Which Republican Presidential Candidates Have Supported The Arts? It's Debatable Says Americans For The Arts
By: Michael Dale Nov. 10, 2015
The eight highest polling Republican presidential hopefuls will participate on their party's main debate stage tonight, while four will participate in a lower tier debate.
Funding for the arts and arts education is an important issue that rarely gets significant coverage during presidential campaigns. While the arts are, in one way or another, a part of every American's life, the issue of public funding for arts programs and institutions is one filled with heated opinions.
The advocacy organization, Americans For The Arts, helps inform voters on presidential candidates' histories with arts issues, citing votes, quotes and actions. Below is a sample of information provided by their website, americansforthearts.org. Click on a candidate's name for Americans For The Arts' complete page on his or her history with arts-related issues.
SIGNIFICANT QUOTE: "Art makes students better...I have seen the data and students do better in math, for example, when they are participating in an organized sport or in the arts. Art is very similar to... organized sports. It teaches skills that are necessary to learn."
SIGNIFICANT ACTION: In 2010, under Bush's administration, Florida replaced the Common Core Standards with the Florida Sunshine State Standards, which include dance, music, theatre, and visual arts.
SIGNIFICANT QUOTE: "One of the things that I used to do is, I used to love to memorize things. I memorized poems, memorized Bible verses. And other people didn't know those things, and it began to make me feel that there was something special about me, and that I could learn things."
SIGNIFICANT ACTION: Founded the Carson Scholars Fund that, in part, provides funding to schools to build and maintain Ben Carson Reading Rooms, where children can partake in independent leisure reading.
SIGNIFICANT QUOTE: "We are educating our children today for industries and businesses that have yet to be invented. In this new environment, creativity and innovation will be as important as the ability to read, write and multiply. Arts education is one of the key ways to unleash the creative capacities in our young people."
SIGNIFICANT ACTION: Defended tax funding for the arts in 2009 and preserved arts funding by removing language from a bill that would have caused it to be cut for Fiscal Year 2012-2013.
SIGNIFICANT QUOTE: "We need to get the federal government out of areas it doesn't have the constitutional authority to do... We need to eliminate the National Endowment for the Arts."
SIGNIFICANT ACTION: Did not sign a series of Senate pro-arts Dear Colleague letters that requested increased funding for the NEA and NEH, support for the Office of Museum Services and the protection of the charitable tax deduction.
SIGNIFICANT QUOTE: "we need to remember that we're not simply educating for a job. We're educating to inspire children, feed their souls and advance society. Thus, we need to encourage study of the arts, history, music and philosophy."
SIGNIFICANT ACTION: Started the One Woman Initiative organization to fund female entrepreneurs with micro-loans in developing countries. Arts-related entrepreneurial endeavors such as textile/clothing businesses have recieved loans and aid from the organization.
SIGNIFICANT QUOTE: "The arts aren't extraneous, extracurricular or expendable. They are essential."
SIGNIFICANT ACTION: As Governor of Arkansas he signed a bill that required every public elementary school in the state to provide at least 40 minutes of instruction in music or visual art every week. As of June 2005, instruction increased to one hour each week for elementary schools and participating teachers had to be certified to teach art and music.
SIGNIFICANT QUOTE: "Fundamentally, I don't think $30 million for the federal government to buy new cars, $1 billion for the Census, $50 million for the National Endowment for the Arts is going to get the economy moving again as quickly as allowing the private sector to create jobs."
SIGNIFICANT ACTION: As Governor of Louisiana, Jindal proposed what was reported as an 83% cut to arts funding in 2009."
SIGNIFICANT QUOTE: "The arts and humanities play a unique role in the lives of our families, communities and country by enhancing and enriching the human experience. I hereby designate October 2011 as Arts & Humanities Month throughout Ohio and encourage the residents of Ohio to celebrate and promote the arts and culture in our state."
SIGNIFICANT ACTION: As Ohio's governor, created the first ever state wide Capital Arts and Cultural Committee, a group of arts leaders who meet and determine projects to which funding would be granted. The projects that were granted funding ranged from tiny community theaters to large-scale historical building restorations in major cities.
SIGNIFICANT QUOTE: On July 6, 2015, Senator Paul spotlighted a $25,000 grant from the NEA in his ongoing Waste Report, which is characterized on his Senate webpage as "an ongoing project to catalog egregious examples of wasteful spending throughout the U.S. government."
SIGNIFICANT ACTION: In 2011 introduced a budget plan that would eliminate the National Endowment for the Arts and the Corporation for Public Broadcasting.
SIGNIFICANT QUOTE: In response to President Barack Obama's apology to an art history professor for unintentionally trivializing an academic concentration in art history as not being as valuable as a technical degree, Rubio posted on Twitter, "Pathetic Obama apology to art history prof. We do need more degrees that lead to #jobs."
SIGNIFICANT ACTION: Did not sign a series of Senate pro-arts Dear Colleague letters that requested increased funding for the NEA and NEH, support for the Office of Museum Services and the protection of the charitable tax deduction.
SIGNIFICANT QUOTE: "The arts foster a strong sense of community and bring new ideas and cultures to many individuals and families all over the nation. Elimination of such programs would create a cultural vacuum that could not easily be filled."
SIGNIFICANT ACTION: Co-directed $300,000 in federal money for the August Wilson Center for African American Culture in Pittsburgh.
SIGNIFICANT QUOTE: "I flirted briefly with the idea of attending film school, but in the end, I decided real estate was a much better business."
SIGNIFICANT ACTION: Has personally given at least $465,125 to arts-affiliated organizations in New York between 1994 and 2010.
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