Orman thinks the Hobby Lobby decision was wrong. "This is a dangerous precedent to set and opens the door to many more court challenges from private employers," his website says. Orman says he supports access to abortion services.
Orman also called for a constitutional amendment overturning the Supreme Court's Citizens United decision, which said corporations, labor unions and other groups have a First Amendment right to spend unlimited amounts on elections.
Roberts supports the Citizens United decision and recently tried to block consideration of a Senate proposal allowing limits on corporate campaign spending.
In the State Fair debate, Roberts said he supported "transparency" in campaign donations. "If people know where the money is coming from," he said, "I think that is the biggest reform we can make." Yet current law allows unlimited secret donations to social welfare organizations known by their 501(c)(4) section of the federal tax code. Roberts has not indicated any desire to eliminate those groups.
Orman says he is open to considering a required background check in order to purchase a weapon at gun shows. "I just do not think it makes sense to make it easy for a convict, or someone who was under a restraining order for domestic abuse to be able to walk into a gun show and easily get a gun," Orman said at the debate.
Roberts says that position threatens all gun owners. "Don't mess with people's right to bear arms with any restrictions," he said in the Hutchinson debate.
Roberts has supported health care spending at times. He voted for the prescription drug benefit that was added to Medicare in 2003 and has supported federal efforts to expand health care delivery options in rural areas.
Orman has not expressed support for repeal of the entire Affordable Care Act and says the Republican Party's repeal attempts are futile until President Barack Obama leaves office. But he has criticized Obamacare as an expansion of a "broken system" and says he would have voted against the measure had he been in the Senate.
Unlike Roberts, though, Orman supports a path to citizenship for some of the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants now in the U.S. "It's just not practical to say that we're going to find and send back, to other countries, 11 million undocumented people," he says on his website. "If you are here undocumented, you should register, pay a fine, obey our laws, hold down a job and pay taxes, and then I think you should be able to stay here," he said at a Kansas State Fair debate earlier this month.
Roberts opposes any path to citizenship for immigrants in the country illegally--he calls it amnesty.
But the businessman, dressed in blue jeans and a tailored blazer, wasn't fazed. Orman took every chance to call Washington broken and point out the long tenure of Roberts there.
Orman repeatedly said he tried both parties and didn't like either. But Roberts wasn't buying it. He pushed for Orman to better define who he would side with in the Senate, asking if he was going to be a Republican one day and a Democrat the next.
Both times that I bought a handgun, I was required to go through a mandatory background check to ensure that I was a US citizen who hadn't been convicted of domestic violence, subject to a restraining order, incarcerated for longer than a year, dishonorably discharged from the military, or determined to be mentally defective. Over 700,000 people who met the description above have been prevented from buying firearms at licensed dealers since the background check requirements went into effect.
The idea that those 700,000 people could simply head to a gun show and buy a firearm without the same background scrutiny doesn't make sense to me. While there are likely other illegal ways for criminals to get firearms, we shouldn't make it easy for a violent offender or a mentally ill individual to get a gun. The process for me took a few minutes and ultimately resulted in me being able to buy my handguns without delay.
A: "The single greatest hurdle facing an independent candidate is getting the 5,000 signatures on the petition to allow his or her name to be on the ballot," Orman commented. "This is not imposed on party candidates."
"The single greatest hurdle facing an independent candidate is getting the 5,000 signatures to be on the ballot." Orman also stated the rules for this petition stipulate county- specific forms (there are 105 counties in Kansas) and the petition has to be signed in person with a witness--all of which makes the disallowance of signatures very easy.
Another major disadvantage to independents came in 1901 in Kansas with the passage of Antifusion Laws. Prior to this, according to Orman, third parties thrived [because] candidates could run under more than one party. Candidates could state that they were a Populist and a Republican (or any other combination).
"The expectation in Kansas is that candidates run under a party label," Orman said. He continued to say that this expectation does not line up with a new Gallup poll showing that 42 percent of Americans consider themselves independent voters. He was once hopeful that a two-party system could find solutions, but it has become clear that neither party represents the values that average Americans share.
Orman describes himself as a fiscally conservative, socially tolerant candidate--and too often voters with mixed politics cannot find a home within either party. Plenty of research has shown that the average American's political opinion is a blend of conservative and liberal ideals. Are people resistant to the idea of a blend of politics?
"There is definitely a strong psychological connection to party affiliations," Orman said.
As a business owner, he also discussed how we have a health care system that we cannot afford. Each year for the past 15 years, health care expenses have risen. These increases often come at the expense of better wages for employees.
Because Congress has failed to act over the last 30 years, the US now has more than 11 million undocumented workers. Simply deporting all of those individuals is not practical, would be incredibly expensive and difficult to accomplish.
We've seen our credit rating as a country downgraded because of the whole debt ceiling debate because politicians refuse to face the tough choices we need to make and play by a different set of rules. We need to require the federal government to report expenses and revenue by the same strict accounting standards now required of all major companies.
To remain competitive in the global marketplace, we need to keep college education affordable for the middle class.
The truth is this is a false choice, and I know it because as a businessman I did both. The first company I ever started, Environmental Lighting Concepts, designed and installed energy efficient lighting systems for commercial and industrial buildings.
Our company created jobs, helped the environment, protected natural resources, and made money for our customers. We used the opportunity to cut energy and ultimately help the environment as a good business decision.
We've created such uncertainty with our inability to come together and solve problems that it's made it difficult for businesses to choose to invest in the United States. We're our own worst enemy when it comes to creating jobs in this country because the dysfunction in Washington doesn't inspire confidence.
As a country, we need to live within our means. I believe it's immoral to pass along large debts to the next generation. The only way we get spending under control is by making hard choices that Congress today seems unwilling to make. With each party fighting for their own pet projects and political power, there is no accountability to the American people.
"Washington is broken," he said, "and we're sending the worst of both parties to Washington--people who are bitter partisans who seem to care more about pleasing the extremists in their own party and the special interests than they do in solving problems."
He said Roberts is part of the problem. "He's taken a sharp turn to the right recently and ultimately I don't think he's representing the best interests of Kansas," Orman said. Orman, a 1991 graduate of Princeton University, briefly ran against Roberts in 2008 as a Democrat before dropping out of the race.
Orman said elected leaders of both parties are focused more on getting re-elected than solving problems. "I tried to work within the system but ultimately decided the only real way to make a difference is to challenge it," he said.
"I consider myself fiscally conservative and socially tolerant," Orman said. For about 13 of the last 14 years, Orman said, he has been registered as unaffiliated. He has supported Republicans and Democrats, but he's contributed more to independent causes, he said. He declined to reveal how he voted in the 2012 presidential race between Democrat President Barack Obama and Republican Mitt Romney, saying he believed in the sanctity of the ballot.
In 2007, Orman prepared to run as a Democrat against Roberts. "I just didn't feel comfortable running with a party label," he said, and he soon withdrew from the race.
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The above quotations are from 2014 Kansas Senate debates.
Click here for other excerpts from 2014 Kansas Senate debates. Click here for other excerpts by Greg Orman. Click here for a profile of Greg Orman.
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