Gwen Moore

From KeyWiki

Gwendolynne Moore is a Democratic member of the United States House of Representatives, representing the 4th district of Wisconsin.

Congresswoman Moore is a member of the prestigious House Committee on Financial Services, which has jurisdiction over the banking, insurance and housing industries. She serves on two subcommittees of the House Committee on Financial Services, including the Subcommittee on Capital Markets and Government Sponsored Enterprises and the International Monetary Policy and Trade Subcommittee. Rep. Moore also sits on the House Budget Committee, which oversees the federal budget process, reviews all bills and resolutions on the budget, and monitors agencies and programs funded from the budget process. She is also a member of the Democratic Steering and Policy Committee.

In addition to her committee work, Congresswoman Moore was elected Democratic Co-Chair of the Congressional Women’s Caucus by her fellow female colleagues. She has held this position since January 2011. ^[1]

Early life

Born in Racine, Wisconsin in 1951, Congresswoman Moore was raised in Milwaukee. The eighth of nine children, Rep. Moore’s father was a factory worker and her mother was a public school teacher. Congresswoman Moore attended North Division High School in Milwaukee where she served as Student Council President. After graduation, Rep. Moore started college at Milwaukee’s Marquette University as a single, expectant mother on welfare who could only complete her education with the help of TRIO. Congresswoman Moore earned a B.A. in Political Science from Marquette, and went on to serve as a community leader, spearheading the start-up of a community credit union as a VISTA volunteer for which she earned the national “VISTA Volunteer of the Decade” award from 1976-1986.^[2]

Political career

Gwen Moore served in the Wisconsin State Senate from 1993-2004. Prior to her election to the Senate, Congresswoman Moore served two consecutive terms in the Wisconsin State Assembly from 1989-92. In 2000, Congresswoman Moore earned a Harvard University Certificate for Senior Executives in State and Local Government. As a state legislator, Congresswoman Moore was a champion of progressive and social issues and has continued to stand up as a voice for each and every constituent and neighborhood across the city. She applied her career expertise to help create jobs and build communities. She made a positive impact in critical issues related to welfare, education and criminal justice. A tireless advocate of women's rights and civil rights, Congresswoman Moore led the fight against racial profiling, domestic abuse and voting rights violations.^[3]

New Party backing

In 1996, in addition to the four Progressive Milwaukee/New Party-backed candidates running for state office (Spencer Coggs, Dale Dulberger, Gwendolynne Moore, Johnnie Morris-Tatum, two New Party members in Fox Valley ran for the state assembly. Progressive Fox Valley founder and chair Tony Palmeri was in a surprisingly close race against an four-term incumbent conservative Republican in Oshkosh. New Party and AFSCME member Corky Van Handel also ran for the state assembly in a nearby district. Both ran as Democrats. ^[4]

Honored George Paz Martin

At the close of 2006, Milwaukee radical activist George Paz Martin was given a Lifetime Peacemaker Award by the Wisconsin Network for Peace and Justice, and was honored on December 6th in the U.S. House of Representatives in a statement read by Gwen Moore, Representative to Congress from the 4th Congressional district. Martin has appeared on every major U.S. television network, C-Span, CNN, BBC and Democracy Now to speak against the War in Iraq, as well as countless radio and television stations around the world.^[5]

Congressional Progressive Caucus

As of February 20 2009 Gwen Moore was listed as a member of the Congressional Progressive Caucus.^[6]

Anti Iraq War

At 1 p.m. on Saturday, March 21, a small crowd of roughly 300 protestors had gathered outside the county courthouse at 10th and Wells in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Congresswoman Gwen Moore spoke to the assembled.

Supported Lifting the Gaza Blockade

On Jan. 27, 2010, U.S. Representatives Keith Ellison and Jim McDermott led 52 other members of Congress in signing a letter addressed to President Barack Obama, calling for him to use diplomatic pressure to resolve the blockade affecting Gaza. Gwen Moore was one of the signatories of the letter. ^[7] The entire letter together with a complete list of signatories can be read by clicking here.

Admired Bruce Colburn

Bolstered by African drumming, personal stories of health disasters in the current system, hundreds of signs, speeches by leading elected officials and tributes to Ted Kennedy, whose coffin at that moment was being carried to Arlington National Cemetery, more than 800 citizens jammed into a parking area across from Summerfest’s main gate Saturday August 29 to send Wisconsin’s congressional delegation back to D.C. with a simple demand – “Let’s Get It Done!”

To underscore its belief in President Obama’s health care reform, the crowd helped present Wisconsin’s two senators and eight members of the House with more than 50,000 declarations of support along the lines of Obama’s strategy, signed by residents and separated into piles, so that each representative knew how many thousands were personally marked by voters in their district.

Rep. Gwen Moore (D-Wis.), the lone Wisconsin member of Congress to attend this send-off, anchored her rousing speech in the reality of what the current legislation intends and includes, not the fantasies promulgated on the Internet and cable news.

She quoted a veteran organizer she admired, Bruce Colburn, who had told her of his concern that health care reform was being dismissed by the opposition as just a case of money, just one of many issues the nation must address – rescuing business, revitalizing manufacturing, returning families to savings not debt, pushing green technology and mass transit, finally passing employee free choice, education improvement, using cap and trade to fight an overheating planet.^[8]

Abortion

Planned Parenthood

Moore received $1000 in lobbying funds from Planned Parenthood in 2008.

EMILY's List

Moore has been supported by EMILY's List during her campaigning.

Supporting Obama's birth control plan

Rep. Jan Schakowsky, D-Ill., and three other congresswomen attended a special news conference Feb. 8, 2012, reacting to Republican Speaker John Boehner's attack on the Obama administration's birth control policy.

Boehner vowed to overturn the policy, complaining that it was a violation of religious freedom because its coverage includes schools and hospitals with religious affiliation. Other Republicans saw this as a political opening, and argued that this was a sensitive issue of "religious liberty."

Schakowsky, along with Reps. Rosa DeLauro, D-Conn., Lois Capps, D-Calif., and Gwen Moore, D-Wis., said at the press conference they supported the president's policy, explaining that it strikes a balance between religious and individual freedom.

Schakowsky said the policy exempts churches from providing birth control benefits for their workers.

As for religiously-connected hospitals and schools, she explained, "If they want to be part of the business world, then they have to follow the same rules as other businesses."

Capps and DeLauro outlined some of the benefits of the birth control decision, noting that it was based on scientific evidence, decreased infant mortality and unintended pregnancy, and would reduce the long-standing gender discrimination issues that women in health care face.

Rep. Michael Quigley, D-Ill., said the ruling was a mainstream one, and that the Catholic Church ought to support it.

"The idea that birth control could be controversial in 2012 is outrageous," Schakowsky remarked. "Women's health care should not depend on who the boss is." Furthermore, she predicts a backlash among women if Republicans continue to attack this policy.

"It would be at their peril if they try to undo this," she concluded.^[9]

Staff

The following are past and present staff:^[10]

External links

• Moore's website with the House of Representatives
• On Ballotpedia

References