeking abortions to wait 24 hours and receive information about the pain the fetus could feel, the gestational age of the fetus at the time of the procedure, as well as the medical risks associated with abortion.

In 2008, Pawlenty appointed Eric Magnuson to serve as chief justice of the Minnesota Supreme Court. Magnuson once wrote an amicus brief for an anti-abortion rights group that argued against public funding for abortions. Pawlenty has also said he is against public funding for abortions.

His record on gay rights has evolved. While still in the Minnesota House in 1993, Pawlenty voted for the Human Rights Amendment that banned discrimination in housing and employment based on sexual orientation. But during his battle for the 2002 Republican gubernatorial nomination, Pawlenty said the vote was a mistake. In 2004, he signed a pledge in support of a state constitutional amendment defining marriage as being between a man and a woman.

Taxes and Spending

As governor, Pawlenty has tried to hold true to his pledge not to raise taxes and to restrain growth in spending. When he took office in 2003, the state was facing a $4.2 billion budget shortfall, but instead of cutting taxes, he reduced spending by more than $2 billion. "The days of a program for every problem and a state government that leads by blank check are over," he declared.

In 2005, Pawlenty and the state legislature reached an impasse over the budget that forced a partial shutdown of the government for the first time in history. The compromise that followed included a 75-cent "health impact fee" on cigarettes, which some charged violated his pledge not to raise taxes.

In its 2008 Fiscal Policy Report Card on America's Governors, the libertarian Cato Institute gave Pawlenty a B grade. The report criticized Pawlenty for a number of fee increases, but concluded that his "veto record is impressive, including rejecting a gasoline tax increase, a hike in the top personal income tax rate, and various bloated spending bills. Pawlenty has delivered fairly restrained budgets over the years and kept spending growth to modest increases."

By 2006, Minnesota was projecting a surplus of $2 billion over the following three years, but the budget situation deteriorated in the midst of the economic slowdown. In February 2009, the Minnesota Management and Budget office forecasted a combined $4.6 billion shortfall for the 2010 and 2011 fiscal years.

In 2009, Pawlenty opposed the $787 billion economic stimulus package signed by President Obama. Pawlenty said he was concerned about the federal government spending money it doesn't have and believed that not enough of the package was aimed at infrastructure. He said the legislation evolved into a "meandering financial buffet of spending across all kinds of categories, many of which are not stimulative." Instead, he supported a Republican alternative that was focused on tax cuts.

Pawlenty decided to accept the stimulus funds despite his opposition to the legislation that was signed into law, and dismissed charges of hypocrisy. "[W]hat is the rule that you can't participate in federal legislation if you're concerned about it?" he asked rhetorically. "If you're a liberal governor and you're opposed to military spending, does that mean you don't take the National Guard money? If you're opposed to No Child Left Behind, do you not take that money?"

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