The president calls on Congress to act on several key policies, but promises to veto Republican priorities.

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“I’ve seen something like gay marriage go from a wedge issue used to drive us apart to a story of freedom across our country, a civil right now legal in states that 7 in 10 Americans call home,” the president said.

AP Evan Vucci

WASHINGTON — President Obama declared his view that same-sex couples' right to marry is a "civil right" in Tuesday night's State of the Union address, the end of a long path the president has traveled on the issue.

"I've seen something like gay marriage go from a wedge issue used to drive us apart to a story of freedom across our country," he said, "a civil right now legal in states that 7 in 10 Americans call home."

The words came four days after the Supreme Court announced it would be taking up the issues of whether states can ban same-sex couples from marrying and whether they can refuse to recognize same-sex couples' marriages granted in other states in four cases to be heard later this spring.

Although Attorney General Eric Holder announced later that afternoon that the administration will be filing a brief in the case that supports a nationwide resolution of the issue in support of same-sex couples' marriage rights, Tuesday's comments are Obama's first reaction to the coming court hearing.

The decision to reference his support for a national resolution to the issue is a marked contrast to his position as a candidate in 2008, when he opposed marriage equality — instead supporting only civil unions for same-sex couples.

It wasn't until his re-election campaign in May 2012 that the president announced his personal support for marriage equality. Even then, however, questions remained about how he thought the legal issues now before the Supreme Court should be resolved.

When the court did hear the case over California's Proposition 8, the administration opposed the constitutionality of the marriage ban — but did so in a brief that was based on a limited argument that only would have ended bans in California and seven other states.

Now, the president will make clear that he has traveled the path to meet advocates at their goal: Marriage equality is a civil right.

“There’s a president who is determined to move the country forward. If he can do that with the Republicans through Congress that would be great,” says a White House official. If you liked November and December…

Pool / Getty Images

WASHINGTON — Before Tuesday's State of the Union, the White House namechecked Republicans in an attempt to show that President Obama's new spending proposals that he'll outline during the speech aren't radical liberalism run amok.

But when the rubber meets the road, the White House doesn't think it needs the Republicans in Congress to move the president's agenda forward. Despite an election that overwhelmingly favored the GOP, the president will mostly wait for the Republicans to come to him — with little expectation of that actually happening in most cases.

That doesn't mean, White House officials say, that the president's 2015 agenda is "dead on arrival," as one aide put it Tuesday. It just means no one at the White House really expects the gridlock in D.C. to break, nor that it has to for progress to go forward. The president is perfectly happy to speak over the heads of Republicans in the chamber to GOP elected leaders in the states, who have been more welcoming of Obama's agenda. Through a combination of state action and executive power, White House aides said the president can make his State of the Union speech into relevant changes for the lives of Americans, despite likely intransigence from the GOP.

Viewers watching the speech will see "a president who is determined to move the country forward," said one White House aide. "If he can do that with the Republicans through Congress that would be great, we would welcome that kind of constructive engagement. We haven't seen that, frankly, in the past six years."

It's something of a different tone from the State of the Union in 2011, which came after Obama's first midterm shellacking at the hands of the GOP. That election ended with Democrats in charge of the Senate, Republicans running the House, and a president who said it was possible to build a bridge between them. Then came the reign of the government shutdown, the 2012 elections, the immigration breakdown, the failure of the Obmacare website, and the rest.

This time, things are different. Obama signaled his intention to stick to his guns with a flurry of veto threats hours before he was scheduled to give the State of the Union address. The month-long rollout of State of the Union "spoilers," as the White House called it — including calls for free community college education and tax hikes on the rich — Republicans on Capitol Hill were not expecting a speech that would lead them to new avenues of compromise.

"It appears they have no idea who won the election," said one senior Republican aide on the Hill. "Which now gives stock to Democrats' complaints that the White House slept through the midterms."

No matter what the White House says, though, there's one issue — besides the traditional spending bills — where the administration will definitely require Republican cooperation: authorization of military action in Iraq and Syria.

Domestically, though, in a preview of the address at the White House, the aides told reporters that the success in raising the minimum wage in many red states as well as Republican governors interested in some of the president's early childhood education agenda shows the path around the Congress Obama is happy to walk. The free community college scheme was modeled, aides said, on a similar program in Tennessee, which they acknowledged Tennessee's Republican leaders say they don't want to see turned into a federal mandate.

"Maybe they didn't get the memo, the president is not able to run again in 2016. That's not what he's focused on. Why would he be focused on an election he's not in?" a White House aide said of Republicans declaring Obama's 2015 agenda a "nonstarter" in recent interviews. "The point is that we're going to make progress in any way we can."

Lawmakers from both parties expressed disappointment that President Obama did not say he will send draft legislation authorizing the U.S. military operation in Iraq and Syria.

Iraqi soldiers launch a rocket during clashes with ISIS.

MOHAMMED SAWAF/AFP / Getty Images

WASHINGTON — President Obama called on Congress to approve "a resolution to authorize the use of force against" ISIS in his State of the Union address — but what that will look like or even who will write the new authorization remains a mystery to most lawmakers.

Following the president's speech, lawmakers from both parties expressed disappointment and confusion that President Obama did not say Tuesday that his administration will take the lead on language approving the U.S. military mission.

"I am disappointed [Obama] did not signal an intention to send a draft to Congress for consideration," said Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine in a statement. "I was pleased the Senate Foreign Relations Committee acted last month. But Congress as a whole will be better prepared to act with specific guidance from the administration on the language of an AUMF. I hope that guidance is forthcoming soon."

Sen. Ron Johnson, a Republican who sits on the Foreign Relations committee, told BuzzFeed News that the AUMF mention left him "totally confused."

"The president needs to define what he means by 'defeat'…He has to lay out what he needs to accomplish defeat and then he has to lay out the strategy and send us some language," Johnson said. "We need some leadership out of the commander-in-chief and he's provided none."

Currently, the United States is fighting ISIS in Iraq and Syria without a new, specific use of force resolution; the administration has been relying on the AUMFs of 2001 and 2002. Republicans have called on the president to draft his own language for the mission and send it to Congress.

Democrats passed their own resolution out of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee in the last Congress but it never came to the floor.

Republican Sen. Bob Corker, the chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, and members of Republican leadership have said that they expected the White House to send language to Congress "in a few weeks" but lawmakers are still unclear if that is actually going to happen.

The administration has said they generally like the framework included in the draft AUMF written by Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez when he was chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee and they would like to have authorization but did not necessarily need it.

If members were hoping that the State of the Union speech would clear up confusion about what the president was asking for, they were mistaken.

"It was unclear in the speech," said Republican Sen. Rob Portman. "But I heard from my colleagues that he's planning on sending something which is important because we need to know what he wants."

White House aides said the president intends to thread the needle between lawmakers who aides say want Obama to deliver a fully-written AUMF to Congress and others who want input on what the language will be as its being drafted. The official White House readout of the president's meeting with Congressional leaders on Jan. 13 committed Obama "to working with members of both parties on text for an AUMF that Congress can pass to show the world America stands united against ISIL." On Tuesday, White House officials said that meant "potentially our own language" but also stressed that discussions with Congress will be ongoing while the AUMF is drafted.

"You should expect us to be proactive with the Congress in the coming weeks with our own concepts and our own language for the AUMF but we want to hold open the door to that being an ongoing consultative process," an official said.

Some Republicans were cautiously optimistic about the possibility of getting an AUMF done this Congress.

"I think it's something we can work with him on," said Rep. Patrick McHenry. "But he needs to send something down. That is traditionally what Democratic and Republican presidents have done. That is the hope. "

Evan McMorris-Santoro contributed reporting.

DC’s hometown Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton says she’s “heartbroken” President Obama again ignored the city’s push for statehood during his State of the Union Speech.

Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton

Gary Cameron / Reuters

WASHINGTON — The District of Columbia's Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton didn't mince words Tuesday night on twitter when commenting on her colleagues' often sophomoric attempts to secure a coveted aisle seat for President Barack Obama's State of the Union speech.

Each year members begin taking seats in the House chamber hours before the president begins speaking in hopes of getting a grin-and-grip moment on national television with the occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave.

And on Tuesday night, Norton wasn't having any of it, and took to twitter to chastise her colleagues for acting "like 5-year-olds."

But Norton didn't just reserve her twitter side-eye for members of Congress. Following Obama's speech, Norton also criticized him for not mentioning the District's long sought after statehood.

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No president had ever said (or written) these words in a State of the Union address before. Other firsts: “ironic,” “hype,” “fake,” and more.

Jonathan Ernst / Reuters

In this year's State of the Union address, Barack Obama used dozens of words that had never been mentioned in any previous SOTU address. Some highlights, from the remarks as prepared for delivery:

That's why we defend free speech, and advocate for political prisoners, and condemn the persecution of women, or religious minorities, or people who are lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender.

Seven years ago, Rebekah and Ben Erler of Minneapolis were newlyweds.

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“This idea that our immigration laws somehow need to be ignored is quite frankly ridiculous.”

Sen. Marco Rubio

Javier Galeano / Reuters

WASHINGTON — Sen. Marco Rubio Wednesday called the Obama administration's efforts to provide so-called DREAMers with deferred deportation "ridiculous" and insisted the controversial program must come to an end.

The House earlier this month voted to end Obama's 2012 executive order creating the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program — which delays deportation of undocumented immigrants brought to the United States as children.

While the Florida Republican said he does not believe Congress should simply undo the existing temporary deportation deferments granted under DACA, he made clear the program must be terminated.

"The 2012 order has to come to end at some point. That executive order will expire at the end of this presidency … that cannot be the permanent policy of the United States. I think it was wrong to make that decision in the first place," Rubio said during a breakfast sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor.

Rubio also rejected the notion that those covered by DACA should be given some form of special status.

"This idea that our immigration laws somehow need to be ignored is quite frankly ridiculous. Every nation on earth has immigration laws, including the nations some of these people are coming from," Rubio said, adding, "If you are in violation of those laws, you should not be claiming that you have some right to ignore those laws."

Although in the past Rubio has supported a comprehensive effort to overhaul immigration laws, he made clear Wednesday that is not an option.

"I can tell you that with tremendous confidence, because I tried it," he said, pointing to the failed effort in the last session of Congress to pass legislation.

Instead, Rubio argued Congress should first put in place new border security and changes to legal immigration law before tackling the status of the estimated 11 million undocumented immigrants in the country.

A long-awaited argument brought surprising questions from Justice Antonin Scalia.

Chris Geidner/BuzzFeed

WASHINGTON — After a rocky start that included seven protesters interrupting Supreme Court proceedings Wednesday morning, several justices appeared skeptical of arguments to limit the scope of claims that can be brought under the Fair Housing Act.

The case finally brought the question of whether policies that are not discriminatory on their face but have a "disparate impact" on a particular race can be brought under the civil rights law — a question the court has tried to hear arguments on twice previously, only to see the cases settle prior to arguments.

While the Fair Housing Act of 1968 makes no specific mention of whether "disparate impact" claims are covered by the law, every court of appeals to decide the issue and the federal government — through the Department of Housing and Urban Development — agree that such claims are permitted under the act.

The strongest argument for allowing such claims, it appeared from the arguments on Wednesday, is the fact that when Congress amended the law in 1988, it included three exemptions for particular types of disparate impact claims. As such, several justices argued, the exemptions would have been unnecessary unless disparate impact claims, more generally, are allowed under the overall law.

Some of the sharpest questions posed to Texas Solicitor General Scott Keller, opposing the use of disparate impact claims, came from an unexpected corner: Justice Antonin Scalia.

Of the 1988 amendments, Scalia asked, "Why doesn't that kill your case?"

When Keller pushed back against that and similar questions from Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor — with some help from Justice Samuel Alito — by saying the question came down to whether the 1968 law itself initially allowed disparate impact claims, Scalia was incredulous.

Regarding the "plain text" of the law, Scalia told Keller the 1988 amendments must be considered, saying, "You look at the whole law ... We don't just look at each little piece."

In addition to Sotomayor and Ginsburg, Justices Stephen Breyer and Elena Kagan appeared to be supportive of a reading of the law that would allow for such disparate impact claims.

When the lawyer for the group challenging Texas' policy made his case, much of the discussion focused on how this specific case would be resolved — a question about what Sotomayor referred to as the "steps" in disparate impact litigation. In such litigation, first an initial case must be made that the policy has an adverse effect on a race. Once that happens, then legitimate reasons for the policy must be shown, and, if such reasons are shown, then it is determined whether there are alternatives available that would not have the same effects.

Notably, despite the discussion over those "steps," the Supreme Court declined to include debate over those steps in the "questions presented," or the formal court announcement of what issue it is considering. Instead, the court limited the question to whether disparate impact claims are allowed under the Fair Housing Act.

When the attorney representing the Obama administration, Solicitor General Donald Verrilli, made the federal government's case, he notably refocused the argument on that question. Repeatedly, Verrilli noted that there might not, ultimately, be a violation of the Fair Housing Act in this case. Instead, he said that issue could be resolved by lower courts and the majority of the disparate impact cases — "heartland" cases, which he described as involving occupancy requirements or policies limiting property use — could be allowed to continue.

In concluding his arguments, however, Texas' lawyer, Keller, raised a secondary question beyond the issue of whether the Fair Housing Act allowed for such claims, saying that there was "constitutional doubt" about whether disparate impact claims could ever be allowed under recent Supreme Court cases. This is so, Keller argued, because it would require entities to give "race-conscious consideration" in attempting to avoid FHA-related litigation. The constitutionality of such claims was not before the justices; however, the state raised the question as a reason to more narrowly interpret the act in order to avoid that constitutional question.

Sotomayor — who earlier noted that she has "studied" disparate impact law "very carefully" — countered that the possibility of disparate impact claims does not require race-conscious considerations so much as it requires people to think about the policy or program that would have "the most race-neutral" effects.

The court is expected to decide the case by late June.

The actually interesting part of the State of the Union is usually what’s happening behind the president.

We asked Facebook who more people talked about on Facebook during the State of the Union: Biden or Boehner.

Justine Zwiebel / BuzzFeed

What a boss.

No matter how you felt about President Obama’s State of the Union address, we can all agree this guy won the night.

Alejandro Renteria / Via Twitter: @AlejandroRent

Renteria said that after the speech, he saw other Hill staffers shaking hands with Obama and realized he had the chance to have a "memorable moment" with the president.

"As the president was about to exit the House Floor, I asked him 'Mr. President, could you sign my tie?'" Renteria said. "And he responded with a smile and said 'Oh no, you don't want me to do that.' and I looked at him and said 'Yes I do, Mr. President.' He actually signed my tie and smiled back as he exited the floor."

Renteria said he received many calls and texts from people asking him if he saw the guy get his tie signed, without realizing it was him.

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For now, senators say it’s not a problem that one of the most powerful Republicans in D.C. already has a likely presidential candidate. “I work with Sen. McConnell on stuff, I make sure he knows what I’m doing to try and get it across the finish line,” Paul said.

Mitch McConnell campaigning for re-election in November with Rand Paul.

John Sommers Ii / Reuters

WASHINGTON — Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has made no secret that he'll support his fellow Kentuckian, Sen. Rand Paul, should Paul run for president in 2016.

And Paul has also made no secret that he very, very likely will do just that.

But there's a lot of time between now and the election, and at least two other Republican senators (Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio) who seem to hold the same ambition. The open question: What happens when one of the most powerful lawmakers in D.C. is already committed to a candidate — and one with very distinct policy ideas?

Paul and other Republican senators dismissed the idea it would be a problem, and though a source close to McConnell dismissed the issue as well, the source acknowledged the majority leader is aware of the potential for conflict.

When asked directly by BuzzFeed News in New Hampshire last week if he felt there'd be any tension with Republicans on Capitol Hill over McConnell's support, Paul bluntly replied, "No."

That doesn't mean that his relationship with McConnell won't have its benefits. Paul has a direct line of access to McConnell and he said he speaks with him regularly about his legislative priorities.

"There are a lot of things I'm working on that I'm interested in getting done. Probably the things in the first few months that I'd like to get passed is something on [tax] repatriation. I'm working with [California Democrat] Sen. Boxer on it, I've talked to Sen. McConnell about it," Paul said. "I work with Sen. McConnell on stuff, I make sure he knows what I'm doing to try and get it across the finish line."

The relationship, at times uneasy, has benefited both. Paul endorsed McConnell early on in his 2014 re-election race, and helped him during a contentious Tea Party primary challenge. What each gets out of the exchange is clear: the powerful McConnell is a good ally to have for Paul, and the popular Paul delivered key support for McConnell in their home state.

Paul and McConnell's Senate colleagues won't say they're worried, though, that the majority leader would potentially show preferential treatment to Paul.

"Mitch is not going to take his support for Rand and do anything that's not in the best interest of the conference. No one worries about that," said Sen. Lindsey Graham, himself weighing a bid for president. "I admire Mitch for supporting his colleague, it's the right thing to do but in terms of how we run the senate or what bills come up I don't think presidential politics is going to matter to Mitch."

Sen. Jeff Sessions told BuzzFeed News that McConnell's support for Paul would be "a positive for Rand," although he doubted many other Senators would rush to join him in that endorsement.

"[McConnell] will have to be balanced. I don't think he could give one person in the Senate an advantage simply because they are running for president," Sessions said. "But Rand's able to advocate his own legislation pretty good."

Ron Bonjean, a Republican strategist, said the relationship is unlikely to cause problems — for now. "The challenge could come during the Republican primary debates where the stakes are high and McConnell throws his weight behind legislation Paul has at a critical juncture," he said.

Like McConnell, Harry Reid's Senate conference in 2008 was crowded with would-be nominees, including President Obama, Vice President Joe Biden, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, and former Sen. Chris Dodd.

Unlike McConnell, however, Reid hadn't just come off a reelection race in which he leaned heavily on one of the contenders. That allowed Reid to stay out of the primary process altogether. In fact, despite rumors at the time that the Nevada Democrat preferred Obama over his other colleagues — a rumor his office vigorously and repeatedly denied — Reid did not use his considerable power in the chamber to Obama's benefit. Former aides to Reid said they were under strict instruction to not show any favoritism when putting together press conferences or caucus events.

Sources close to McConnell also say that he's aware of the potential for conflict, and is "deeply serious" about not playing 2016 favorites.

"McConnell's central ‎premise for returning the Senate to regular order is to stop the practice of using the floor as a campaign studio," said one source with knowledge of McConnell's thinking. "The same principle applies to his own conference as it does to Democrats."

"I imagine McConnell speaks frequently with Sen. Paul about issues pertaining to Kentucky and the nation," the source continued, "but the entire GOP conference knows that he's deadly serious about not allowing campaign politics, presidential or otherwise, shape the business they do in the Senate."

McConnell has also been clear that there are areas where he and Paul disagree. But by McConnell's own admission, the two have a "close relationship" these days.

"We didn't start out that way, but we ended up being big allies. He was very helpful to me," McConnell said at a Politico event in December. "And obviously I'm going to support somebody from my own state. And everybody understands that."

Don Stewart, McConnell's deputy chief of staff, reiterated in a statement that the two have a "very close working relationship."

"While they don't agree on every single issue, they've been able to do a lot together to advance the interests of all Kentuckians," he said. "That relationship will continue and Senator McConnell is proud to support his fellow Kentuckian in whatever path he chooses."

Sen. Jerry Moran, another ally of McConnell's who led the Senate Republicans' campaign arm last cycle, said that it was nothing new that senators with ambitions for higher office would seek out support from their home state colleagues.

"I don't see anyway that it matters. Sen. McConnell is still going to be Sen. McConnell and his support for a fellow Kentuckian wouldn't intrude or interfere," he said. "We always have lots of senators who express interest in running for president and other senators interested in supporting their colleagues."

Preet Bharara goes to war.

Carlo Allegri / Reuters

Preet Bharara stood out first not for his early prosecutions of bankers and local pols — aggressive, but not unusual for an office with an aggressive tradition — but for his rather edgy sense of humor. It was the summer of 2013, and Preet was the guest of honor at Delivering Alpha, a tony gathering of hedge fund managers.

"You told me there were going to be a lot of people here from the hedge fund industry," Bharara told the room full of suits. "I just want to apologize in advance that I don't have enough subpoenas for all of you."

Pause for nervous laughter.

"Obviously, I'm kidding. I do have enough."

Until fairly recently, it wasn't clear if Preet — he's now a first-name-only New York icon — was just a powerful guy with a weird sense of humor, or whether the attitude that humor implied would extend to his role in what is in some ways the country's most powerful autonomous law enforcement office, the United States attorney for the Southern District of New York. The traditions of prosecutorial independence that Karl Rove once tried and failed to reverse mean that a U.S. attorney doesn't fully answer to the president who appointed him, the party that he belongs to, or really to anyone other than the traditionally pliable foreperson of a federal grand jury. And the aggressive, elitist tradition of the Southern District holds that pretty much the entire world is under its jurisdiction.

Bharara's tough talk on Wall Street was followed by action, with the prosecutor finding a technical path around the Justice Department's hesitation to indict a major financial institution.

That move was just a warm-up, it turns out, for a creative and extremely aggressive attack on New York State's two most powerful Democrats. The New York Times scoop Thursday morning that Bharara plans to indict New York State Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver is a dramatic and unusual move, a step far across the invisible lines that often constrain appointed prosecutors: He has blown up his own political party.

His frontal assault on the open secrets of New York political power has been a genuine shock to the state's politics and even to its press, who missed the secret payments that appear to be at the heart of the reported Silver indictment. The process began last year, when Andrew Cuomo cut a particularly crude variety of the deal on which most statehouses operate: He shut down an ethics investigation into the state legislature in exchange for legislative support for his policies. His gambit became the subject of an excellent Times investigation — and then, to everyone's surprise, Bharara essentially reversed Cuomo's move, using his expansive power to seize the evidence Cuomo's Moreland Commission had gathered and turn it over to his own investigators.

Silver's reported indictment appears to come from the Moreland Commission files, and Bharara's move has already done massive damage not just to Silver, whose spokesman didn't respond to an email Thursday morning, but also to Cuomo, implicated by extension in a cover-up.

Few saw Bharara's ferocity coming. He had been a federal prosecutor as a young lawyer, as many smart young lawyers are, and then went into politics, serving as a top staffer to Sen. Chuck Schumer, who got him the U.S. attorney job. Schumer doesn't have a particular reputation as a reformer — his interests are meat-and-potatoes policy, not the less visceral questions of governance — and nothing about Bharara's pedigree suggested he planned to burn down the New York State Democratic Party (though nothing suggested any particular loyalty to it either). Bharara was well-liked — funny, media savvy, a live wire — and wasn't known for the kind of raw aggression associated with two other legendary New York prosecutors, Rudy Giuliani and Eliot Spitzer.

Now Bharara is at war, and should he win (and even if he loses — some of Giuliani's Wall Street prosecutions fell apart), he is now an obvious candidate for any of the major New York political offices. And as Mike Bloomberg's allies, in particular, look for a new challenger to Mayor Bill de Blasio, the prosecutor who took on his own party will likely be the first man they call.

Bharara was, briefly, among the figures mentioned last fall for another top job, attorney general of the United States, replacing a loyalist who served as President Obama's "heat shield." Obama went instead with the U.S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, Loretta Lynch, a well-regarded prosecutor who has not shown the same eagerness to indict prominent Democrats. Bharara, with two more years in office, is that particularly dangerous and rare political figure: a federal prosecutor who doesn't give a fuck.

“This is my daughter… she was murdered by a serial rapist released early from prison in Arkansas. Will we see a version of this unaired ad — obtained by BuzzFeed News — in 2016?

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In the fall of 2007, as Mike Huckabee was surging in the Iowa polls, Mitt Romney's foundering presidential campaign dispatched a camera crew to Arkansas with the charge to produce one of the most brutal ads of the election cycle.

The final product — a withering spot that tied Huckabee to a 2003 murder committed by a serial rapist who was paroled while he was governor of Arkansas — never saw the light of day. But the unaired ad, obtained this week by BuzzFeed News, highlights a potentially potent line of attack on Huckabee as he considers a 2016 bid for the presidency.

The ad's existence was first reported in the 2012 book The Real Romney (and noted, then, by BuzzFeed News). The book's authors report that Alex Castellanos, then the Romney campaign's chief strategist, was aiming for an emotionally hard-hitting commercial that would have the same effect as the infamous "Willie Horton" attack ad on 1988 Democratic presidential candidate Michael Dukakis.

Others in the campaign, including Stuart Stevens, believed going after Huckabee so harshly would backfire. The operatives ultimately deferred to Romney, who spiked the ad, believing it would make him look "desperate."

The ad features an interview with the mother of the murder victim, condemning Huckabee's judgment and ruling him unfit to be president.

"This is my daughter," the mother says in the commercial. "She was pregnant with her first child. She was murdered by a serial rapist released early from prison in Arkansas. It was Mike Huckabee's intent that Wayne Dumond be released from prison. It's a pattern of bad judgment — very bad judgment. I don't know how you could trust that person with the highest power in our country."

On the screen at the end of the ad, white lettering appears against a black backdrop informing viewers, "Mike Huckabee granted 1,033 pardons and commutations, including 12 murderers."

Though this ad never ran, Romney did eventually produce a softer spot attacking Huckabee's extensive use of pardons to cast him as soft on crime. No doubt many of these cases are sitting in opposition research files belonging to Huckabee's prospective 2016 opponents — although it's unclear whether such a line of attack would carry the same force eight years later, at a time when many Republicans are rethinking their approach to criminal justice.

A spokesman for Romney declined to comment on the ad, while an adviser to Huckabee did not respond to a request for comment.

House Speaker John Boehner wants the Israeli prime minister to speak about the threat from radical Islam and Iran. The White House says world leaders are supposed to first inform them before planning a trip to the U.S.

House Speaker John Boehner has invited Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to speak before a joint session of Congress on “the grave threats radical Islam and Iran," prompting a rebuke from the White House over a "breach of protocol."

Jonathan Ernst / REUTERS

"Americans and Israelis have always stood together in shared cause and common ideals, and now we must rise to the moment again," he said.

Netanyahu accepted Boehner's invitation and will address Congress on March 3rd. Boehner said on Twitter that he had originally invited Netanyahu to speak on Feb. 11, but the Israeli leader asked to move it to March so he could attend a conference in D.C.

"I look forward to being able to share with the joint session Israel's vision for working together to address these threats and to reiterate Israel's commitment to the bond that unites our two democracies," Netanyahu said in a statement.

Boehner's invitation came a day after President Obama said he will veto any new sanctions on Iran in his State of the Union address.

"But new sanctions passed by this Congress, at this moment in time, will all but guarantee that diplomacy fails  —  alienating America from its allies; and ensuring that Iran starts up its nuclear program again," Obama said. "It doesn't make sense. That is why I will veto any new sanctions bill that threatens to undo this progress."

Obama will not meet with Netanyahu when he is in D.C. for his address, the White House confirmed. The administration said the decision is in line with prior practice of not meeting with foreign leaders close to when their country holds elections. Israel is holding elections in March.

Boehner said in a Wednesday press conference that he did not consult Obama before sending the invite to Netanyahu, but that he didn't believe he was "poking anyone in the eye."

He said that the threat from Iran and Islamic extremists is "serious," but in his address Obama "papered over it."

However the White House criticized the invitation as a breach of the protocol for when world leaders visit the U.S.

White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest said that usually leaders inform the White House before planning a trip to the U.S. He said the administration will decide a course of action after speaking with the Israelis about what Netanyahu will say in his address, the Associated Press reported.

The State Department also expressed displeasure, with spokesperson Jen Psaki telling reporters "traditionally" the administration would be informed by the world leader directly about a visit.

The Israeli leader has been a vehement critic of negotiating with a nuclear Iran. He and President Obama have endured a tense relationship throughout their time in office.

Netanyahu has addressed a joint meeting of Congress twice before, once in 1996 and once in 2011.

He is the latest among many former Israeli prime ministers to address Congress, including Ehud Olmert, Shimon Peres, and Yitzhak Rabin.

LINK: Obama: I’m Ready To Veto The Republican Congress

LINK: 2015 SOTU First To Say “Lesbian,” “Bisexual,” “Transgender”

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Reid said he’s “doing fine” after his accident earlier this month, and added that he still intends to run for re-election in 2016.

AFP / Getty Images BRENDAN SMIALOWSKI

WASHINGTON — Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid said he's "doing fine" Thursday in his first media appearance since he injured his right eye and several ribs earlier in January.

Wearing a bandage over his eye, Reid detailed how his injury occurred, saying an exercise band he was using broke, hit him in the face, spun him around and sent him flying into some nearby cabinets. Reid did not disclose the brand of exercise product he was using.

Reid also said he had four broken ribs, but that was "minor."

"Didn't knock me out, but it sure hurt," said Reid, a former boxer.

On Monday he'll have surgery to reconstruct bones in his eye and face. He'll also have blood drained from the injured eye.

The senator said he hopes to be back "full time" the week after his surgery.

Reid, who still has some bruising on his cheek and neck, opened up the press conference calling Republicans' efforts to pass a Department of Homeland Security funding bill "outrageous.

Despite his injuries, Reid said that, at least for now, he still plans on running for re-election when his term is up in 2016.

When asked about the possibility he suffered a concussion, Reid said he hadn't been told he had one but "but perhaps I have, I don't know."

"I do have a better understanding of the football players and the baseball players who have concussions," he said.

A poll! Without the Senate majority, there’s a lot less keeping Senate Democrats in line when it comes to the things they actually want to happen.

Sen. Elizabeth Warren clearly wants stronger regulation on big banks. Here she is attacking the close ties between Citigroup, Democratic administrations, and Congress in December.

The letter is signed by the House Oversight Committee’s top Republican and Democrat.

Screenshot from http://Healthcare.gov

WASHINGTON — A bipartisan group of House Oversight Committee lawmakers called on the Obama administration Thursday to give more information about how the federal health exchange website uses and protects consumer information.

The letter is signed by five committee members including Chairman Jason Chaffetz and Ranking Member Elijah Cummings.

The letter calls on Health and Human Services Secretary Sylvia Burwell to brief the committee on a story from the Associated Press, which reports Healthcare.gov shares personal consumer information with third-party marketers.

The AP reported that information like age, zip code, and whether a person is a smoker or non-smoker is shared with companies including Google, Twitter, and Facebook.

Specifically, the letter asks what data is shared, if there are any restrictions placed on the use of the data, and what "controls are in place to ensure the information collected is not used commercially."

Sens. Orrin Hatch and Chuck Grassley sent a letter to the Centers of Medicare and Medicaid Services on Tuesday asking for similar information.

Read the full letter here:

Congresswoman Renee Ellmers is at the center of the controversy over the pulled vote to ban abortions after 20 weeks.

Rep. Renee Ellmers

Olivier Douliery/Abaca Press / MCT

WASHINGTON — At the last minute on Wednesday night, Republican leadership pulled a bill to ban abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy after several women and moderate members from their own party protested.

At the center of the controversy over the pulled vote and the target of much of the ire from anti-abortion activists is Congresswoman Renee Ellmers, a 3rd term member from North Carolina, who objected to language in the bill that would have required women to report their rapes to police prior to seeking an abortion. Ellmers and Rep. Jackie Walorski withdrew their co-sponsorship of the bill last week.

The vote was to take place on the same day as the March for Life, when hundreds of thousands anti-abortion protesters march through D.C on the anniversary of the Roe vs. Wade court decision. The House instead passed a bill banning taxpayer funding for abortions.

On Thursday, approximately 50 people who had participated in the March for Life stood outside of Ellmers' office, where a weary legislative director dutifully took notes to hear their complaints.

"I want to tell you…we are very upset with Renee," Tami Fitzgerald, the executive director of the North Carolina Values Coalition, told the staffer. "We are going to make sure someone else takes her seat in 2016. We are not going to put up with these shenanigans. She cratered a big pro-life victory today."

Fitzgerald told BuzzFeed News that Ellmers was their focus because she had voted for similar legislation last congress and that Ellmers "had been on record as a no-exception pro-lifer."

"She started this folly. Instead of getting behind a pro-life bill that will save 18,000 unborn children per year…she has fought behind the scenes to get the bill pulled off the calendar today and change it," Fitzgerald said. "I do not believe the controversy over this rape exception is big enough to torpedo a major pro-life bill like this."

Ellmers has gone on to explain that she was concerned about legislation that would appear "harsh and judgmental" to young people and women.

"She said she was concerned about how 'millennials' will feel? Millennials are pro-life too. They're out there marching today," said Gwen Eppard, who traveled from Maryland to attend the March. "I just feel like she betrayed them too. If she's saying she's pro-life, she didn't act it."

Socially conservative members of Congress were confused by the vote switch as well.

Without mentioning Ellmers by name, Rep. Tim Huelskamp said "if you vote for a bill one year, and oppose it the next that is very difficult to explain.

"I think there's mismanagement on this. They pull this the night before? There are 150,000 marchers who are already concerned about the House leadership's commitment to life and this only furthers their concern," Huelskamp told BuzzFeed News.

Republican conference chairwoman, Cathy McMorris Rodgers told attendees of the march that leadership was still committed to passing the 20 week ban.

However Rep. Charlie Dent, a moderate from Pennsylvania, said that the criticism of Ellmers specifically was unfair.

"It wasn't just women members. It was me. It was other members," he told reporters.

"It's unfair to target her because there were many members — male and female — who had concerns about the language. I guess it was reported that at the retreat she said something about it so they are picking on her, but I think it's unfair," he added.

Nearly 20 years ago, Carson argued for government-run catastrophic health care and “national guidelines” on how and when the very ill should be treated. Carson himself calls his proposals “fairly radical.”

Earnie Grafton / Reuters

In 1996, Dr. Ben Carson, now a conservative favorite and potential presidential candidate, wrote a paper outlining his vision for U.S. health care.

Some of his proposals: nationalized catastrophic care, essentially replacing Medicaid with health care food stamps, and "national guidelines" about when the elderly and terminally ill should receive care.

By implementing government-run catastrophic health care, Carson argued, the price of premiums would go down so much that employer-based health care would come to end and people would own their own health care policies. In fact, Carson wrote, Medicare would also no longer be necessary.

In recent years, Carson has been a vociferous critic of the Affordable Care Act. His current-day proposals for health care involve giving a $2,000 stipend to each American to set up Health Savings Accounts — and little else from the government, he told Politico last year.

Nearly two decades ago, though, in the essay published by the Harvard Journal of Minority Public Health, Carson uses the food-stamp program and some disaster relief programs as models for improving U.S. health care and, in some cases, the means for dramatically reducing its costs.

Carson writes of using computers to improve national records, making the track record of physicians accessible and transparent, and requiring insurers to provide coverage despite preexisting conditions. But the centerpiece of Carson's plan is government-run health care for catastrophic events.

"It has been generally been assumed that we wish to avoid a single-payer health care system," wrote Carson. "Yet there are some well-defined programs that the federal government has handled reasonably well, such as the Disaster Relief Program."

Carson describes how catastrophic health care events account for the biggest costs to insurers — and therefore, the reason for skyrocketing premiums as medical advances in the second half of the 20th century allowed Americans to live much longer. He cites the "massive aid" the government provides to citizens after disasters as a strong model.

"The next question is, who will pay for catastrophic care? The answer: the government-run catastrophic health-fund. Such a fund would be supported by a mandatory contribution of approximately 10 to 15 percent of profits of each health insurance company, including managed care operations."

The essay also features a particularly sharp passage about how Americans view health care for the elderly and very ill.

"Unlike many other advanced nations," Carson wrote, "American society has not yet come to terms with the fact that it is not unreasonable to keep simply someone comfortable at home when catastrophic illness occurs rather than putting them in an intensive care unit, poking and prodding them, operating and testing them ad nauseam, why not allow them the dignity of dying in comfort, at home, with an attendant if necessary?"

One solution, Carson wrote, would be to establish "national guidelines" for care, noting at one point in the essay that if the government provided for catastrophic care, it "would facilitate a national debate on what catastrophic conditions should be treated and to what extent."

"Decisions on who should be treated and who should not be treated clearly requires some national guidelines and obviously should be made based on the viability of the patient rather than the age of the patient," he wrote. "There are clearly many 90-year-old individuals who are healthier than some 40 or 50-year-old individuals and certainly medical treatment should not be withheld if there is a reasonable chance of recovery and resumption of a normal lifestyle."

These national guidelines are not the only federal standards for care that Carson proposes.

Earlier in the essay, Carson proposes as a malpractice reform, that "a law could simply be passed stating that a physician who is adhering to the national guidelines for the treatment of a certain diagnosis could not be sued even if the results of the treatment were not optimal."

To take care of the very poor, Carson proposed a system of "health stamps" explicitly modeled after the food-stamp program.

"Instead of giving medical assistance cards to the poor, they could be issued the equivalent of health stamps," he wrote. "These would be credit vouchers (which could be in the form of electronic money) that could be used to purchase medical services in the same way that food stamps are used to purchase food items."

Carson's current rhetoric and proposals stand in sharp contrast to those outlined in his article.

Last year, he told Politico that in his current proposal for health care reform, "[t]he only responsibility of the government would be providing $2,000 per year for every American citizen ... to provide everyone with a health savings account" — a role that falls far short of his earlier suggestion that the government take over catastrophic coverage from private insurers.

In the same interview, he also criticized government-assistance programs.

"We take the downtrodden in our society and we pat them on the head," Carson said to Politico. "We say 'There, there, you poor little thing. I'm gonna give you free health care. I'm gonna give you housing. I'm gonna give you food stamps. You don't have to worry about anything."

In a statement to BuzzFeed News, Terry Giles, a Carson confidant who will chair his campaign if he runs, said the essay was evidence that Carson is a deep-thinker about U.S. health care — and that the positions were from long ago.

"The Harvard Journal article from two decades ago is proof that Dr. Carson has for a very long time been thinking about how health care could be delivered to all Americans. This is not an issue he has only recently thought about but a plan that has matured and been more perfected by him over many years. His beginning view 19 years ago on health care for all Americans is as relevant to his view today, as our current military action in Afghanistan is compared to our military strategy in Afghanistan two decades ago."

Carson suggests that such a program would result in "a significant reduction in health insurance premiums," since companies would be able to "reap very substantial profits" while charging consumers a lower rate if freed from the responsibility of providing insurance for catastrophic care — a situation which would also allow the government to crack down on "profiteering," and establish a reasonable regulatory environment:

For example, if a company collected $5 billion in premiums, paid out $1 billion in claims, and had predetermined and pre-approved business expenses of $1 billion, that would result in a profit of $3 billion. This amount would be excessive since they could not claim to be saving for future catastrophic health care events since the government would be taking care of such situations. The health insurance companies would have to return the money to clients or drastically reduce further premiums to comply with a pre-established profit limit.

Other insurance regulations would also need to occur, such as not permitting insurance companies to exclude those with pre-existing conditions, not allowing them to effectively exclude people by raising their premiums to prohibitive levels, etc. It should, however, be kept in mind that since the companies would not be required to cover catastrophic disease, there would be little reason for them to engage in these unfair activities.

The resultant savings, Carson writes later in the essay, would make it possible for people to own their policies — thus getting rid of the need for Medicare, because people's insurance would not be tied to their employment, and therefore would not be affected by retirement.

Medicare has not been addressed in this proposal because it would not be necessary with this system. Since individuals would own and maintain their own health care policies, retirement from the work force would not affect them, just as retirement does not affect homeowners' policies or automobile insurance policies. Certainly some mechanism for lowering premiums for retired people with fixed incomes should be explored.

Another area in need of reform is a very touchy issue that involves care for terminal patients or for the patient who has a very short life expectancy. As our knowledge increases and our technical abilities advance, we find ourselves capable of doing such procedures as a quadruple bypass on 85-year-old individuals or extensive resections of malignancies in very elderly individuals who also have other medical problems. As our general population continues to age and as our technical abilities continue to improve we will find ourselves in a position of being able to keep most people alive, although perhaps at not a very active level, well beyond their 100th birthday. The question is: Should we do it simply because we can? It is well known that up to half of the medical expenses incurred in the average American's life are incurred during the last six months of life. The reason for this is that unlike many other advanced nations, American society has not yet come to terms with the fact that it is not unreasonable to keep simply someone comfortable at home when catastrophic illness occurs rather than putting them in an intensive care unit, poking and prodding them, operating and testing them ad nauseam, why not allow them the dignity of dying in comfort, at home, with an attendant if necessary?

Decisions on who should be treated and who should not be treated clearly requires some national guidelines and obviously should be made based on the viability of the patient rather than the age of the patient. There are clearly many 90-year-old individuals who are healthier than some 40 or 50-year-old individuals and certainly medical treatment should not be withheld if there is a reasonable chance of recovery and resumption of a normal lifestyle. If a patient insisted on having everything done, consideration of more aggressive treatment should be given. This author believes that most reasonable terminally ill patients would rather die in comfort and dignity than be tormented until the end in a hospital setting.

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GloZell Green asks President Obama how he justifies dealing with the Castros.