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Bond: Blunt’s successor needs to fight for Missouri

With several contenders on both sides of the aisle vying for U.S. Senator Roy Blunt’s position next year, former seat holder Kit Bond said Missouri needed a strong successor to follow in Blunt’s footsteps. 

“I wasn’t going to retire until I found that Roy was ready to step in, and I also told Roy he wants to make sure he gets a good person to succeed him,” Bond, a Republican, said. “People need to know what you’re thinking, and you need to develop a sound platform of the things you need — that the people of Missouri need.”

Bond served in the U.S. Senate for 24 years, leaving office in 2011. Prior to his tenure on Capitol Hill, Bond served two nonconsecutive terms as Missouri’s governor and spent two years as the state’s auditor. 

Bond appeared on Sunday’s episode of “This Week in Missouri Politics” to discuss the race, the state’s bicentennial, and current events in Washington, D.C. 

Bond also addressed the massive infrastructure package that passed the U.S. Senate last week. The $1.2 trillion Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act has been touted by the White House as the largest long-term investment in competitiveness and infrastructure in nearly a century. The bipartisan bill received a yes vote from Blunt who applauded substantial investments in roads and bridges, broadband, and electric vehicles. 

“There’s a lot of things in there that I wouldn’t have wanted to put in,” Bond said. “There are lots of pros and cons in it, and I believe that Roy voted for it because he felt that was the best outcome, but right now there’s so much spending. Inflation is going up, and people are going to start feeling it.”

Bond also discussed President Joe Biden, whom he served with in Washington, D.C. Bond said he was “very likable” but cast doubt on his voting record when it came to international affairs. Biden is under pressure for his handling of the situation in Afghanistan as the Taliban has quickly seized control. 

COVID-19

State Rep. Jim Murphy and St. Louis Alderman Jack Coatar joined Cora Faith Walker with the St. Louis County executive’s office and Steele Shippy, a senior campaign consultant for Victory Enterprises, on this week’s panel. The group discussed the response to rising COVID-19 cases across the state, the stalled mask mandate in St. Louis County, and County Executive Sam Page’s leadership.

“I find it really interesting when folks say that he’s done these sorts of things for political reasons,” Walker said. “I can absolutely assure you it is because of the Hippocratic Oath that he took as a doctor that he’s doing a lot of these things.”

Murphy pointed to a recently-signed state law restricting local officials’ power to issue health orders, noting mask mandates and shutdown orders were the bill’s main targets.  

“Their job is to protect our health, and it’s the legislative people that are elected by our citizens to protect their liberties,” Murphy said. “We think that the mask ordinance that just got overturned should have been overturned — not because it’s a bad idea, because it was a bad ordinance.”

Watch the full episode of “This Week in Missouri Politics” below, or listen to the podcast version here.