page_title: Tim Pawlenty 2012 presidential campaign
section_title: Book tour and political positions
hierarchical_section_title: Tim Pawlenty 2012 presidential campaign / Book tour and political positions
caption_attribution_description: Tim Pawlenty in Phoenix, Arizona on February 26, 2011.
context_page_description: The 2012 presidential campaign of Tim Pawlenty, the 39th Governor of Minnesota began shortly after the 2010 midterm elections. He was seeking the 2012 Republican Party nomination for President of the United States.
  On March 21, 2011 Pawlenty announced on Facebook that he had filed the organization of an exploratory committee with the Federal Elections Commission. He formally declared his candidacy in Iowa on May 23, 2011. The day after finishing third place in the August 13, 2011 Ames Straw Poll, Pawlenty ended his presidential campaign.
context_section_description: Pawlenty went on tour for his book Courage to Stand, and as of January 18, his book had reached #1,979 on Amazon.com's list of bestsellers. Pawlenty calls himself a social conservative. In his extended interview with Jon Stewart on The Daily Show, he said he thinks United States Social Security and Medicare need to be cut to balance the federal budget.
  Pawlenty believes that state governments should outlaw abortion, except for cases of rape, incest, and to save a woman's life.  He thinks the United States Supreme Court decided Roe v. Wade wrongly, abortion being a state, not a federal, matter. He opposes same-sex marriage and civil unions. He would like to reinstate "Don't ask, don't tell" should he become president. Answering a question from talk radio host Bryan Fischer, he replied, "... I have been a public supporter of maintaining Don't Ask, Don't Tell and I would support reinstating it as well".
  In December 2010, Pawlenty was one of three U.S. governors who publicly declared solidarity with Christian-right group Family Research Council.
  Pawlenty's tour passed through Minneapolis, San Francisco and Dallas, ending in Iowa in January where the Iowa Caucuses are scheduled for February 6, 2012.  "That will come up fast," he said, "if I do run."
  In a December 2010 column in The Wall Street Journal, Pawlenty argued in favor of the historical benefits of "private sector" labor unions and strongly against "public sector" labor unions, whose collective bargaining rights he would like to see curbed: "The rise of the labor movement in the early 20th century was a triumph for America's working class. In an era of deep economic anxiety, unions stood up for hard-working but vulnerable families, protecting them from physical and economic exploitation." He also criticized modern unions: "The moral case for unions—protecting working families from exploitation—does not apply to public employment... Unionized public employees are making more money, receiving more generous benefits, and enjoying greater job security than the working families forced to pay for it with ever-higher taxes, deficits and debt."
caption: Pawlenty at a book signing in February 2011 in Phoenix, Arizona.
exif: {"Image Make": "Canon", "Image Model": "Canon EOS 50D", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image XResolution": "72", "Image YResolution": "72", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop 7.0", "Image DateTime": "2011:02:28 15:18:45", "Image Artist": "", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image Copyright": "", "Image ExifOffset": "248", "GPS GPSVersionID": "[2, 2, 0, 0]", "Image GPSInfo": "972", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "1086", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "8937", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/125", "EXIF FNumber": "9/2", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Manual", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "1250", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2011:02:26 11:30:29", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2011:02:26 11:30:29", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ShutterSpeedValue": "7", "EXIF ApertureValue": "35/8", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "120", "EXIF SubSecTime": "96", "EXIF SubSecTimeOriginal": "96", "EXIF SubSecTimeDigitized": "96", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "3168", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "4752", "EXIF FocalPlaneXResolution": "792000/149", "EXIF FocalPlaneYResolution": "1056000/199", "EXIF FocalPlaneResolutionUnit": "2", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Normal", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Manual Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard"}