Q&A with Paul Thompson, Candidate for Idaho State Senate Dist. 25

In 2018, you ran against Rep Lance Clow. Why are you running this time?
So, I’m running against Rep. Linda Hartgen. She’s decided to leave the House and run for the empty Senator seat. On one level, my decision to run again wasn’t necessarily just to run against Linda. I think that we’re noticing that this idea of a ‘common sense conservative’ is nothing
more than a smoke screen, a distraction, to get votes for Republicans to get elected, and to continue to legislate with immorality behind the scenes. I’m running against her because I think she’s an advancer of immoral ideas.

Why should Republicans vote for you?
As a member of the Constitution Party, I get this question a lot. When you look at the policies or platforms of both political parties, there are a lot of similarities between the Republican Party and the Constitution Party. Both argue for a small federal government, and small state government, and to keep the liberties intact for the people. Republicans can easily vote for someone who adheres to the Constitution Party platform because it’s really in tandem, in unison, with the Republican platform. The primary difference here is that the Constitution Party desires for its members to adhere to its platform, and what we don’t have is that kind of representation here in the Magic Valley. We have individuals who
tell us they’re Republicans and then their own voting record proves that they don’t adhere to their own Party platform. I’m not asking people to leave their Party; I’m just saying that with me you have a candidate who matches your own Party platform and is truly conservative.

What would you say are the top three differences between you and Linda Hartgen?
If there’s three top things, it’s going to be education, taxing and common sense. I’ve read all the bills that Linda has been voting on for the last two sessions. A top difference between me and Linda is what’s going on in the education system. Our education system is an attack against nature, the advancement of transgender, the advancement of pronoun confusion, the
advancements of critical race theory. Linda and I stand on nearly polar opposites on all of these issues.

An example of that is two years ago Linda voted with the Democrats to allow the Idaho Dept. of Health & Welfare to continue to let people change their birth certificates, that even minors can do this. I would never be in favor of letting any minor go around their parents and give the authority to the state over the parent. Linda voted with the Democrats in opposing a bill that the Republicans introduced to not give personhood status to artificial intelligence, animals and objects. She was the only Republican in the House that voted with Democrats to give personhood status to animals, to dogs, rocks to and artificial intelligence. That’s not being a ‘common sense’ Republican. We’re both running for the Senate but with me voters will know that ‘common sense’ will be able to identify critical race theory in the schools.

I would also include a significant difference between us is the role of government. Rep. Hartgen votes for big spending bills. She currently has a 3% ranking on the Idaho Freedom Index on spending. Meaning, she votes on bills that require more government spending. I want to reduce spending of the government which is the only real way to see a reduction of the tax burden. We cannot expect to see a real reduction of property tax or income tax until the government is disciplined in how it spends money.

Why is it important for voters to vote for the candidate first and not make the party the first consideration?
I’ll use an example of putting Party first here in the Magic Valley. So, Republicans, even though they may have a good-looking platform, are too often willing to endorse a candidate who doesn’t match their values. The Party is really partly to blame. Then you have Magic Valley voters who think that a candidate with a Republican endorsement on the ballot is going to be an automatic conservative, that they’re going vote for small government, in favor of parental rights, and state sovereignty. The reality is that if voters don’t look beyond the Party label, and just vote based on the Party, that person can just go in and vote however they want to, as is
happening in the Magic Valley.

Linda Hartgen voted in lockstep with registered Democrats 93.5% of the time in 2022, yet when voters hit the polls in November, they historically voted down Party line. How do you plan to educate your constituents and overcome this legitimate hurdle?
Yeah, so, one of the best ways to do this is to just be in front of the people to answer their questions. One example is the Candidate Forum that Magic Valley Liberty Alliance hosted on October 13th at the Turf Club in Twin Falls. Linda declined the opportunity to debate me. That ought to be a big glaring problem for voters, that someone who’s wanting to convince you that they are a ‘common sense conservative’ declined to stand in front of the people to defend their voting record. I think the best way for me to make the appeal to the people is to make myself willing to be in front of the people.

How can people help support you and your campaign?

I really appreciate this question. You can visit our website www.votepaulthompson.com to learn more about who I am, the things that I stand for. As a born-again believer, I’m asking people of faith to pray for me and pray that I would be a man of integrity, both in the campaign and if elected.

A second way that someone can help is they can donate, so on our website there’s a support button that will take you to how you can give online, there’s a PayPal, or you can mail a check to Paul for Idaho, 2936 Lovina Ave., Twin Falls, ID.

We have a have a campaign team of four young men are taking care of all the door knocking. You can call me at 208-410-8002 to put you in touch with our door knocking team.

We have a mass mailer that’s about to go out. That means we have a lot of clerical administrative kind of work to do at our house, at what I like to call the world headquarters of the boat Paul Thompson campaign. We’re about a week out from having that material here and so if someone’s interested in helping with that, please call me at 208-410-8002.

If you’ve got yard space and you’d be willing to post a sign out in your yard, or you know a business owner that would be willing to do that, we got people on the ground all over the city looking for those spots.

We’re in need of anyone who would be willing to gather up your neighbors together to host meet and greets. We can either gather in your home or a
restaurant, or in a conference room. These events are a real effective way that we can get the word out to more people.

There are lots of events going on over the next several weeks.
Southern Idaho Freedom Rally, Sunday October 23, Twin Falls City Park, 1 – 6 pm. I really want to encourage everyone who reads this that we need you there. On the week of the 17th through the 20th I have handful of podcast interviews that we’re doing. On the run-up to Election Day, we will be running radio ads, YouTube ads, and Facebook ads, while continuing with door knocking.

Finally, I want to really encourage the community that this is no time to miss the election on November 8th. I believe this is an election of all elections. This may seem like hyperbole but when you look at the landscape of what’s going on right now in Idaho, I think it would be among the worst things that could happen for real God-fearing people to not get engaged in this election. It’s not too late. I think this is a great day to be alive. This is a great day to put on your patriot shoes on November 8th and get yourself to an election poll and vote Paul Thompson for
Idaho.