Republican Secretary of State candidate Knute Buehler refuses to play by the same rules he claims to support.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Trent Lutz, Executive Director director [at] dpo [dot] org (503) 239-8625
The Democratic Party of Oregon today is calling out Republican Knute Buehler, an orthopedic surgeon running to be Secretary of State, for his blatant hypocrisy on campaign finance reform. Dr. Buehler touts his long record of supporting campaign contribution and spending limits, but now that he’s a candidate for office, he refuses to play by the same rules he promotes as a centerpiece of his campaign.
“Dr. Buehler says that he wants to reduce the influence of money in politics, but his actions as a candidate reveal otherwise,” said Meredith Wood Smith, Chair of the Democratic Party of Oregon. “It only took Dr. Buehler a matter of months to fall under the ‘influence’ of money that he claims to be against.”
Dr. Buehler frequently points to his involvement with a ballot measure in 1994 as proof that he supports campaign contribution and spending limits. And as a candidate for Secretary of State, he’s repeated these claims at every opportunity. However, when Kate Brown, Oregon’s current Secretary of State, challenged him to lead by example and join her in a voluntary campaign spending limit of $1 million, he refused and called the offer a “gimmicky idea.”
Just weeks before, Dr. Buehler stated in The Oregonian’s voter guide that he supported “incentives for voluntary spending limits.”
“When you truly believe in something, that’s usually enough of an incentive to stand by your words,” Wood Smith continued. “But with Dr. Buehler we now know that he chose political opportunity over standing up for what he claims to believe.”
Nevertheless, Dr. Buehler continues to make campaign finance reform a pivotal issue in this race. His duplicitous message displays prominently on billboards throughout Oregon that say, “Get Big Money Out of Politics.”
To learn the truth – and the hypocrisy – behind Dr. Buehler’s pledge to get the money out of politics, visit: www.knutebuehlerfacts.com
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