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Issues

Ken Buck's Priorities

Ken serves on the House Judiciary Committee and the House Foreign Affairs Committee. He serves on the House Judiciary Subcommittee on Antitrust, Commercial and Administrative Law, and on the Subcommittee on Immigration and Citizenship. He also serves on the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on the Indo-Pacific.

Priorities

Life

Each Life is a Precious Gift

Congressman Buck has stood up against the pro-abortion agenda of the Biden-Harris administration

Crime

Back the Blue

All of our rights as Americans depend on being safe

Immigration and Border Security

Secure the Border

Without a border, we don’t have a country.

Fighting the Left’s Radical Social Agenda

Giving Rights back to Parents

The Left is on the march, and trying to turn our children against fundamental American values.

Second Amendment

Protecting the Right to Bear Arms

I’m an absolute supporter of the Second Amendment, and I fight to protect it every day.

Big Tech

Using Anti-Trust laws to Restore Competition

In order to have capitalism, you have to have competition

Energy and Inflation

Cheaper energy means cheaper everything

Right now, we have the highest inflation rate since 1982, and it’s all Joe Biden’s fault.

More about Ken Buck...

Starting in 2004, Ken Buck was elected Weld County District Attorney three times. He led a staff of more than sixty people with a strong record of criminal prosecution and crime prevention. Under Ken’s leadership, the crime rate in Weld County dropped 50%, one of the best records in the country.

Ken is a Christian and a leader in his profession and community. Ken has volunteered and served on the boards of many important community groups. As District Attorney, Ken brought together community leaders to create the Juvenile Assessment Center. The Center has helped more than two thousand kids and their families get back on the right path in life.

Life

One of the values that I hold dear is the sanctity of human life.  Roe v. Wade was a terrible mistake.  The birth of my children only reinforced this view: that childbirth has something miraculous to tell us about the will and purpose of God, and that each life is a precious gift.  To extinguish that life is a deeply evil act.  

I see this principle as being reflected in the Declaration of Independence as well, with the Framers specifically enshrining “life” as an inalienable right for all Americans from the beginning.  I’m 100 percent pro-life, period.  Susan B. Anthony’s List, one of the major pro-life groups fighting for the rights and lives of the unborn, has said

“Congressman Buck has stood up against the pro-abortion agenda of the Biden-Harris administration and Pelosi Democrats who are actively working to expand abortion access and abortion funding. Rep. Buck has voted consistently to defend the lives of the unborn and infants.”

I’m grateful to carry an A+ from them, the highest possible rating, as well as 100 percent from National Right to Life.  In terms of the specific actions I’ve taken to move the protection of life forward, not just through votes, but by pushing additional legislative protections I have some bills that I’m supporting, listed below. “Original cosponsor” means that I was signed up at the time the bill was introduced, which helps show the bill has broad support from the beginning, making it easier for sponsors to build their coalition.  

  • Original cosponsor of H. R. 243, the Title X Abortion Provider Prohibition Act, which would defund from Planned Parenthood as well as any other organization that commits abortions.   
  • Original cosponsor of H. R. 606, the No Abortion Bonds Act, which would stop abortion clinics from getting tax writeoffs for bonds.  
  • Original cosponsor of H. R. 619, Born-Alive Abortion Survivors Protection Act, which would require doctors to save the lives of babies who survive abortions.
  • Original cosponsor of H. R. 1080, the Pain-Capable Unborn Child Protection Act, which establishes a new criminal offense for performing or attempting to perform an abortion after 20 weeks or more.

I’ve also actively pressured the Biden administration through letters with my colleagues working with pro-life organizations.  These are a few of those letters:  

  • Signed letter to the Food and Drug Administration against eliminating longstanding patient safeguards associated with the chemical abortion drug mifepristone. 
  • Signed letter to the Attorney General calling on the Department of Justice to investigate the remains of pre-born children for violations of the prohibitions against partial-birth abortions. 
  • Signed letter to President Biden against anti-life provisions in the 2023 budget proposal.

Crime

All of our rights as Americans depend on being safe.  We must be safe in our streets, safe in our homes, safe in our churches and safe in our businesses.  The rising wave of crime threatens that basic social contract.  I’m a former prosecutor and I’ve convicted hundreds of criminals.  As a nation, we cannot go back to incredible murder rates and lawlessness of the 1980s and 1990s.  The Democratic Party has consistently put forward a defund-the-police, soft-on-crime message, and even some in the Republican Party have forgotten the hard lessons of the last three decades, that deterrence works.  I will always advocate for police, who truly are the thin blue line between law-abiding citizens and dangerous criminals.  These are some of the specific actions I’ve taken to fight for the right of every American to live in a safe community:

  • Introduced the BRICKS Act of 2021, H.R. 687, to increase the penalties for rioting. 
  • Introduced H.Res. 387, which expresses support for the police. 
  • Introduced the PROTECT Act, with Senator Hawley, which would toughen penalties for child sex predators. 
  • Cosponsored H. Res. 530, which expresses that the Department of Homeland Security and all its law enforcement agencies conduct critical operations to keep the United States safe and secure. 
  • Cosponsored H. Res. 1026, which says that any Member of the House who makes a public statement advocating for defunding the police should not get private police protection. 

I’ve also led two letters on crime issues that I consider of absolute importance:

  • A letter to Attorney General Garland urging him to do more to combat the mass shoplifting we see in many urban areas. 
  • A letter to the Chairman and Ranking Member of the Senate Judiciary Committee urging them to review Justice Ketanji Brown Jackson’s (the Democratic Supreme Court nominee) troubling record of leniency in sentencing child pornography cases. 

Immigration and Border Security

Without a border, we don’t have a country.  Instead, every city and state becomes a border town.  I was recently on a border tour with my friend Congressman Andy Biggs and the situation down there is very bad, as any border patrol agent or local sheriff can tell you.  That lack of security has the potential to translate across America, to your town or city.  

I’m against illegal immigration, and I fully support securing the border, deporting those who are here, and building both a physical wall and a legal wall against additional illegal immigration.  

It’s hard to overstate just how dangerous the Biden border policies are.  His own Department of Homeland Security predicts an influx of 18,000 migrants PER DAY when he carries out his dangerous revocation of Title 42, a public health authority that allows the United States to suspend the entry of aliens that may present a public health risk.  That comes out to about 6.5 million migrants per year–more than the entire population of the state of Colorado.  

We’ve got to act, and I have done so on a number of specific occasions to fight for the basic sovereignty and function of the American border and our right to choose, as a people, who becomes an American and who doesn’t:

  • Introduced H.R. 643, the Stop Greenlighting Driver Licenses for Illegal Immigrants Act, to prohibit federal funding to states that 1) issue a driver license to an individual without proof of U.S. citizenship or lawful presence in the United States or 2) prohibit a local or state government entity from sharing immigration enforcement info with the Department of Homeland Security.
  • Cosponsored H. R. 471, the PAUSE Act of 2021, which would stop the Biden Administration from ending Title 42, a pandemic emergency authority that’s key to keeping migrant caravans from continuing to come to our southern border.
  • Original cosponsor of H.R. 1496, Sarah’s Law, requiring ICE to detain an alien who is unlawfully present in the United States and has been charged with a crime that resulted in the death or serious bodily injury of another person. 
  • Cosponsored H.R. 4562, the Migrant Child Trafficking Prevention and Accountability Act of 2021, which would hold those who pay to move alien children across the border accountable. 
  • Cosponsored H.R. 4760, the Criminal Alien Removal Clarification Act of 2021, which would provide for much faster deportation of any alien convicted of two felonies.  

Here are some of the higher-profile letters I signed on this issue:

  • Signed letter to Vilsack and Becerra opposing stripping federal agencies of workers to try and stem the flow of illegal immigrants caused by Biden policies. 
  • Signed letter to President Biden supporting a secure border and requesting Secretary Mayorkas brief members of the House of Representatives.
  • Signed letter to President Joe Biden to advocate for including the mandatory use of E-Verify in immigration legislation.
  • Signed letter to Troy Miller at US Customs and Border Protection to express concerns about security and immigrant detention conditions at the southern border.

Fighting the Left’s Radical Social Agenda

The effort to insert Critical Race Theory into our schools as well as radical transgender ideology is something that conservatives must oppose.  The Left is on the march, and trying to turn our children against fundamental American values as well as expose them to sexual concepts that are grossly inappropriate for the public school setting.  If we don’t stop this, we will find ourselves facing a generation of young Americans who hate their history, and are proponents of radical gender ideologies.  We’ve got to stop this stuff, now.  

I support the rights of parents to choose what their children learn, and to ensure that the curriculum being taught in the schools they pay for reflects their values, not radical liberal educators.  I support the rights of women to have their own bathrooms, and sports leagues.  There are fundamental differences between the two genders, and if men are allowed to compete, it will spell the end of Title IX as we know it, a law that has provided opportunity for hundreds of thousands of women athletes to excel.  

  • Introduced H.R. 3810, Saving American History Act of 2021, a bill to stop the teaching of Critical Race Theory in K-12 schools.
  • Signed letter to Secretary Cardona regarding Critical Race Theory and the Department of Education dictating curriculum and thought to local schools.
  • Signed letter to Attorney General Garland about decision to involve federal law enforcement into school board debates, asking that they consult with the ethics agency. 
  • Signed letter to Mark Emmert, NCAA president regarding concerns over Title IX violations and Lia Thomas. 
  • Wrote an Op-ed in the Washington Times regarding Lia Thomas’ participation in women’s swimming. 

Second Amendment

The Framers of the Constitution included a right to bear arms that “shall not be infringed” for a reason.  It’s the safeguard of every other right that we have.  This is why I’m an absolute supporter of the Second Amendment, and I fight to protect it every day from gun-grabbing bureaucrats and government officials who would take that right from us. Here are some of my actions on this front:

  • Original cosponsor of H.R. 38, the Concealed Carry Reciprocity Act, which establishes federal reciprocity for concealed carry of firearms nationally.
  • Original cosponsor of H.R. 95, the Hearing Protection Act, which removes silencers from the definition of firearms for purposes of the National Firearms Act. It also treats persons acquiring or possessing a firearm silencer as meeting any registration and licensing requirements stemming from the National Firearms Act.
  • Original cosponsor of H.R. 2469, which would ensure that silencers are treated the same as firearms accessories. 
  • Original cosponsor of H.R. 1827, which would prohibit federal funding for state firearm ownership databases. 
  • Original cosponsor of H.R. 1534, the Protecting the Right to Keep and Bear Arms Act, which would prohibit President Biden from declaring an emergency to impose gun control.  
  • Cosponsor of H.R. 6817, which narrows the scope of the National Firearms Act to cover fewer types of guns and equipment. 
  • Cosponsor of H.R. 7366, which would ban imposition of any state or local liability insurance, tax, or user fee requirement for firearm or ammunition ownership or commerce  
  • Signed letter to Marvin Richardson, Acting Director of the ATF, to ensure that citizens maintain the right to manufacture their own suppressors. 
  • Wrote a letter to Regina Lombardo, Acting Deputy Director of ATF, to call for reforms to simplify the process for third-party processors of ATF eForms system.
  • Signed a letter to Marvin Richardson, Acting Director of the ATF opposing new rules and regulations of stabilizing braces.
  • Signed a letter to Marvin Richardson, Acting Director of ATF, to call for meaningful eForms access for third-party processors of applications for suppressors. 

Big Tech

I believe that something must be done about Big Tech.  I’m not against success in business, and I have no interest in taking the Democratic approach of micromanaging the economy, but Republicans passed antitrust laws for a reason: in order to have capitalism, you have to have competition.  Without competition, you have no price discovery mechanism, which is the very core of the free market.  If prices don’t change, then the market doesn’t allocate resources properly.  Instead, value is pulled further and further toward the dominant firm, eliminating the ability of anyone else to compete, and hurting the consumer, who has nowhere else to take his business.  

Specifically as it regards to the marketplace in tech, I worked on an 18-month investigation of their anticompetitive practices.  The more the Judiciary Committee looked, the more we found.  In one instance, a local Colorado company invented the pop-socket, a kind of grip aid for your smartphone.  They got the product to market and started selling online.  Amazon then copied and started selling its own, knock-off version, just different enough to make an infringement case difficult.  By the time the Colorado company got anything in court, Amazon made millions.  There are dozens of this type of case.  Google controls 94 percent of the desktop search market.  Facebook’s CEO, Mark Zuckerberg, is on record as saying he was buying Instagram so it didn’t become a competitor.  

If we want to fight Big Tech, we need to use the antitrust laws to restore competition.  I support fixing section 230 (the special “publisher giveaway” for tech firms), but the core of dealing with this problem is antitrust.  We also need to return control over the internet experience to the user by creating real privacy safeguards for consumer data.  To that end, I’ve sponsored and worked to move forward a number of different bills on the subject, as well as worked on others.  

  • American Innovation and Choice Online Act – would restore competition online and create an even playing field by prohibiting anticompetitive behavior on tech platforms.
  • State Antitrust Enforcement Venue Act – would strip Big Tech of its home court advantage in antitrust cases and ensure that lawsuits filed by state attorneys general aren’t consolidated and sent to the Northern District of California, where many Big Tech firms are headquartered.
  • Ending Platform Monopolies Act – would eliminate the ability of dominant platforms to leverage their control across multiple business lines to self-preference and disadvantage competitors in ways that undermine free and fair competition.
  • Augmenting Compatibility and Competition by Enabling Service Switching – would establish interoperability and data portability requirements, promote competition online by lowering barriers to entry, and switch costs for businesses and consumers.

In addition to leading in Congress on antitrust for Big Tech, I am also strongly opposed to the Department of Homeland Security’s “Disinformation Board,” or what many are calling the “Ministry of Truth.”  

  • Cosponsored the Protecting Free Speech Act, to strip funding from the Board.
  • Signed letter calling for the leader of the Board, Nin Jankowicz, to testify as well as pushing back on previous statements.
  • Signed letter questioning the legal authority of the board and demanding answers on its mission

Energy and Inflation

Right now, we have the highest inflation rate since 1982, 8.3 percent, meaning that the price of goods and services is increasing much faster than people’s wages.  The president’s policies have caused this issue.  He has spent money that the country doesn’t have.  As federal spending goes up very quickly, the economy can’t just simply summon more goods and services into being–those take time to produce, further adding to the upward pressure on prices.  

The Democrats have added insult to injury with their no-holds-barred attack on American energy production.  When President Trump left office, he left us with low gas prices and America as a net exporter of energy.  Under this president, gas prices in Colorado have skyrocketed, while the Governor has cut oil production more than 30 percent by adding new layers of red tape and regulation to the energy sector.  Inflation is a complicated problem, but falling energy prices are a major answer, because every good and service in the economy requires energy to produce.  Cheaper energy means cheaper everything, not just gas. 

Here’s what I’ve done specifically in the area of energy while I’ve been in office:

  • Original cosponsor of H. R. 519, the Safeguarding Oil and Gas Leasing and Permitting Act of 2021, which would shut down President Biden’s oil and gas moratorium.  
  • Original cosponsor of H. R. 420, the No Taxpayer Funding for Paris Climate Agreement Act, which would ensure that Biden can’t get us back into the Paris Accords that President Trump left.  
  • Cosponsored H. R. 543, the POWER Act, to prohibit the President from issuing a halt on leasing and permitting energy and minerals on certain federal land
  • Cosponsored H.R. 6886 – PADE Act, which prohibits the importation of crude oil and petroleum products from the Russian Federation.
  • Cosponsored H.Res.1101 – Expressing the sense of the House of Representatives that the United States should support the safe and responsible development of its energy resources via drilling, in an effort to maintain a robust energy supply chain that promotes national security, safeguards against energy scarcity, and reduces energy poverty for all Americans 
  • Wrote a letter to President Biden asking for immediate action to be taken to bolster domestic production of critical energy resources and restart construction on Keystone XL Pipeline in light of the war in Ukraine.  
  • Signed letter to Secretary Haaland and Director Lefton inquiring about the status of the 2022-2027 Bureau of Ocean Energy Management’s National Offshore Continental Shelf Oil and Gas Leasing Program, and to push back against the Department’s decision not to appeal a decision banning drilling in certain areas.  
  • Sent a letter to United States Trade Representative Katherine Tai expressing concern over the United States’ dependence on China for rare earth elements and urging the Office of the United States Trade Representative take action to ensure that the United States’ supply is not reliant on any single country and to promote opportunities for domestic production in this area.