State Representative, position A

In his three terms in the House, Rep. Vito Barbieri has been an outspoken tea party supporter and opponent of Medicaid expansion and civil rights protections for gays. The board chairman of the Open Arms crisis pregnancy center and clinic in Coeur d’Alene and a home-schooling advocate, he’s called on Christians to pull their children out of Idaho’s “Godless” public schools; he chairs the House Business Committee. Barbieri maintains that he’s the right representative for his highly conservative district; he’s twice won re-election. “My opponent has been focused on education, and the need to increase the budget,” Barbieri said. “I don’t believe that the constituents in this district even acknowledge that those are top priorities.”

Kathy Kraak Kahn, his Democratic challenger, a retired teacher, says she’s seen first-hand how Idaho’s schools are hurting. “They’re just short-changing education all across the board, transportation, the school buses, school bus drivers, substitute teachers in what they pay them, school nurses being cut out or cut short. Students are not being served.” Kahn said of Barbieri: “Almost every vote that he makes would not be the way I would have wanted that issue to go.”