Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day: Jackie Walorski- 2022 Update

In 2016, 2017, 2018, 2019, 2020, and 2021, “Fanatical Republican Extremist of the Day” presented its original profile of the U.S. House Representative from Indiana’s 2nd Congressional District, Jackie Walorski, who during her time in the Indiana House of Representatives from 2004-2012, gained some notoriety for being a co-sponsor of a widely contested Voter ID bill to curtail the statistically non-existent problem of in-person voter fraud that led to a slew of lawsuits, was barely upheld in a U.S. Supreme Court challenge, and was then duplicated by various other Republican-controlled state legislatures to ensure voter suppression as a national tactic. What really made Jackie Walorski stand out, however, was her complete dedication to attacks on a woman’ right to choose, often sabotaging common sense legislation in the Indiana state legislature by adding on riders or amendments regarding abortion that would be the “poison pill” to make Democrats in Indiana forced to no longer support it. She used this tactic most famously (and disgustingly) to sabotage legislation to prevent hate crimes against the LGBTQ community by putting in an amendment to consider fetuses a protected group. Walorski decided to make the jump to national politics and hoped to ride the Tea Party Wave to Washington, D.C., to represent Indiana’s 2nd District in the 2010 elections, challenging Democratic Congressman Joe Donnelly for his U.S. House seat. During that campaign, she spoke about privatizing Social Security, and with her radical record in the Indiana state legislature, voters still balked at the idea of putting her into office.
But alas, she still wasn’t giving up hope, especially after Indiana’s 2nd District was gerrymandered after the 2010 elections by House Republicans so that Walorski could get another chance at weaseling her way into Congress again, once it had a +6 Republican lean, rather than the previous rating, only a +2 lean, that it had when she lost to Joe Donnelly in 2010. Donnelly didn’t want a rematch, and instead, ran a successful campaign in 2012 to be elected to the U.S. Senate.
Jackie Walorski would lose any advantage she might have gained from fundraising, though, after she was involved in a scandal regarding her attempts to fundraise off of a Planned Parenthood “sting” video. No, not the ones that popped up over the summer of 2015. Walorski was using footage from a pro-life activist pretending to be a 13 year old girl and go to a Planned Parenthood to raise money for her campaign coffers even prior to that slander. She sent the fundraising letter out during a period when it wasn’t allowed, then tried saying the ethics committee who were investigating her for doing so were “overlooking the rape and sexual abuse of a 13-year old minor”. (Which, again, wasn’t true, she wasn’t 13, wasn’t raped or abused, and wasn’t pregnant.) Anyway, Walorski’s Democratic opponent was an Iraq War Veteran Brendan Mullen, and as the polling showed the race tightening in August of 2012, she made the classy decision to doxx him, and release his home addresses in Washington, D.C., to the public in a campaign ad.

Sadly, this tactic may have worked, as Walorski won office by only about 3,800 votes, 49 to 48%.(And we remind you, this was after the district was gerrymandered to help her as a Republican.)
Since she arrived in the capitol, Walorski's voting record includes votes against disaster relief funding for victims of Hurricane Sandy, voting to defund the Department of Homeland Security to protest President Obama's executive orders on delayed deportations,  voting for the 2013 Government Shutdown and all anti-choice legislation that comes to the floor. Oh, and she did react to the more recent faux-controversy over Planned Parenthood because of the Center for Medical Progress bogus "sting videos, accusing the organization of "selling baby body parts." Which if you recall, is the exact kind of rhetoric that motivated Robert Dear, the shooter who attacked and killed several people at a Colorado Springs Planned Parenthood, so thanks for that, Jackie.      

Ironically, in 2016, Rep. Walorski survived both a primary challenge because of how she pulled her own anti-choice bill, HR 7, because she realized too late that it would not provide exceptions for rape, unless it was reported to authorities. Both Walorski and Rep. Renee Ellmers  panicked, and called for their own legislation to be dropped before they risked reigniting the War on Women claims the GOP had been battling in a big way (considering they schedule the vote on the anniversary of the Roe v. Wade ruling, yeah, it would have been pretty bad). Walorski was immediately branded a traitor to the Pro-Life movement, and did her best to earn back their good graces by getting her name down as a co-sponsor on HR 36 in May of 2015, but to no avail, she’s made herself the target of primary challenges for blinking whatsoever in anti-choice fanaticism.

• December 18th, 2019: Rep. Walorski ignores her Congressional duty to hold a president who has been proven to commit high crimes and misdemeanors accountable and votes against the FIRST impeachment of Donald Trump.
• May 15th, 2020: Walorski votes against the HEROES Act, to further support the healthcare industry and citizens affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.
• December 10th, 2020: Walorski signs her name to an amicus brief to the Supreme Court, begging them to overturn the results of the 2020 election. The same election that she won re-election in.
• January 6th, 2021: Jackie Walorski votes for the objection to the electoral college’s votes in the 2020 election, a failure to send any sort of message that he wasn’t intimidated or sympathetic to those who attacked the Capitol to attempt a violent coup.
• January 13th, 2021: Rep. Walorski votes against the second impeachment of Donald Trump, because the Republican Party no longer feels like they should be accountable for anything, including failed coups that result in the deaths of both their participants and police officers.
• February 4th, 2021: Jackie Walorski votes to keep Marjorie Taylor Greene’s committee assignments, because she wouldn’t want her to be accountable for all the bigoted remarks and conspiracy theories she’s spread online (probably because she’s a kindred spirit).
• February 25th, 2021: Walorski votes against HR 5, the latest version of the Equality Act, that would provide workplace protections for LGBTQ Americans.
• March 3rd, 2021: Rep. Walorski votes against HR 1, a bill created to prevent the corruption of money in politics, and protect voter access to the ballot box.
• March 3rd, 2021: Jackie Walorski votes against the George Floyd Justice in Policing Act of 2021.
• March 10th, 2021: Walorski votes against the American Rescue Plan Act of 2021, because she feels people deserve to die in poverty during a pandemic.
• March 17th, 2021: Rep. Walorski is one of 172 Republicans who choose to vote against the re-authorization of the Violence Against Women Act, likely because they feel the 2nd Amendment remaining absolute is more important than preventing people with a history of domestic abuse from owning a firearm (which statistics show, makes them more likely to use those firearms against women in their lives).
• May 19th, 2021: Rep. Reschenthaler votes against HR 3233, the creation of a commission to investigate the Capitol Attack.
• November 5th, 2021: Jackie Walorski votes against HR 3684, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act.

Jackie Walorski was re-elected in 2020 with 61% of the vote. She spent the past two years doing everything she apparently can to assure the Covid-19 pandemic continues, calling the concept of vaccine passports that would be required to be carried for admission to venues as “Un-American”, because there’s nothing more representative of the USA than having the medical capability to fight a disease but allowing plague carriers to still spread it. She’s also trash-talking Vladimir Putin a lot, but that’s only because she’s one of 398 members of Congress sanctioned by Russia (she’ll speak up against her party’s favorite dictator once they inconvenience her financially) and she’s going to stir up conservative support by, what else… lying about abortion! This time, it’s claiming that there were fetal remains recovered from “partial-birth abortions”, which really aren’t a thing, and haven’t been since the National Right to Life Committee made it up in 1995, and the GOP continued misrepresenting the facts when they tried to ban dilation and evacuation abortions (the real name) in 2003.
At least she’s consistent about being full of s***.