to raise spending on public schools. he figured out a way to freeze college tuition in the state. he figured out a way to stop ruining people s lives at the stupid and petty point of the criminal justice system by no longer letting them seize your drivers license if you were late paying a fee or paying a fine. after citizens united gutted the no corporate money rule for its elections, steve bullock fought that all the way to the supreme court as attorney general. he then as governor worked with the republican legislature to ultimately enact some of the most progressive new campaign finance protection laws in the country that said, it is a red state, and it s a really republican legislature that he s got. steve bullock is pro-choice. that means he has vetoed approximately one gazillion efforts at abortion bans and abortion restrictions in the state, including one as recently as this month. he vetoed republican efforts to end same-day voter regulatiistr
$5.15. that meant if you were working nine to five, five days a week, monday to friday, you never took a day off, you never took a sick day, a vacation, you worked five days a week for 52 straight weeks every single week of the year, cumulatively you would make for the year $10,712 as your annual salary, before taxes. in that state that year, 2006, they decided they would put a measure on the ballot to raise that state s minimum wage, raise it from $5.15 an hour to $6.15 an hour, and then importantly, they would tie the minimum wage to prices so when prices went up the minimum wage would automatically keep pace. it would tick up every year. $6.15 an hour still sucks, but that ballot measure that year would mean a dollar an hour raise right away for the lowest paid people in that state, and
not easy for a democrat to win statewide in a red state in a presidential election year. again, that was 2008. john mccain was at the top of the ticket. the republican party carried that state in the presidential race over barack obama, but steve bullock won his race for attorney general that year, even as the state went red for the presidency. then four years later in 2012, steve bullock ran for governor. again, not easy for a democrat to win statewide in a red state. again in a presidential election year. this time the republican nominee was mitt romney, and mitt romney that year carried montana, won montana over barack obama by solid double-digits. nevertheless, that same year, that same night in 2012, democrat steve bullock won the governorship, even as the state went red for the presidency again that same night. then four years later, 2016, he ran for reelection as governor. again, not easy for a democrat to win statewide in a red state,
night. tonight the state s republican governor signed it into law. this is the strictest abortion ban to pass the legislature. it s not just happening in alabama. it is happening all over the country in all the states where republicans have full control. this is what republicans are doing with their control of state government. including alabama. we ve got radical restrictive abortion bans passing at least one chamber of the state legislature. so far in already half, already 11 of the 22 states under republican control, plus one more in montana where republicans control the legislature, but there the democratic governor, that democratic governor who vetoed one of these anti-abortion bills in his state last week, he is going to be here in just a moment talk about his presidential bid. the gudmaker institute tracks abortion. they say they have never seen anything like what we are seeing this year in 2019. quote, the extreme nature of this year s bills is unprecedented. but that s what re
gets the privilege of announcing to the state when the minimum wage goes up every year because of that battle he led and won with such a huge margin back in 2006. this was the announcement this year about montana s minimum wage going up again because it is yoked to price increases. so it keeps pace with inflation. as a democratic governor with a very republican legislature, steve bullock has also figured out a bipartisan way to expand medicaid in his state. that got about 100,000 people in his state on to health insurance who hadn t previously had it. and that s 100,000? that s a lot, right, just hearing that as a number. but considering the fact that that s 100,000 people in montana finally getting health insurance in a state that only has about a million people. so that s i mean 10% of the state gets health insurance through medicaid expansion? that s a transformation in that state, and he did it with a republican legislature. bullock also figured out a way