You won't find her mentioned on the D.C. Republican website, but activist Missy Reilly Smith constitutes a kind of one-woman "tea party" movement in the liberal bastion that is the nation's capital.
The staunch pro-lifer, running a long-shot campaign against longtime Delegate Eleanor Holmes Norton, a Democrat, is trying to wake up the city's lethargic GOP and push the abortion issue to the front of the party's agenda with new, graphic ads airing this week.
The D.C. Republican Party does not support Mrs. Smith's campaign, and local party leaders asked her not to run. In an interview, she said they told her, "You never will be able to win."
Mrs. Smith, who worked in real estate sales and ran an anti-abortion advocacy group, is challenging a popular liberal incumbent who has defeated all comers since 1990. In 2008, for example, Mrs. Norton faced no Republican challenger and won more than 92 percent of the vote in the general election.
Mrs. Smith acknowledged a steep uphill climb, with only an estimated 30,000 registered Republicans in the city versus more than 336,000 registered Democrats. But she said the District's Republicans "blew me off" because of her conservative platform, not the voter registration numbers.
Mrs. Smith said her critics have miscast her as a one-issue candidate because of her uncompromising stands against abortion, which she called "murder," and homosexuality, which she called an "abomination." Fellow Republicans are simply refusing to pay heed to America's Judeo-Christian morals and "Republican principles," she said.
Mrs. Smith's platform rests on many of the issues highlighted by the tea party movement — limited government, support for the military, school vouchers and "pro-family" values.
While embraced by tea party enthusiasts across the country in growing numbers, those positions run contrary to the platforms of many D.C. GOP and Democratic candidates alike.
Mrs. Norton and most of the Republicans running in the Nov. 2 general election support gay rights. Mrs. Norton also is pro-choice and opposes gun rights and federal funding of the city's school voucher program.
Republican D.C. Council candidate Tim Day said the District's electoral landscape has to be prepared before conservatives can take on such hot-button issues as abortion
Ok, my asshole bleeds for this moron – she claims that those evil child killing people, the ones who act just like used car salesman – the ones who just won’t let you back out of the door unless you buy something, in her case, they sold her two abortions.
She said that they told her that she was not killing a baby; (and I agree that she was not killing a baby) however, how can anyone be that naïve and ignorant, she must have not wanted to have a child at the time, and then she sought to have the abortions – so just what in the fuck did she think that she was carrying around in her gut?
Yes, if you kill your fetus, you won’t have a baby, but isn’t that the point of having an abortion in the first place. Now this guilt riddled crazy bitch, wants to take away the rights of every other women to make the same choice that she made – I’d say it would be a safe bet that most other woman who seek an abortion, know that they’re killing the fetus in their gut. This woman is a shining example of the need for children to have comprehensive sex-education at a young age in our public schools. I’ve met Christians who even in their 20’s still didn’t know where babies come from.
