My Beliefs

Government belongs to the people, not politicians, lobbyists or bureaucrats.

My Record

Accountability: In 2009, I authored the most comprehensive education reform bill to bring more transparency and accountability to the state’s largest expenditure – common education.

Taxpayer Transparency: I helped pass the Oklahoma’s original “Open Books” bill and was the principal Senate author with Representative Ken Miller of its successor: the “Open Books 2.0″ bill, which seeks to make every individual expenditure of government searchable by individual check and draft.

Spending Less: I voted against the largest budget in state history, saying that if revenues decreased in the future, more problems would result than what we would care to deal with.  I also carried the bill to create the Chief Information Officer, which has saved other states tens of millions of dollars and will hopefully do the same in Oklahoma.

Voter I.D.: Voting is one of our most precious rights and it should be diligently protected from voter fraud.  Because of that, I’ve sponsored and helped pass legislation to require voters to prove they are actually the persons on the rolls when they case their ballot.

Eminent Domain: To ensure Oklahoma doesn’t take property away from people for economic development purposes, I led the charge after the Kelo vs. City of New London case was decided by the U.S. Supreme Court to protect Oklahoma private property rights from government land grabs solely for economic development purposes.