John Shadegg - Political Positions

Political Positions

Shadegg is an economic conservative who has fought for lower taxes and against government waste and is a signer of the Taxpayer Protection Pledge. Shadegg opposed a house budget resolution that would increase taxes in 2007. Citizens Against Government Waste considered him a "Taxpayer Hero". National Taxpayers Union considered him a "Taxpayer Friend" in 2006.

In every Congress since the 104th Congress, U.S. Congressman John Shadegg has introduced the Enumerated Powers Act, although it has not been passed into law. At the beginning of the 105th Congress, the House of Representatives incorporated the substantive requirement of the Enumerated Powers Act into the House rules.

In 2007, he opposed several bills to set a deadline to withdraw troops from Iraq. Shadegg voted against the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007, which increased the federal minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.25 an hour. Shadegg voted for a bill to build a 700-mile (1,100 km) fence along the border between the United States and Mexico (Secure Fence Act of 2006). In 2005, Shadegg voted against a bill to create a flag-burning amendment to the Constitution.

Shadegg is a staunch advocate of a federal prohibition of online poker. In 2006, he cosponsored H.R. 4411, the Goodlatte-Leach Internet Gambling Prohibition Act and H.R. 4777, the Internet Gambling Prohibition Act.

Shadegg is vehemently opposed to the Healthcare Reform Package that was tabled in October 2009. He said the reform package is a "Soviet-style gulag health care", and will make American healthcare something akin to that available to the prisoners of Russian gulag.

On October 14, 2009, Shadegg joined with three fellow Representatives in calling for the investigation of CAIR (the Council on American-Islamic Relations) over allegations of trying to plant "spies," based on a CAIR memo indicating that they "will develop national initiatives such as Lobby Day, and placing Muslim interns in Congressional offices." The request came in the wake of the publication of a book, Muslim Mafia, the foreword of which had been penned by Congresswoman Sue Myrick, that portrayed CAIR as a subversive organization allied with international terrorists. CAIR has countered that these initiatives are extensively used by all advocacy groups and accused Shadegg and his colleagues of intending to intimidate American Muslims who "take part in the political process and exercise their rights."

In November 2009, New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg expressed confidence in the security of having five 9/11 suspects brought to trial in lower Manhattan, to which Shadegg gave an overheated response: "Well mayor, how are you going to feel when it is your daughter that is kidnapped at school by a terrorist?". He later apologized to the mayor and his family for "the insensitivity of my remarks."

On March 17, 2010, after criticizing the lack of a single-payer health care system or an alternative public option in health insurance reform proposals by the Obama administration, Shadegg, who has previously responded to the possibility of such a system as, "full on Russian gulag, Soviet-style gulag health care", stated in an interview, "I would support single-payer." Shadegg's spokeswoman later clarified the remark, explaining that the Congressman believes that "Forcing them to compete, even through a public option, would be better than an individual mandate which will not work."

On September 29, 2008, Shadegg voted against the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 which created the Troubled Assets Relief Program.

Despite his support of the second economic stimulus package bill, he voted "NO" on the first Economic Package and he also was a proponent of the 2009 Tea Party protests which condemned any bailouts, and even spoke at a rally in Phoenix.

On November 30, 2010, Shadegg declared his opposition to the extension of unemployment benefits on the basis that "the unemployed will spend as little of that money as they possibly can", having commented to Mike Barnicle "Your answer is it’s the spending of money that drives the economy and I don’t think that’s right."