Mimi Walters

Marian Elaine "Mimi" Walters (née Krogius; born May 14, 1962) is an American businesswoman and politician. A member of the Republican Party. She served from 2015 to 2019 as the U.S. representative for California's 45th congressional district.

Before running for office, Walters was an investment banker from 1988 to 1995, and served as chairwoman of the Laguna Niguel Investment and Banking Committee. After serving on Congress, Walters was a fellow at the USC Center for the Political Future in the fall of 2020.

Early life and education

In 1962, Walters was born as Marian Elaine Krogius in Pasadena, California. Walters' father is Tristan Krogius. Walters graduated from Dana Hills High School (1980) before earning a Bachelor of Arts in political science from the University of California, Los Angeles in 1984.

Career

Walters was an investment banker from 1988 to 1995. She was an investment executive at the firm of Drexel Burnham Lambert, and later joined the firm of Kidder, Peabody, & Co. Her term ran from January 2005 to January 2007. In November 2006, she was re-elected to a second term in the Assembly.

California State Senate

Walters was elected to the State Senate in November 2008.

2010 California State Treasurer election

In January 2010, Walters announced that she would run for California State Treasurer against Democratic incumbent Bill Lockyer. Walters became the Republican nominee for State Treasurer, but lost to Lockyer in the general election.

2012 California State Senate race

Democratic candidate and trial lawyer Steve Young filed an unsuccessful civil lawsuit in an attempt to keep Walters' name off of the 2012 ballot. Young's lawsuit challenged Walters' residency in the 37th District; after the California Citizens Redistricting Commission re-drew the state's legislative districts in 2011, Walters announced that she had moved from Laguna Nigel to Irvine, in order to be eligible to run in the 37th Senate District.

U.S. House of Representatives

thumb|Walters during the [[115th United States Congress|115th Congress]]

Elections

2014

On July 2, 2013, Walters formally announced her candidacy for Congress, to replace Congressman John B. T. Campbell III, who announced he would not be seeking another term.

She was endorsed by a number of Republican members of Congress from California, including Campbell, Kevin McCarthy, Darrell Issa, and Ed Royce. Prior to the 2014 election, she set up the Blessings of Liberty Leadership PAC.

Walters was placed in the National Republican Congressional Committee's (NRCC) "Contender" category of their "Young Guns" program. In September 2014, the NRCC named Walters along with 13 other candidates to their "Vanguard" program. In the non-partisan blanket primary, she came in first place in a field of three candidates, with 45% of the vote. In the general election, she defeated Democratic candidate Drew Leavens with 65% of the vote.

2016

In November 2016, Walters won re-election by 17 points over her Democratic opponent, Ron Varasteh. For the campaign, Walters raised over $2 million.

2018

Walters ran for re-election in 2018. She and Democrat Katie Porter advanced out of the top-two primary in June 2018. Walters and Porter, a consumer lawyer and UC Irvine law professor, faced off in the general election on November 6, 2018.

In May 2018, Politico reported that Democrats were confident they would oust Walters, given that in 2016, Hillary Clinton had carried the 45th district, writing that Walters had "backed some of the most polarizing planks of President Donald Trump's agenda", and that Walters was "upbeat about surviving the much-predicted Democratic wave". Politico noted her support for a popular November ballot referendum. "The only reason I'm a target is because Hillary Clinton won my district", said Walters. "I got 37,000 more votes than President Trump did."

In September 2018, the Congressional Leadership Fund (CLF), the largest Republican super PAC active in U.S. House races, announced a $400,000 ad buy in support of Walters' campaign. In October 2018, the Los Angeles Times reported that the CLF had not purchased advertisements for Walters in its opening round of broadcast television advertising buys in Southern California. The CLF pushed back on the Los Angeles Times report, saying they had reserved over $3 million in Walters' district and had begun advertising there in August.

At the end of election night, Walters was in the lead, but over the following days, Porter gained votes and eventually overtook Walters as more ballots were counted. In fund-raising e-mails sent to supporters, Walters made unsubstantiated claims of fraud, alleging that Democrats were seeking to "steal" her seat by tampering with votes.

On November 15, 2018, the Associated Press called the race for Porter.

Committee assignments

Committee on the Judiciary
Subcommittee on Courts, Intellectual Property, and the Internet
Subcommittee on Regulatory Reform, Commercial and Anti-Trust Law
Committee on Transportation and Infrastructure
Subcommittee on Aviation
Subcommittee on Highways and Transit
Subcommittee on Railroads, Pipelines, and Hazardous Materials
Committee on Ethics
Committee on Energy and Commerce
Subcommittee on Communications and Technology
Subcommittee on Consumer Protection and Commerce
Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations

;Caucus memberships

Republican Main Street Partnership
Republican Study Committee

Political positions

Abortion

Walters opposed abortion, but had de-emphasized the issue during her political campaigns. In 2015, during her freshman term, she served on the United States House Select Investigative Panel on Planned Parenthood.

Cannabis

Walters had a "D" rating from the National Organization for the Reform of Marijuana Laws, an advocacy group supporting the legalization of marijuana.

Donald Trump

In July 2016, FiveThirtyEight labeled Walters an "Eager Unifier", for having endorsed Trump wholeheartedly, but not until after the Indiana primary.

In February 2017, Walters voted against a resolution that would have directed the House to request 10 years of Trump's tax returns, which would then have been reviewed by the House Ways and Means Committee in a closed session.

FiveThirtyEight had found that Walters voted with President Trump 99% of the time, and was the eighth-most partisan Trump supporter in the House, when compared to her district's voting patterns.

Federal taxation legislation of 2017

In November 2017, Walters voted in favor of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, the house version of the Republican Party's tax reform bill. The House bill removed state and local tax breaks that many Californians used, such as the mortgage interest deduction.

Also in 2015, Walters voted to repeal the limits on carbon dioxide emissions from power plants set by the Clean Power Plan. "Forcing a shift away from traditional energy resources", she explained, "would ultimately stifle the economy for years to come and harm consumers' pocketbooks." Walters also co-sponsored the Stopping EPA Overreach Act of 2017, which became law, and which declares that there is no legal requirement to regulate global warming.

Walters was originally a climate change denier, but she began to shift her views after meeting with the Orange County Central chapter of the Citizens' Climate Lobby in 2014. After they explained to her how the market-based approach of carbon fee and dividend could have a positive impact on the climate, without expanding government, Walters replied, "You guys are doing it the right way". In July 2017, Walters voted to veto the Perry Amendment, which would have de-funded Defense Department efforts to track climate change and its threats to military bases.

In October 2017, after President Trump pulled out of the Paris Agreement, "Walters officially changed from a climate-change skeptic to a believer ... and joined the Congressional Climate Solutions Caucus".

Health care

Walters supported the repeal of Obamacare, and voted in 2015 for H.R. 596, the House bill to repeal Obamacare. She also voted for H.R. 3762, the Restoring Americans' Healthcare Freedom Reconciliation Act, which would have repealed Obamacare.

Walters supported repealing and replacing the Affordable Care Act (known as Obamacare) with the American Health Care Act, the GOP's replacement plan for Obamacare, which did not come to a vote initially. She said that passing the American Health Care Act "is a critical step" towards the goal of rescuing "this failing health-care system".

On May 4, 2017, Walters voted to repeal the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) and pass the American Health Care Act. In early 2017, Walters tweeted that she was "committed to protecting patients w/ pre-existing conditions to ensure their access to quality, affordable health care". Walters was an original co-sponsor of H.R. 4684, the Access to Quality Sober Living Act, which would require the Department of Health and Human Services to establish best practices for sober living facilities for opioid addicts. This legislation was written after a subcommittee hearing exposed scams at such facilities.

Gun control

A May 2018 profile of Walters referred to her long-time "reputation as a gun-rights advocate". In the State Assembly, "she twice voted against bills requiring the micro-stamping of bullets from automatic firearms", against "background checks for ammunition buyers", against a ban on "large-capacity conversion kits", and against "prohibiting people under domestic violence restraining orders from obtaining firearms". But during her years in the House, "California voters' concerns about school shootings had risen dramatically, with 73 percent of respondents admitting they were worried about a mass shooting at their public school", with high-school students in Walters's district holding gun violence protests.

LGBT rights

As an Assemblywoman, Walters endorsed Proposition 8, which declared same-sex marriage illegal in the state of California. Then-Minority Whip Steny Hoyer (D-MD) named Walters as one of seven Republican representatives who switched their votes regarding a bill upholding an executive order prohibiting defense contractors from discriminating against people based on their sexual orientation. The identities of the seven vote-switchers were not publicly recorded, and none of those named by Hoyer confirmed his claims. PBS NewsHour reported that, under shouts of "shame", Walters voted against this protection, which ended up narrowly failing.

Military

In January 2018, Walters voted for H.R. 695, the 2018 Department of Defense Appropriations Act, saying that she had acted to "fully fund the Department of Defense to ensure our men and women in uniform have the tools and resources they need to keep our country safe... It is imperative our armed forces are properly equipped and ready to meet current and future challenges."

Nuclear waste

In March 2018, Walters signed a bi-partisan letter in support of funding to re-start the licensing process for the Yucca Mountain nuclear waste repository. "Just south of California's 45th district", she stated, "1,800 tons of spent nuclear fuel sits at the inactive San Onofre Nuclear Generating Station (SONGS). Unfortunately, our Nation's nuclear waste management system is broken, and spent fuel sits at nuclear sites like Songs, with nowhere to go. By law, the Federal government is obligated to take ownership of, and safely store, spent fuel at a permanent repository."

Strikes

In 2014, Walters voted for a bill in committee that banned public transit workers from going on strike.

Human trafficking

In February 2018, the House passed H.R. 1865, the Allow States and Victims to Fight Online Sex Trafficking Act (FOSTA), introduced by Walters, Ann Wagner (R-Missouri), and Carolyn Maloney (D-New York). It included an amendment written by Walters that would permit enforcement of criminal and civil sex trafficking laws against websites that facilitate online sex trafficking. The amended legislation passed with bi-partisan support.