Patty Buehler: Knute is moderate and pro-choice, I should know (Guest opinion)

Republican gubernatorial candidate Knute Buehler and his wife Patty (in red) gathered with supporters in Wilsonville on Tuesday, May 15, 2018.

By Patty Buehler

I'm a pro-choice woman and a registered Independent. I've been a resident of Oregon for 27 years. I'm a health care professional -- a physician. I'm the mother of a 21-year-old daughter and 24-year-old son. I'm married to Knute Buehler, the Republican candidate to be Oregon's Governor.

I'm writing to respond to the misleading and divisive attacks leveled in an op-ed by the Democratic Party of Oregon Chair Jeanne Atkins about Knute's support for abortion rights and women's reproductive health. I'm sure I'm in a far better position Atkins to know what my husband believes in and how he puts this into practice every day.

On the specific issue of abortion rights, Knute has been pro-choice for as long as I've known him. As a doctor and now as a lawmaker, he believes medical decisions shouldn't involve politicians. In the legislature, he has voted to support abortion rights when he voted in favor of the Oregon Health Authority budget that includes public funding for abortions, even though most of his Republicans colleagues in the House voted against it. Knute wrote the law that -- for the first-time -- gave Oregon women the freedom and convenience to purchase birth control over-the-counter without needing permission from a doctor. Atkins, whose very position is dependent on cronyism from Brown, dishonestly portrays Knute's "no" vote on HB 3391. His vote was a rejection of creating new benefits for new beneficiaries (men and women) when Brown was already cutting programs for foster kids, veterans and the elderly. It is simply a lie to say it was a vote against a woman's right to choose.

Atkins is obviously worried about a campaign between Brown, a lackluster governor who has failed to lead, and Knute, a moderate with a record of independent and innovative leadership. To win, Brown and her partisan allies need to convince you that Knute is something that he is not: pro-life and opposed to abortion rights. As hard as Atkins and Gov. Brown may try, Knute doesn't neatly fit into the narrow labels that too often define our politics today. Knute is fiscally responsible, socially inclusive and reform-minded. He is pro-choice and supports gay rights. But he also believes in keeping taxes limited and low, and regulations restrained. He is willing to challenge the status quo and the powerful special interests in an education system that is failing too many of our kids in too many schools -- something Gov. Brown refuses to do.

This is hardly the record of some anti-woman extremist that Atkins would like you to believe. What Atkins and Brown really don't like is that Knute is willing to listen - and to hear -- both sides to advance policies that will actually reduce unintended pregnancies and improve women's health. This is called moderation. This is called independent leadership. I know it's a rare thing these days, but I believe Oregonians are hungry for it in a new governor.

Secretly, I believe that Atkins and Gov. Brown know this, too, and that has them very, very worried.

-- Patty Buehler, M.D., lives in Bend.

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