Friends of the Parks, a nonprofit group focused on preserving Chicago’s parks, told BuzzFeed News they plan on commissioning their own poll to gauge the level of support for a plan to build Obama’s presidential library on a public park in South Side Chicago.

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WASHINGTON –– One of Chicago's most powerful conservation groups is casting doubt on findings released Wednesday by the Barack Obama Foundation that reveal broad support among residents for a plan to erect the Obama presidential library on public parkland.

Friends of the Parks, which in recent days has requested to speak to President Obama and was granted an audience with the foundation, told BuzzFeed News it is launching its own poll to gauge the level of community support for the University of Chicago's proposal to build Obama's presidential library on public parkland in the south side of the city. The nonprofit threatened to sue the Obamas if they decided to go through with the proposal.

"Chicago is the birthplace of the skyscraper and for the President to suggest his presidential library be a 'groundscraper' in a historic public park flies in the face of the policies he has espoused both as a community organizer in Chicago and during his presidency," Friends of the Parks President Cassandra Francis said in an email to BuzzFeed News.

Francis questioned the integrity of the Barack Obama Foundation's polling.

"By raising the fear that the President will pick a competing city if he does not get his 20 acres in a park-like 'majestic, campus setting,' as well as the confusion caused by how the questions are asked including as to whether you want the presidential library in the Washington Park-neighborhood or the Washington Park-park, have skewed the poll results," Francis said.

The polling research was conducted by prominent Democratic strategist Cornell Belcher of Brilliant Corners Research & Strategies –– a pollster for the Democratic National Committee and Obama for America in recent elections. The survey, which engaged over 600 South Side residents, found that just 24% of respondents who live near Washington and Jackson parks, two sites that are the focus of the University of Chicago's proposal, were opposed to the project.

Francis said many of the people she surveyed were unaware that not building on parkland was an option.

"I had 100% support signing of a petition when I asked the question, 'What if the presidential library was built on this piece of University of Chicago land instead of in the park so you could have the presidential library AND keep your park?'" she wrote in an email to BuzzFeed News. "This has been for too long presented as an 'either/or' instead of a 'both/and" situation.'"

Sources within the Obama foundation that spoke with BuzzFeed News on Wednesday were not authorized to go on the record about the survey's findings. The foundation's effort to gauge public sentiment about the University of Chicago's proposal is already driving speculation that the South Side school is again the favorite to win the bid.

Three other sites are being considered: the University of Illinois-Chicago, University of Hawaii in Honolulu, and Columbia University in New York (which is the president's alma mater). The Obamas are expected to make a decision within the next weeks.

In December, the foundation told the Chicago Sun-Times that Columbia was the frontrunner to win the library bid due to doubt over whether the University of Chicago could acquire the parkland on which it proposed to build from the Chicago Public Park District. That's when Mayor Rahm Emanuel swooped in, coordinating efforts to open a dialogue between the Chicago Park District board and the community. He was successful, and on Feb. 11, the board voted to transfer the land to the city. The Chicago Plan Commission and the City Council are set to vote in March.

The foundation wouldn't characterize its level of concern over opposition to building on the parkland.

"I think that given that some people have raised issues about proposals to use park land, the Foundation felt it was important to hear directly from the surrounding community and find out what they think," a source close to the foundation told BuzzFeed News on Wednesday. "And of course as Cornell shared in his exploration of that, he found there is overwhelming excitement and community support about the possibility of putting the president's future library on the south side, as well as support for using park land.

"The Foundation has made clear from the beginning that it deeply cares about what the community thinks and wants to know that there is deep support," the source continued. "[University of Chicago's] proposal hinges on the use of park land, and it's important for the Foundation to know – independently – for the purposes of its evaluation that there is that strong support."

Friends of the Parks said it supports the Obama library coming to Chicago, but it has proposed an alternate site on a parcel of land owned by the University of Chicago. It also has lauded the less publicized proposal on the west side of the city submitted by the University of Illinois-Chicago.

"We are looking into commissioning our own poll next week to clarify and show the 11-acre alternative in the Washington Park-neighborhood which was not clearly presented," to those surveyed, Francis said. "This is the President's own, self-imposed deadline for the selection of the site for the Presidential Library."

“…almost always these massive shootings whether they are military or not, occur with the doctors involved giving psychotropic drugs to people who are depressed.”

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Former Congressman Ron Paul, the father of potential presidential candidate Rand Paul, said Wednesday that "American Sniper" Chris Kyle would be alive today if his killer was not using psychotropic drugs.

Paul has repeatedly linked or blamed mass shootings on the use of psychotropic drugs.

"If Eddie Ray Routh had never served in the military, I'm of the opinion that he would probably not have killed anybody," Paul wrote on the website of his Institute of Peace and Prosperity on Wednesday as well as on his Facebook page. "He would not be imprisoned for life and Chris Kyle would be alive today. Much of the blame should lie with our foreign policy of interventionism and the VA's faulty reliance on psychotropic drugs for treating the guilt associated with preemptive wars."

The post echoes comments Paul made last year in a speech to The Independent Institute in which he said "it doesn't take a real genius" to figure out psychotropic drugs are the cause of mass shootings.

"Just recently we heard about another shooting at Fort Worth," Paul said in his April 2014 speech. "Second time you know, within a short period of time and soldiers were killed and the articles kept saying, 'well we got to get to the bottom of this, what is causing this?' And yet it doesn't take a real genius to figure it out. Because when you look at it, if you look at the shootings and the various problems on campuses, and who knows what will happen on the one that happened today, but almost always these massive shootings whether they are military or not, occur with the doctors involved giving psychotropic drugs to people who are depressed."

Paul said when many veterans return from war they realize the dangers of multiple deployments and come to the belief that perhaps the war they are fighting in is "useless, worthless, maybe there is no benefit to it."

"When individuals come back, of course they are torn, because they have realization -- just as I was pleased that they have the realization that a non-interventialist foreign policy pleased the military -- what would it be like to go over the 3,4,5 and 6 times, worrying where your next step is going to be and whether you are going to get blown up. Seeing your buddies killed, and not seeing back home a whole lot of concern about why we are there. Just 'oh yes you are great guys, you are all a bunch of heroes' and we all wear bumper stickers and everybody is happy about it. But that is a far cry from these people waking up and saying 'you know, maybe this war is useless, worthless, maybe there is no benefit to it.' And all of a sudden they remember about kids getting killed, women getting killed, and all the carnage and saying, 'you know they never did a thing to me, why did I go 6,000 miles?'"

Paul then again singled out the use of psychotropic drugs, saying "now we have a suicide epidemic" and this was all a consequence of American foreign policy. The former congressman added the ultimate solution to the epidemic of soldiers committing suicide was a non-interventionist foreign policy.

"Now I am convinced that soldiers that are put up with that and when they are exposed to it, when they come back end up with a lot of guilt and so they go see a doctor and unfortunately the doctor gives them these drugs and they end up—and now we have a suicide epidemic. And its a consequence of the foreign policy. We are not going to stop this problem by turning it over to the doctors. We need to turn it over to the American people who insist that our government quit getting involved in these kind of wars and exposing our kids to these predicaments they are in."

Here is Paul's Facebook post:

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Renteria met with Hillary Clinton in mid-February and is the leading contender to become the national political director for her expected campaign, two sources told BuzzFeed News. An early signal that Latino outreach will be serious.

Amanda Renteria

Jacquelyn Martin / AP

Amanda Renteria, the first Latina chief of staff for a U.S. senator, is a top contender for the high-profile national political director role in an eventual Hillary Clinton presidential campaign, two sources told BuzzFeed News.

Renteria met with Clinton the second week of February in New York City, where Clinton is said to have loved her, the sources said.

Roll Call reported on Thursday that Renteria is "poised to be named the national political director."

Renteria, 40, is a Harvard and Stanford grad, and an experienced Hill staffer, previously working for California Sen. Dianne Feinstein and then Michigan's Sen. Debbie Stabenow. Most recently, she ran a failed bid to oust incumbent Rep. David Valadao in California's 21st Congressional District, where she made outreach to Latino voters a priority, but lost by 17 points, during a Republican wave election.

Still, to Hispanics who have openly questioned whether Clinton would add high-profile Latinos to the top tier of her campaign, Renteria would signal that the presumed favorite for the Democratic nomination is taking outreach to Latino voters seriously.

"I think it's a big signal that Hillary knows she has to and is going to take the Latino community seriously," said Matt Barreto, co-founder of polling firm Latino Decisions.

"It shows it's going to have that sensibility and it's not going to be an afterthought," said Democratic strategist Maria Cardona, who is part of the post-election DNC task force report.

Clinton faced pressure last year from immigration activists to detail her position on executive actions that would defer deportations. (She ultimately tweeted her support for the president's actions.)

"The reason this is important is because Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio are starting to position themselves as candidates that could siphon Latino support," Barreto continued, pointing to a question Rubio received in New Hampshire this week from a voter who asked if he would commit to deporting every single undocumented immigrant in the country. Rubio said it was "not a realistic proposal."

But Clinton is no novice either — she has enduring Latino support that goes back decades from outreach with the community in South Texas in the 1970s.

In 2008, Guy Cecil served as Clinton's political director and Patti Solis Doyle was the highest-ranking Hispanic, serving as campaign manager, before being fired in a February 2008 shakeup.

The Mexican-American Renteria's parents were farm workers and she was described as a "rural Latina" to BuzzFeed News. She's said to be a darling of top Latino donors, who made their presence felt during Obama's reelection campaign to the tune of $32 million from the Henry Muñoz, Eva Longoria-led Futuro Fund, which led to the creation of the Latino Victory Project, that injected $88,000 for TV ads in the final days of the campaign. Renteria raised $1.8 million for her congressional run.

As recently as Jan. 23, Renteria was quoted saying her political future might be in Sacramento rather than Washington, D.C. and she hasn't tweeted since Jan. 26.

Asked how exactly Renteria could manage to penetrate the highest levels of Clintons orbit, a space already inhabited by longtime supporters, someone who knows Renteria said she is the kind of person who instills confidence and gets the job done. They also pointed to her charisma and invoked one of Clinton's mottos.

"She blooms wherever she is planted," the source said.

The “blame the Senate” mantra continues for the House GOP over the DHS funding battle.

U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) talks to the media.

Yuri Gripas / Reuters

WASHINGTON — At the start of this session of Congress, House Republicans were hopeful that things would be different and with the GOP in charge of the Senate, everyone would finally be on the same page.

After all they'd spent the past four years complaining that Democratic leader Harry Reid was their main blockade to real progress. But now there is an open split between how House Republicans want to tackle funding for the Department of Homeland Security and the approach Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has taken in the Senate.

And conservatives in the House are now grappling with the reality that their dreams of Republican kumbaya may still be far away.

After multiple failed attempts to pass a House bill that would both fund DHS and target President Obama's recent immigration executive actions, McConnell struck a deal with Reid to split the bill, allowing for a vote on a "clean" DHS bill. It's unclear how the House will respond but funding for DHS runs out Saturday morning at 12:01.

"They put the surrender caucus in charge of the Senate and Harry Reid is still in charge," said Kansas Rep. Tim Huelskamp. "There are going to be millions of folks that helped change the Senate from Democrat to Republican that are going to be very disappointed in Sen. McConnell. They are trying to figure out what the difference is between the two on these particular issues."

McConnell would have needed sixty votes to move forward on debate on the House bill and fell short every time. To Huelskamp, that excuse wasn't good enough.

"There's been no message right now. I saw five emails over the weekend about keystone and nothing about DHS," he scoffed.

While the House and Senate share priorities on things like job legislation and most recently the Keystone pipeline — the battle over funding DHS has brought to light much of the tension between the two chambers. Boehner told his conference earlier this week that he had not talked to McConnell in two weeks and has said repeatedly he's waiting on the Senate to act.

Some Republicans are more willing to give McConnell some credit but still felt that he didn't do enough to hold the line and fingers were being pointed at House Republicans for holding up the funding.

"I think the message is – and I don't want to attack my Republican colleagues in the Senate — but my message to Sen. McConnell is we need to listen to our constituents. And they aren't happy with what President Obama did with the executive actions," said Tennessee Rep. Stephen Fincher. "I am very frustrated that we continue to get the blame. We passed something, the Senate didn't. We did our job."

"Its' sort of like a marriage. It's give and take," Fincher added. "If we're always giving and they are always taking this ain't gonna work."

The finger pointing is going both ways. Sen. Mark Kirk told reporters earlier in the day the Senate needed to "say to the House: 'Here's a straw so you can suck it up.'" Even conservative members of the upper chamber have relented and said they will not hold up a vote on the clean DHS bill.

"It's frustrating but they have to do what they think is right," sighed Florida Rep. Ted Yoho. "I'm not over there. I think we sent a good bill over there and I would have liked to have seen stronger talk coming out of the Senate."

Not every GOP member of the House thinks that McConnell did the wrong thing. New York Rep. Peter King, a frequent critic of House conservatives, said McConnell was "being an adult" by letting a clean bill come up for a vote.

"These guys always say Harry Reid is tying up the senate and maybe he is, but when it comes here we shouldn't tie up the house," King said.

As you may know, that’s not how the science works.

Sen. Jim Inhofe, a Republican from Oklahoma, has taken a number of stands against the idea that human actions are dangerously changing the climate.

Sue Ogrocki / AP

He even wrote a book on the "hoax" and "conspiracy" of global warming.

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"Do you know what this is? It's a snowball."

"Mr. President, catch this."

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On Friday, briefs are being filed in the cases challenging bans on same-sex couples’ marriages in Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, and Tennessee.

Carolyn Kaster / AP

WASHINGTON — The first formal step in the marriage cases before the Supreme Court is happening Friday, as the same-sex couples in four midwest states ask the justices to strike down bans that prevent them from marrying or having their marriages granted elsewhere recognized in the states.

When the court announced in January that it would be hearing the cases out of Kentucky, Michigan, Ohio, and Tennessee, it set a schedule requiring the couples or, in one case, widower, to file their briefs with the court by Friday.

The first brief whose filing was announced on Friday was in a pair of cases out of Ohio, both of which deal with recognition of marriages previously granted to same-sex couples in other states. The brief's filing was announced at 10 a.m.

Shortly thereafter, the couples in Tennessee — also seeking recognition of their marriages granted elsewhere — filed their brief, as did couples in Kentucky seeking the right to marry and the right to have marriages granted elsewhere recognized.

A bit before 11:30 a.m., the final brief came in from the Michigan couple seeking to marry in that state.

The states' briefs defending the bans will be due in a month, by March 27.

Read the Ohio petitioners' brief:

Read the Tennessee petitioners' brief:

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For the second time, Ken Mehlman is leading a Supreme Court brief in support of marriage equality. The signatories include a number of officials from Romney’s 2012 campaign.

Courtesy of Ken Mehlman

WASHINGTON — For the second time, Ken Mehlman — the one-time head of the Republican National Committee — is gathering notable Republicans and libertarians around the country to support a brief at the Supreme Court that will urge the justices to take marriage equality nationwide.

"There is a need for more Americans to choose to participate in the institution of marriage," states the brief, a copy of which was reviewed by BuzzFeed News. "Yet these bans, by denying each member of an entire class of American citizens the right to marry the person he or she loves, discourage those important family values."

In an interview with BuzzFeed News, Mehlman emphasized that the brief is consistent with the Republican Party's aims.

"What we hope it will do is it will make the case from a conservative, from a libertarian perspective," Mehlman said, "that marriage equality is consistent with promoting freedom and family values — and, as we've seen in the states where there is civil marriage today — can be done in a way that in no way impacts or harms religious liberty and, in fact, explicitly protects religious liberty in many of these states."

Among the new names joining Mehlman's effort on the brief are several notable former public officials and prominent operatives in the Republican Party, including former lawmakers Bob Inglis, Steve LaTourette, and Rick Lazio.

Inglis has come full circle on the issue — noted in news stories at the time for his aggressive questioning of Democratic witnesses who opposed the Defense of Marriage Act when the House of Representatives was considering the bill in 1996.

"The signers of this brief, myself included, are people who very much disagree with judicial activism," Mehlman said. "We believe that the court standing up for the right of loving couples to marry one another is consistent with our constitutional order and necessary that same was that overturning bans on free speech are necessary or overturning bans on the Second Amendment are necessary to protect liberty."

Among other new signatories this time around are the spokespeople for the past two Republican presidential candidates, McCain 2008 spokesperson Tucker Bounds and Romney 2012 spokesperson Andrea Saul. Ron Kaufman, a prominent Romney 2012 adviser, and Zac Moffatt, Romney 2012's digital director, also signed on.

Former George W. Bush administration officials Jon Berrier, who was the communications and political affairs coordinator for Vice President Cheney, and T. Vance McMahan, who was the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations Social and Economic Council, have signed the Mehlman brief, as has Erin Sheley, a law professor who served as the deputy director of the Federalist Society's faculty division from 2008-2010.

Since Mehlman came out in 2010, he has been supportive of marriage equality — an effort that followed his time at the helm of the Republican National Committee when the party backed the passage of many of the amendments he is now working to overturn.

One of his first big public efforts to support marriage equality was hosting a major fundraising event for the American Foundation for Equal Rights in 2010 in support of the group's case against California's Proposition 8 amendment. When that case got to the Supreme Court, Mehlman coordinated an amici curiae, or friends of the court, brief to encourage the court to see that the issue had support from a broad swath of conservatives and moderate Republicans.

Now, with the issue before the justices again, Mehlman is back with a new effort, authored by lawyers at the Wilmer Cutler Pickering Hale & Dorr — including Reginald Brown and Seth Waxman — and Polsinelli law firms.

With just a few days of circulating the brief for signatures, the brief has increased the number of signatories — which was 131 in 2013 — by more than 50. And, they expect more before the brief is filed.

Mehlman says that, as more places have gained marriage equality, people see that "America is more free, that important values like fidelity and responsibility are more promoted, by allowing all Americans to marry the person that they love.

"So, people have now seen this happen in most states in the United States and the concerns that some people had about what the impact would be have not only not occurred, but the opposite's occurred: Families are stronger, communities are stronger, and freedom is stronger."

In the brief, the lawyers echo points made in the Prop 8 case amici brief, as well as a similar amici brief filed in 2014 at the 10th Circuit Court of Appeals in the marriage cases out of Utah and Oklahoma.

"The marriage bans challenged here, like the act at issue in Windsor, target gay and lesbian couples and their families for injurious governmental treatment," the brief states, referring to the 2013 Supreme Court decision striking down the Defense of Marriage Act's federal ban on recognition of same-sex couples' marriages in United States v. Windsor. "The bans are accordingly inconsistent with amici's understanding of the properly limited role of government."

The brief goes on to argue that "equal access to civil marriage" is required "because there is no legitimate, fact-based justification for government to exclude same-sex couples in committed relationships" from the right to marry. "Such bans impede family formation, harm children, and discourage fidelity, responsibility, and stability," the brief states.

In responding to the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals' decision upholding the states' bans, the Mehlman brief criticizes the opinion by Judge Jeffrey Sutton deferring to the democratic process.

"It is ... not a violation of principles of judicial restraint for this Court to strike down laws that infringe 'fundamental rights necessary to our system of ordered liberty,'" the brief states. "It is instead a key protection of limited, constitutionally constrained government."

If, as Mehlman and his co-signers argue, the court ends bans on same-sex couples' marriages across the country this June, he said he doesn't expect a result different than elsewhere when marriage equality came to other states. "I think people in all states are fundamentally fair-minded," he said, reiterating that people in those remaining states would see that families, communities, and freedom are stronger with marriage equality in place.

As for what's next for LGBT efforts after such a ruling, Mehlman said the marriage movement is part of "a larger recognition" by Americans.

"I think and hope and believe that the same fundamental decency and fairness that is causing more Americans — a majority today — to say 'you ought to be able to marry the person you love,' will also say, to those people, 'you ought to be judged at work by the quality of your efforts,' and support … legislation that makes sure people are judged on a fair basis at work," he said.

Conservative opposition likely derailed the education bill.

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A Republican-led effort to repair No Child Left Behind collapsed unexpectedly Friday after House Republicans could not generate enough support from their own party.

The House was expected to vote today on the Student Success Act, a Republican bill that would replace George W. Bush's long-expired No Child Left Behind law. But conservative opposition to the bill derailed the vote, which was eventually cancelled.

The Student Success Act dramatically would dismantle several key provisions of Bush's trademark education law, ending some federal programs, and returning significant oversight to state and local governments. But the conservative Heritage Foundation and Club for Growth had rallied ultra-conservative members to vote "no" on the bill, saying it did not go far enough in reducing the federal government's control of education.

A representative for House majority leader Kevin McCarthy's office did not respond to a request for comment.

The Student Success Act would keep an unpopular federal mandate that students be tested every year in third through eighth grade. It would also not permit states to opt out of the program. The Club for Growth criticized the bill for showing "no meaningful reduction in overall spending;" the Success Act calls for locking in education funding at 2012-2013 levels.

The Obama administration waged its own battle to derail the House's bill earlier this week, when it released numbers claiming that funding provisions would mean drastic cuts for school districts with many poor and minority students. Many took issue with the administration's analysis, saying they presented an unlikely worst-case scenario.

“What I worry about is that this president’s hesitancy in going all the way and defeating ISIS may be linked…to his overarching desire to get a deal with Iran.”

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Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal said he believes, but cannot prove, that the reason President Obama is not fighting the Islamic State might be his desire to get a nuclear deal with Iran.

"I worry that this president's desire to get a deal -- even if it's a bad deal -- I worry if he wants a bad deal greater than no deal," Jindal said on NewsMaxTV's Midpoint program on Friday. "Let's be clear, a nuclear armed Iran is a threat, not only to Israel and our European allies, it's a threat, an existential threat to the United States as well and it won't stop with Iran. I believe the Egyptians, I believe Turkey, I believe the Saudis all will want a nuclear weapon as well. And I believe that some of those countries may already have a deal with Pakistan to buy that technology if they need to. So now you've got multiple countries in the Middle East nuclear armed."

"What I worry about is that this president's hesitancy in going all the way and defeating ISIS may be linked -- I can't prove that, I suspect that from his actions, his rhetoric —may be linked to his overarching desire to get a deal with Iran."

Jindal is often mentioned as a Republican presidential hopeful in 2016 and said in the interview he was "thinking and praying" about a possible run.

But never forget his 1970s column arguing that dancing is immoral.

From former Gov. Mike Huckabee's recent trip to Israel:

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In Vine form:

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From his 1970s Rapture Express column as a college and high school student: “I strongly recommend that Christian teens stay away from dancing, mainly because some people would just not be able to respect a person who attended dances.”

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A race for party chairman has turned into a fight over what some say are conflicts of interest. Democrats in the battleground state are still smarting after bad Latino outreach and a big loss in 2014.

Colorado State Democratic Party chairman Rick Palacio at an event with former Sen. Mark Udall.

David Zalubowski / AP

The Democratic Party in the crucial presidential state of Colorado dissolved into bitter infighting Friday over a combination of obscure party rules and allegations that the party's leader has ignored women and Latinos within the party.

The origin of the open feud between Chairman Rick Palacio and other top state Democrats is the Democratic National Committee requirement that 500 state central committee members be divided evenly between men and women. The Colorado party was short 46 men to meet the quota, and Palacio's rivals say he is using the new appointments to appoint supporters before party elections Saturday, something he denies.

"It's an embarrassment to the DNC," said Mannie Rodriguez, the DNC Hispanic caucus finance chair and a Palacio foe.

Colorado's Democrats were already deeply divided over the defeat of Senator Mark Udall in midterm elections. Some Democrats have pinned Udall's defeat on a decision not to campaign aggressively on immigration issues in the heavily Latino state. Palacio serves on a post-election task force charged with figuring out what went wrong in 2014.

But the internal conflict found a new outlet Monday when a Palacio rival for the chairmanship, campaign consultant David Sabados, brought up the fact that the central committee is short on men. The Democratic National Committee warned him Tuesday evening that an election carried out with the imbalance would be subject to challenge, Palacio and the DNC both said, and Palacio then alerted state Democrats in an email, provided to BuzzFeed News.

Palacio told BuzzFeed News that he's picking fairly.

"Where no alternates exist I've taken recommendations from county party chairs," he said.

Palacio has been sent at least three emails, which were reviewed by BuzzFeed News, by central committee members asking him to make the process more transparent and let his opponents Sabados and former congressional candidate Vic Meyers, pick some of the appointees. (A DNC official said the party did not tell Palacio what specific people to appoint.)

In an email sent to all three candidates Friday morning, former congressional candidate Owen Perkins told Palacio that randomly drawing from a group picked by state Democrats "to fill as many spots as possible is the best way to maintain the integrity of the Central Committee makeup and avoid any perception of a conflict of interest."

Behind the arcane procedural fight, however, are substantive disputes.

Rodriguez, the Hispanic caucus finance chair said the party spent 16 cents per Latino voter in Colorado in Spanish-language media.

"They needed a task force report to tell them what went wrong?" he said.

He also complained that Palacio wouldn't work with him on a big phone banking effort targeting Latinos for the reelection of Colorado Gov. John Hickenlooper, but then took the credit when Hickenlooper was one of the few 2014 bright spots in the state.

Palacio said he wasn't going to stoop to the level of that allegation but took issue with the idea that he didn't work well with Latinos in the party.

"That's absolutely false," he said.

The other issues in the race range from concerns over Palacio's giving himself a $25,000 raise in the chairman's post, which he says he had a right to do, to complaints that he has not worked well with labor groups and doesn't speak to women leaders within the party. And Palacio's critics say he's the wrong man to serve on a task force that's supposed to help the party avoid a repeat of 2014 because the state's problems lead back to him.

"My focus is not on Rick and his failings," Meyers said. "He should have resigned after the terrible election losses. But what we need is a successful, stronger party."

"He was the problem, why would they assign him to work on the task force?" Rodriguez asked.

Palacio responds that Colorado was hardly the only place Democrats had a bad year, and that midterm elections historically see losses for the party that belongs to the president. He pointed to Hickenlooper's reelection as a rare bright spot for the party.

"2016 is going to be a different year, much like 2012 was," he said. "If people think any states operates in a vacuum without the influence of national elections, they should probably take a course in the way American politics affects elections."

And no questions meant to “divide on religious grounds.” The radio show host, who will be a part of CNN’s debate, says foreign policy should come first in an interview with radio host Aaron Klein.

Alex Gallardo / AP Images

Hugh Hewitt will not be asking questions about contraceptives at CNN's Republican presidential debate.

In an interview with radio host Aaron Klein that will air Sunday night on New York's AM 970 The Answer, Hewitt ruled out certain types of questions completely.

"I don't care what people think about evolution," he told Klein. "I don't care. I never cared. I don't care if they know how old the earth is and I just have never cared about personal religious beliefs."

The RNC announced last week that Hewitt, the center-right radio host, will participate in the network's September debate. The party has taken a much tighter approach to the debates for the 2016 cycle after a 2012 cycle that saw a grueling 20 debates. The ABC News debate remains a particular source of ire on the right; George Stephanopoulos asked whether states have the right to ban contraception (something no Republican candidate had proposed).

"[Article VI of the Constitution has] no religious test for public office," Hewitt told Klein in the interview. "And that is our tradition. And that is why we are a strong, vibrant democracy is we have no religious test. So I really hate gotcha questions or trick questions that are designed to divide on religious grounds. They turn my stomach actually, so I won't be asking."

Instead, Hewitt said the emphasis should be on foreign policy, with issues like ISIS and Iran taking precedence — as in his interview last week with former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush.

"To me, foreign affairs comes first, not last," Hewitt said.

The five-term Maryland senator announced her intention to not seek re-election Monday at a press conference in Baltimore. She has served in the Senate longer than any woman in history.

Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images

Democratic Sen. Barbara Mikulski announced her retirement from the Senate Monday at a press conference in her hometown of Baltimore, saying she wanted her final two years to be focused on her constituents instead of a re-election campaign.

"This has been a hard decision to make," Mikulski said at the Inn at Henderson's Wharf in Fells Point.

"I want to give 120% of my time focused on my constituents. It's never been about me, it's always been about them."

Mikulski, 78, served as the chair of the Senate Appropriations Committee — the first woman to hold the position — until Republicans took the majority in January. She has served in the Senate longer than any woman in history.

Mikulski added that there was "nothing gloomy" about her announcement Monday.

"I want the people of Maryland to know there's nothing gloomy about this announcement. There's no health problem, there's nothing wrong with the Senate.

Two congressional sources confirmed the retirement to BuzzFeed News before the senator's announcement.

The Washington Post first reported the story Monday.

The ruling goes into effect on March 9. Nebraska officials have filed notice that they will be appealing the decision. [Update: State officials have asked the 8th Circuit to issue a stay, which would stop marriages from starting on March 9.]

Susan Waters, left, and Sally Waters walk away from federal court in Omaha, Neb., after a hearing in their case challenging the state's same-sex marriage ban on Feb. 19, 2015.

Nati Harnik / AP

WASHINGTON — A federal judge struck down Nebraska's ban on same-sex couples' marriages on Monday — although the injunction requiring marriage equality does not go into effect until March 9.

"The State clearly has the right to encourage couples to marry and provide support for one another. However, those laws must be enforced equally and without respect to gender," U.S. District Court Judge Joseph Bataillon wrote. "It is time to bring this unequal provision to an end."

State officials already filed a notice with Bataillon's court that they will be appealing the decision to the 8th Circuit Court of Appeals.

The 8th Circuit already has appeals pending of rulings striking down marriage bans in Arkansas, Missouri, and South Dakota. The court has tentatively scheduled arguments on those cases for the week of May 11.

Additionally, though, Nebraska officials stated in their notice of appeal that they "will be pursuing emergency relief in the Court of Appeals" — presumably a request that Bataillon's injunction be stayed pending the outcome of the state's appeal or of the pending appeals already before the appeals court.

It was not immediately clear from the other marriage cases how the 8th Circuit would deal with the issue in the Nebraska case.

The 8th Circuit has not faced a situation like that now coming to it from Nebraska. This is the first decision in the circuit in which the trial court judge's decision would allow — beginning March 9 — marriages to take place for same-sex couples during the state's appeal.

In Arkansas and South Dakota, federal judges, in issuing their rulings striking down the bans, also stayed — or put on hold — their rulings pending any appeal from state officials.

In Missouri, however, the same-sex couples challenging the ban asked the 8th Circuit to lift a stay put in place by the district court. The 8th Circuit denied the request, and the same-sex couples filed a second request to lift the stay on Feb. 9 — the day the U.S. Supreme Court denied a stay request made by state officials in Alabama's marriage case. The 8th Circuit is yet to rule on that request.

Read the injunction:

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The attorney general promotes Ben Mizer to Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division. A high-profile role for an out gay appointee.

Courtesy of Department of Justice

Ben Mizer, the former Ohio solicitor general, will be the next head of the Justice Department's civil division, according to sources at the Department of Justice with knowledge of the decision.

Attorney General Eric Holder is expected to make the formal announcement of Mizer's appointment — Principal Deputy Assistant Attorney General and Acting Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division — on Monday afternoon. In a release set to be sent to reporters, Holder praised Mizer, a political appointee who first joined the Justice Department in 2011, for his service as a top adviser to the attorney general on civil litigation and other areas.

"Ben's work here in Washington and as Solicitor General for the state of Ohio has put him in some of the most challenging and demanding positions a lawyer can encounter. But in every instance, Ben has repeatedly demonstrated that he is both a gifted lawyer and a capable leader. I am confident that his stewardship of the Civil Division will build on the exceptional record he has already established – and reflect the high ideals that have animated him from the very beginning of his career," Holder said in the statement.

Mizer, 38, is one of more than a dozen out gay lawyers Holder and the Obama administration have appointed to senior positions at the Department of Justice, according to The Victory Fund. Mizer worked first in the Office of Legal Counsel when coming to the Justice Department in 2011 and has served as a senior adviser to Holder for the past several months. Among his other roles prior to his work in Ohio, Mizer served as a clerk to Justice John Paul Stevens at the U.S. Supreme Court.

The current head of the Civil Division, Joyce Branda, will return to her previous job as the head of Commercial Litigation for the Justice Department. The prior head of the Civil Division, Stuart Delery, was promoted to DOJ's third-ranking lawyer, Acting Associate Attorney General, in September 2014. In January, Obama nominated Delery for the role.

The latest shuffle comes as the Senate is expected to confirm Holder's successor, Loretta Lynch, marking the end to Holder's six-year tenure, the third-longest by an attorney general.

Attorney General Eric Holder visits with the Justice Department Civil Rights Dvision's Voting Rights Section on Election Day 2014. Ben Mizer, an adviser to Holder, stands to his left.

“I am hopeful and confident that very capable public servants with a desire to serve in the Senate will step up as candidates for this important office. I will not be one of them,” the former Maryland governor said in a statement Tuesday.

Patrick Semansky / AP

Former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley said in a statement Tuesday he will not run for retiring Senator Barbara Mikulski's seat.

"Senator Mikulski has done an outstanding job representing Maryland in the U.S. Senate for nearly 30 years. I am hopeful and confident that very capable public servants with a desire to serve in the Senate will step up as candidates for this important office. I will not be one of them," O'Malley said.

On Monday, O'Malley declined to comment on a potential run.

"Today is a day to reflect on Senator Mikulski's service to the people of Maryland, not engage in political speculation," O'Malley's spokesperson, Lis Smith, told BuzzFeed News.

Republicans said Monday that they now view the Maryland open seat as a pickup opportunity in 2016, despite the fact that no Republican has won a Senate race in the state since 1980.

A serious GOP effort in Maryland would require Democrats to spend money in the state they weren't planning on in 2016.

O'Malley, a two-term Democratic governor with a legacy lauded by progressives, would have been be a strong Democratic candidate in a state with a number of other potential Democratic candidates. But running for Senate would have meant abandoning his uphill bid for his party's presidential nomination, which as already seen him travel to early primary states and hire staff.

“Sen. Paul strongly believes in America’s special relationship with the State of Israel. At no time, did Sen. Paul specifically introduce legislation targeting Israel. In fact, Sen. Paul’s most recent proposed budget includes $5 billion of foreign aid funding, which would cover aid to our allies,” a spokesman told BuzzFeed News.

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In 2010, before he was elected to the U.S. Senate, Rand Paul said he would vote to end foreign aid to all countries and that if people wanted to give money to Israel, they could give personal donations as citizens.

Paul, the potential presidential contender who recently won the Conservative Political Action Committee presidential straw poll, made the comments in an interview with a Kentucky conservative blogger in 2010.

"If you have to give money to Israel, I'm all for people donating and giving money to Israel but we don't have money for any of those subsidies, it's gone," Paul told blogger Mica Sims in 2010. "We have to borrow money from China to give it to other countries. It makes no sense whatsoever from a fiscal standpoint."

Paul was asked whether he would pull all foreign aid, including funding to Israel. "I won't vote for foreign aid because we're bankrupt as a country."

In another part of the interview, Paul relays details he said he told the the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) during a meeting with the pro-Israel group.

"I understand that Israel is the only democracy in that part of the world, I understand the historical Judeo-Christian kinship we have with them, but I won't always be a rubber stamp with them that we just give them all our money," Paul said of his meeting with AIPAC. "So I will question what we give and how much we give."

Paul said he and AIPAC saw "eye to eye" on many things, such as not censoring Israel for defending itself, and not giving foreign aid to Israel's enemies.

"What happens if bin Laden's people, the radical people, take over Saudi Arabia and we've just given them $200 billion worth of weapons?" asked Paul in the 2010 interview.

"I think we are allies, and that we can work in concert; it should always be our national security first," Paul said in the interview, adding he would vote for policies he said would benefit both Israel and the United States.

In 2011, Paul proposed a budget that would have cut foreign aid, including money to Israel.

Paul has in the past denied that he supported cutting foreign aid specifically to Israel.

"I haven't really proposed that in the past," he told Yahoo News in August 2013. "We've never had a legislative proposal to do that. You can mistake my position, but then I'll answer the question. That has not been a position — a legislative position — we have introduced to phase out or get rid of Israel's aid. That's the answer to that question. Israel has always been a strong ally of ours and I appreciate that. I voted just this week to give money — more money — to the Iron Dome, so don't mischaracterize my position on Israel."

Senator Paul strongly believes in America's special relationship with the State of Israel. At no time, did Senator Paul specifically introduce legislation targeting Israel. In fact, Senat‎or Paul's most recent proposed budget includes $5 Billion of foreign aid funding, which would cover aid to our allies.

Additionally, Senator Paul is in complete agreement with Prime Minister Netanyahu who before a previous joint session of Congress stated:

"We are deeply grateful for all we have received from the United States, for all that we have received from this chamber, from this body. But I believe there can be no greater tribute to America's long-standing economic aid to Israel than for us to be able to say: We are going to achieve economic independence….I am convinced that our economic policies will lay the foundation for total self-reliance and great economic strength."

Senator Paul has made it a focus to cut off aid to those who harbor hatred towards the United States and Israel.

Senator Rand Paul has stated in the past: "I would start by cutting foreign aid from countries who are burning our flag and chanting death to America. Countries that don't seem to be acting like our allies."

Here are the references to Israel in Paul's 2011 budget. The budget argued that cutting all foreign aid, including to Israel and its enemies, would strengthen Israel's hand.

Via web.archive.org

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“It sends a poor message from a very good delegation of Americans that I’m embarrassed about and I would rather have them there to join me in solidifying our position on behalf of American-Israeli relations.”

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Rep. Dennis Ross, a Florida Republican who just returned from a recent trip to Israel, says he's "embarrassed" many members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) are not attending Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's address to Congress Tuesday.

The congressman said the CBC members should be the most supportive of Netanyahu because of what he described as the "common bond" of oppression shared by Jewish and black people.

"It's all political, and of those who should be supportive of any should be the Congressional Black Caucus," Ross told Newsmax TV's Steve Malzberg Show on Monday. "When you look at the oppression, when you look at the culture of enduring faith the Jewish people have had since the beginning of time and you look at the oppression that the blacks have suffered not only here in this country but elsewhere around the world, there's a common bond there."

Ross added that "they should be there at the ready" to support Netanyahu, saying the speech was not just about a nuclear deal with Iran but about world peace.

"They should be there at the ready to support Prime Minister Netanyahu. He's not only there to talk to Congress about the dreadful deal that our president's trying to negotiate, but he's also there to talk to the American people about the significance of Israel and American relations as it goes to world peace. This is something where we've got to stop this oppression that's becoming worldwide of radical Islamic extremists."

Ross called the CBC "a very good delegation of Americans" but said their lack of attendance "embarrassed" him.

"It sends a poor message from a very good delegation of Americans that I'm embarrassed about, and I would rather have them there to join me in solidifying our position on behalf of American-Israeli relations."

Last week, White House National Security Advisor Susan Rice called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s trip to the United State “destructive of the fabric of the relationship.” In his address to the American Israel Public Affairs Committee Monday, Sen. Menendez earned a standing ovation from the crowd when he refuted Rice’s comments. Rice had previously addressed the crowd.

"I must disagree with those who say the prime minister's visit to the United States is destructive to U.S.-Israel relations," the New Jersey Democrat said.

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Clinton used a personal email account to conduct official business despite federal law requiring correspondence be retained by the government, the New York Times reported.

Kevin Lamarque / Reuters

Hillary Clinton used a personal email account exclusively while serving as secretary of state, the New York Times reported Monday, a move that may have broken federal law requiring official communications be retained by the government.

During her four years at the State Department, Clinton did not have a government issued email address, agency officials told the Times. There was also no attempt made to archive her emails, as required by the Federal Records Act.

Federal law considers most letters and emails written and received by officials to be government records that should be preserved, so that congressional committees, reporters, and historians can access them in the future.

Nick Merrill, a spokesman for Clinton, defended her use of personal email, telling the Times that Clinton was complying with the "letter and spirit of the rules" and that she expected her emails to officials using government accounts would be retained.

The National Archives and Records Administration required at the time Clinton was in office that all personal emails be recorded, however Clinton and her aides did not comply with the requirement.

Ranking Member of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform and the Select Committee on Benghazi Elijah Cummings said that Clinton's use of her personal email account had been public for several years, "apparently following the pattern of previous Secretaries of State."

"Although Secretary Clinton has produced her emails to the State Department, it is unclear from press reports whether previous Secretaries have done the same," Cummings said. "Last month, the Committee received Secretary Clinton's emails relating to Benghazi, and now that we have them, I believe Chairman Gowdy should join with me to make them available to the American public so they can read their contents for themselves."

Other government officials have had personal email accounts, but their use is restricted to emergency situations, such as when an agency's server is not working. If personal email is used, it must be "captured and managed in accordance with agency record-keeping practices," the rule states.

In October, the State Department asked all former secretaries dating back to the late 1990s to turn over records of correspondences in an effort to improve record keeping.

Clinton's advisers reviewed her emails on the personal account and decided which ones to turn over. It is not clear now many emails there were, but 55,000 pages were handed over to the State Department.

A spokeswoman for potential Republican 2016 candidate Jeb Bush called on Clinton to release her emails in a statement given to BuzzFeed News Monday night.

"Hillary Clinton should release her emails," Kristy Campbell said. "Hopefully she hasn't already destroyed them. Governor Bush believes transparency is a critical part of public service and of governing. That's why he recently launched www.jebemails.com."

In 2013, an email account belonging to Clinton adviser Sidney Blumenthal was hacked, revealing his communication with an account that appeared to belong to Clinton and registered to the domain "clintonemail.com."

Registry information for the domain said it was created on January 13, 2009, the same day Clinton's confirmation hearings began before the Senate, the Washington Post reported.