Indiana has never elected governors from the same political
party for more than 20 years in a row. Libertarian Donald
Rainwater wants to keep it that way by upending the two-party
system entirely and making history as a third-party candidate.
Indiana Public Broadcasting’s Brandon Smith sits down with
Rainwater to discuss some of the biggest issues in the open
governor’s race.
IPB News Statehouse Bureau Chief Brandon Smith: I want
to start with something that seems to be on a lot of Hoosiers’
minds, and it's certainly been a major issue in the campaign so
far, which is property taxes. How do you address people's
property tax bills without struggling or hitting local governments
in a way that they're going to struggle with their budgets?
Donald Rainwater: So, when somebody says to me, ‘Well your
property tax plan is going to reduce the budgets for fire and
police,’ I'm going to say, ‘No, the local government's already
decided to do that with tax increment financing.’ What my
proposal forces local governments to do is to decide, are we
going to fund the necessary functions of local government and
take care of the people with the tax dollars that the people are
paying? Or are we going to continue to give it to economic
development? Which should be private development, not private
development funded with taxpayer dollars.
Smith: One of the most growing parts of Indiana's education
budget is private school vouchers. We have a near universal
program now — only the very upper most income limits are
barred from getting those dollars. Would you like to see that
program expanded further to basically be universal, get rid of the
income limits?
Rainwater: I am 100 percent supportive of not only universal
school choice as it's currently defined, but I believe that we need
universal school choice that allows parents to find any school
option that provides the right environment to maximize that
child's positive outcomes, whether it's state accredited or not.
We need, I believe, we need to decentralize education in the
state of Indiana.
Smith: So, lawmakers are looking for ways to curb the
exponentially growing cost of Medicaid for the state of Indiana.
Is there any way to rein in those costs without cutting services to
Hoosiers?
Rainwater: The services that have been promised to Hoosier
citizens — state government made the promise, they need to
keep it. We have a $1 billion accounting error. But we also have
in the last budget about $1 billion of new budget allocation to the
Indiana Economic Development Corporation. But to tell these
people, well, we made a budget mistake, so we're going to have
to cancel this program, but it's okay because the IEDC is going to
bring in a thousand new high-paying tech jobs that you won't be
able to do because you've got to stay at home with your child —
morally and ethically reprehensible to me.
Smith: We have Indiana's near-total abortion ban. As governor,
would you like to see that change? Do you think Indiana's
abortion rights are in the correct place?
Rainwater: The current law needs to go through any and all
legal challenges that may need to go through the court system.
And that the state legislature should listen to the people and if
there are adjustments that need to be made, they should make
them. I'm a pro-life libertarian. But I don't believe that one
person should make that decision as to what changes should be
made within that particular legislation. I believe that that is a
very delicate issue and I'm really tired of politicians using it to
get votes.