Mike Huckabee Capitalizes On Uncle Sugar Libido Controversy: Would-Be 2016 President Nabs Huck PAC Donations

Mike Huckabee is taking an enormous amount of ribbing for his bizarre assertion that Democrats somehow make women believe they “can’t control” their libidos without help from “Uncle Sugar.”

The former Arkansas governor and current Fox News host is being called sexist, misogynistic and just plain out of touch by Democrats, progressive bloggers and a number of critics on social media.

As the Washington Post reported, Huckabee made the comments in Washington during a speech at the Republican National Committee’s winter meeting:

“[Democrats tell women] they are helpless without Uncle Sugar coming in and providing a prescription each month for birth control because they cannot control their libido or their reproductive system without the help of government.”

The ensuing Twitter outrage and ridicule, while predictable, is also understandable. The onetime and possible future presidential candidate has a history of making offensive statements in regards to sex and gender, including his much-mocked contention that women have difficulty multitasking during their menstrual cycles.

His latest comments are equally ripe for derision, but they may also prove the old adage that there’s no such thing as bad publicity, at least in the Republican Party. On Thursday, as Talking Points Memo reported, Huckabee wrote in an email to supporters that his remarks were “blown sky-high by hand-wringing, card-carrying liberals from coast to coast, some of them in the media.” Then he asked for donations to his political action committee, Huck PAC, which purports to “promote conservative principles and help elect conservative candidates at every level of government.”

And Huck didn’t stop with the email. The email defending his comments was posted to the Mike Huckabee Facebook page, where it has since been shared 335 times. A cached version of the Huck PAC donation page from Jan. 8 showed only 88 donations for the month of January. The page currently shows 503 donations and counting. (The exact amounts of the donations are not shown.)

That Huckabee is now using the controversy as a springboard for a round of fundraising has not escaped the attention of left-leaning groups, including the liberal watchdog Media Matters for America.

Meanwhile, the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee released statements calling on 10 Republicans who received campaign contributions from Huck to return the money and condemn the comments, the Hill reported. Those Republicans include Reps. Scott Rigell of Virginia, Steve Southerland of Florida and Steve King of Iowa.

Huckabee has told numerous news outlets that he is weighing the possibility of his own presidential run in 2016, but the idea of a “President Huckabee” isn’t exactly resonating with the Twitter faithful.

The 2012 presidential election was a decisive one as far as women voters were concerned. According to an exit poll by CNN, 55 percent of women voted for President Obama, compared with 44 percent for Mitt Romney. As a result, there has been much discussion over the last year about how Republicans need to better appeal to women if they are to win national elections. Apparently not everyone got the memo.

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