With just three weeks to go before the 2022 gubernatorial election, Jim Pillen has been making the rounds in Omaha, meeting with groups such as the Greater Omaha Pachyderm Luncheon and the Business and Professional People for Life. Pillen met with the latter group at Gorat’s Steakhouse on Tuesday, Oct. 18, speaking specifically on issues related to Abortion and the pro-life movement.
Pillen did not mince words when speaking with the pro-life group on Tuesday, a crowd of around 40 guests at Gorat’s Steakhouse in Omaha. “They just sent a baby home that had been born at 21.5 weeks,” Pillen said. “It makes no sense … there’s other moms going over to Bellevue, and not to be too graphic, but literally having their brains sucked and murdered at 21.5 weeks. That stuff’s got to stop in Nebraska.”
During Q&A, one guest mentioned, “Abortions in this state, surgical and prescribed chemical abortions, have doubled since Roe v. Wade [was overturned], specially in Bellevue. Just today one of the sidewalk advocates told me upwards of 12 mothers went in for abortions this morning just today.”
Pillen acknowledged his role in stopping abortion depended entirely on achieving a filibuster-proof majority of 33 votes in the Legislature, a coalition he referred to as “red vests.” He seemed confident there were enough seats to flip to achieve a possibly 35 seat majority, citing candidates Christian Mirch and Merv Riepe.
Pillen also spoke briefly on agriculture, particularly the value of the Ogallala aquifer, which he referred to as a “pot of gold.” “In a year like this, when I was a kid, we wouldn’t have raised a bushel [of corn]. In a year like last year, when it rained more, we would have maybe raised 50 bushels of corn. Because of the Ogallala aquifer and technology in farming, those clay hills I grew up on, guess what they’ll raise this year because of the irrigation? … 300 bushels of corn.”
Pillen, won the Republican nomination in May with 33.8% of the vote, narrowly beating Charles Herbster in a contentious primary race. The Dobbs decision in June, which overturned Roe v. Wade, was expected to bring out Democrat voters in much stronger numbers than would be expected in a midterm election with Democrats controlling Congress and the White House. A recent poll shows Pillen leads Carol Blood in a recent poll by a 7-point margin, which is tighter than expected, but still a comfortable lead in a race he is widely expected to win.
Election day is Nov. 8.
