1. What measures will you support to solve the current Iraq crisis?

2. What policies will you initiate to spur economic recovery and economic development in America's inner-cities?

3. During the past decade, health insurance premiums have been rising by a double-digit percent each year and the number of uninsured

people keeps rising? What policies will you support to bring these trends under control?

4. Name any portions of the USA Patriot Act that you would like to see revised or eliminated and state why you would want to revise or eliminate them.

5. What policies would you implement to promote the development and expansion of minority business enterprises (MBEs)?

6. Do you support the "Leave No Child Behind" Act? Why or why not?

7. What initiatives should the federal government undertake to eliminate racial profiling?

Russ Feingold

1. Our top priority must be the fight against the terrorist network that attacked us on 9/11, which is why I opposed going to war in Iraq. The administration's shifting justifications for going it alone in Iraq have not added up to an imminent and unavoidable threat to our country. Nor did the administration level with the American people about the costs — loss of life, funding, and broken diplomacy— of unilateral action. I supported the $87 billion to support our troops in Iraq and the world is better off without Saddam Hussein ruling in Iraq, but we need to get other countries to help the effort. The Iraq war was not our top priority and was a distraction that has taken critical military resources away from the far more critical fight against al Qaeda and international terrorism.

2. To spur development in America's inner-cities, we need to encourage companies to keep jobs here and the government to buy American; increase the minimum wage so hard working Americans who live in inner-cities can bring a better paycheck home to their families and communities; increase educational opportunities; and encourage investment in these areas. I have been active in each of these areas, with my Buy American Improvement Act; consistent votes in favor of raising the minimum wage; success passing my bills increasing the size of Pell Grants and the number of scholarship opportunities; and consistent support for brownfields restoration funds providing cleanup and redevelopment of contaminated properties in urban areas.  

3. One reason for job loss in Wisconsin is the rising cost of health care on businesses. Wisconsin businesses and families can no longer bear the burden of skyrocketing health care. That's why I have written a plan to redirect wasteful spending, so that each state can guarantee health care coverage for everyone. My plan requires all Americans to have health care coverage as good as the health plans offered to members of Congress. The status quo will not do; the time for action is now. Unlike my opponent who has proposed an expansion of the status quo, I trust the people of Wisconsin to work together for real state-based reform of our health care system.

4. I believe that we can fight terrorism and protect the freedoms that make us Americans. I believe we can do both and that we must do both.

     I voted against the bill because I believed certain provisions of the Act represented a very dangerous intrusion on the freedoms we cherish. Provisions of the USA PATRIOT Act give the government the ability to obtain the disclosure of all business records, including those containing sensitive personal information like medical records from hospitals or doctors, or educational records, or records of what books someone has taken out of the library, based on the assertion that the records are needed for a terrorism investigation, with no meaningful judicial oversight. I also have serious concerns about provisions that would unnecessarily give the government expanded powers to secretly search homes and wiretap the telephones and personal computers of citizens who have no connection to terrorism whatsoever. I have worked with supporters of the USA Patriot Act on a bipartisan plan to strengthen the Patriot Act by ensuring that in our pursuit of justice we do not compromise the very freedom and way of life that we seek to protect.

     With bipartisan support, the SAFE act would significantly modify the USA PATRIOT Act — to protect our country against terrorism and to protect the Constitution by modifying the very provisions of the PATRIOT Act that I originally opposed.  

5. I have always fought to give minorities a fair chance, including most recently in the highway funding bill, where I supported affirmative action policies to recruit qualified minorities into the applicant pool, and to encourage contractors to request bids from businesses owned by minorities for transportation contracts.

In addition I have supported many small business provisions over the years that give small businesses owned by minorities and others a fighting chance.  In health care, tax policy, SBA programs, government regulation, government contracting, education and economic development, I have stood up for small businesses throughout my career in public service. Among other meaures, I was happy to support passage of the Small Business Administration 50th Anniversary Reauthorization Act of 2003, which reauthorized the SBA along with the many programs it administers to support minority-owned small businesses.

6. I strongly support maintaining local control over decisions that affect our children's day-to-day classroom experiences, and I am committed to ensuring that the federal dollars spent on education meet the needs of local school districts. I voted against the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 because I believe it did not bring us closer to these goals. I opposed the mandatory testing provisions of the act, and I have introduced, with Senator Jim Jeffords (I-VT), the Student Testing Flexibility Act to allow local school districts that have demonstrated academic success the flexibility to seek a waiver of those new standardized testing provisions. We should leave the means and frequency of assessment up to the states and local school districts who bear the responsibility for — and most of the cost of — educating our children.

7. I am proud to be the lead Senate sponsor of S. 2132, the End Racial Profiling Act, which I have proposed together with Rep. John Conyers (D-MI), the bill's lead sponsor in the House of Representatives. Our bill would ban racial profiling and require federal, state, and local law enforcement to take steps to end and prevent the practice. I first introduced this bill in June 2001, held a hearing on the bill in the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution, and reintroduced it in February of 2004. It was referred to the Senate Judiciary Committee and awaits further action. With this legislation, and working with law enforcement, civil rights leaders, and others, I am confident that we can prevent racial profiling and allow the important work of law enforcement to continue.