The senator from Vermont is super serious…ly into hamming it up on camera.
Nicholas Kamm / AFP / Getty Images
Paul has been saying polls show him beating Clinton in swing states since at least March, but the last such poll took place months ago.
buzzfeed-video1.s3.amazonaws.com
Rand Paul has repeatedly touted that he is the only Republican running for president who beats Hillary Clinton in several polls in key states.
"When you poll me against Hillary Clinton, we lead her among independents in five of the battleground states," Paul told Wolf Blitzer on Thursday. The senator from Kentucky has been making claims like since as early as March and made them as recently as last week, when he told Boston Herald Radio that he led Clinton not just among independents, but outright, in "five states that were previously won by President Obama."
Paul, who has not said which states he is referring to, has indeed defeated Clinton in certain head-to-head polls in states that Obama won in 2012 that could be regarded as swing states. But Real Clear Politics shows that no such poll has been taken in months, as Paul has faded from the ranks of the leading contenders for the GOP nomination.
According to Real Clear Politics, the last time Paul beat Clinton in a head-to-head poll in a state Obama won was taken in late July in New Hampshire, when he won by two points. By the same token, the last time Paul was ahead of Clinton in a poll in Pennsylvania was June, which was also the last time a poll showed him winning against her in Ohio. In Iowa, the last poll in which Paul surpassed Clinton was taken in April. The same poll is the most recent time the two were pitted against each other in Colorado, and showed Paul ahead by three points there.
Paul could also have been talking about North Carolina, which Obama won in 2008 but Mitt Romney won in 2012, and where a July poll showed him ahead of Clinton by one point.
The most recent head-to-head poll between Paul and Clinton in any of these six states was taken between August 21 and August 24 in New Hampshire by Public Policy Polling. It showed Clinton up by ten.
The Rand Paul campaign did not reply to a request for comment.
Paul often argues that pollsters are pushing undecided voters to make a choice they haven't really made, that the number of people polled is too small a sample, or that, because polls have margins of error, his real level of support could be much higher than they suggest.
On the day Castro endorsed her, the two teamed up to bash Republicans and exhort Hispanics to vote — a preview of things to come.
Eric Gay / AP
SAN ANTONIO — Rep. Joaquin Castro tried to introduce his brother, Julian Castro.
But as Jennifer Lopez's "Let's Get Loud" blasted in the background, Joaquin's clapping slowed, as he waited for his brother — and Hillary Clinton — to work their way along the rope line, through the crowd, and onto the stage where Julian would endorse Clinton for president.
Once they emerged, the crowd cheered, and Julian Castro, who is often mentioned as a possible vice presidential pick by Clinton, began outlining why he supports her.
Clinton, he said, is the best candidate for San Antonians and for Latinos — and her candidacy is historic, too. Castro told the crowd he'd once seen President Obama on television with his young daughter and, when he told her she could be president, she responded, "being president is for boys."
And then he went on the attack. In Spanish, Castro told the crowd that "the difference between her and the Republican candidates is that she respects the Latino community."
Even if Castro doesn't make the running mate shortlist, the former San Antonio mayor and current HUD secretary will be a surrogate for Clinton with Latinos, whose support Clinton has courted this year. Regardless of whether the speculation is accurate, the VP talk benefits both Castro and Clinton, elevating his profile and giving him more weight as a surrogate to Latinos. Castro has clearly improved his Spanish — the language he was not fluent in a few years ago, suggesting an eye toward the national stage.
And the candidate was enthused on Thursday at her first Texas event, which was adorned with large posters featuring Clinton's visage and "LA HILLARY." Fresh off her debate performance in Las Vegas, Clinton told the gathered audience of work registering primarily Latinos to vote in southwest Texas in the 1970s, and the smaller listening events she has done around the country this year.
She emphasized small businesses, particularly those that are Latina-owned; she bashed Republicans; and praised Obama's leadership: "I don't think president Obama gets the credit he deserves for preventing us..." she thundered, before being drowned out by the crowd.
She didn't seek to tamp down or avoid the idea of Castro as vice presidential nominee, either, but instead fanned the talk. When asked about the possibility before the rally during a Q&A event with the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, she didn't shy away from it.
"I think really highly of him and I'm happy to have his endorsement today," she said to the USHCC president Javier Palomarez. "I will look at him for everything."
On display, too, on Thursday was the city of San Antonio.
"Many of them told me they felt that it was an honor to have Julian back and for him to shed the national spotlight on San Antonio," said Juany Torres, who led the Clinton volunteer operation for Thursday's event. After recently leaving her job at Google to come back to San Antonio, she got connected with the campaign's local efforts. Her job on Thursday was to make sure the crowd behind Clinton and Castro was diverse and made for the TV cameras. Torres has a history in Democratic politics, and she said San Antonians viewed the day as a big one. Many in the audience were buzzing about the vice presidential speculation, she said, and while the loudest chants were of "Hillary! Hillary!" there were brief chants of "Julian for VP!" as well.
Castro framed as a longtime Latino stronghold: It was the first major American city to elect a Hispanic mayor in Henry Cisneros and the place where major Latino organizations like MALDEF and the Southwest Voter Registration Project first got their start. The city also looks like what America is becoming, he argued: young, diverse and open-minded.
And with the crowd of 2,500 people in front of the stage and in an overflow area listening, Castro told them to take out their phones and text "Latinos" to 47246, which allows the campaign to engage them with "Latinos for Hillary" text messages, send shots at Republicans during their debates, and eventually turn out voters. Heads in the crowd could be seen looking down as they typed on their phones after his prompting.
Far outside San Antonio, Castro — and the Clinton campaign broadly — will be making the case to Latinos in states like Florida, Colorado, and Nevada, too.
His brother, Joaquin, argued Latino voters are primed to hear the message.
"The Latino community is on heightened awareness about this election, particularly because of the ugliness in this cycle coming from Republicans so far," he told BuzzFeed News after the rally. "And it will be helpful to Hillary to have somebody out there who is a countervailing force, somebody who can vouch for her, but also stands as a symbol of the American dream for millions of Hispanics."
But the Thursday crowd was a homecoming — a 93-year-old woman named Pat Gonzalez, for instance, stood up front, near where Clinton was expected to enter the event. She's long supported Clinton, and remembers paying a poll tax to vote as a Mexican-American. But she personally remembers the Castro twins as children from her days working at City Hall. "I've known him since he was a baby," she said, surrounded by friends and women in her family. "They used to drive me crazy running around because I didn't know which was which," she said, as those around her teased her for saying too much.
And local mariachi singer Sebastien de la Cruz, 13, sang the national anthem before the rally.
"They called me last night and I was very ecstatic when they told me that they would like me to sing," he said afterwards. "It was a great honor and a pleasure."
He also has ties to Julian Castro, who publicly supported him after the then 11-year-old was blasted on social media with racially insensitive remarks for singing the national anthem before a San Antonio Spurs playoff game. With his wife by his side, Castro introduced him after the furor when the Spurs had de la Cruz back to sing again during the same playoff series.
"I want to say thank you to Julian for having my back," he said Thursday. "It was great to have another San Antonian there for me."
Win Mcnamee / Getty Images
The summer months were a lackluster fundraising period for several presidential candidates. So much so that nearly a dozen White House hopefuls were even outraised by several Senate contenders — by a lot in some cases.
According to Federal Election Commission reports filed Thursday, 11 presidential current or former presidential candidates raised five or six figures in the third quarter:
Former Govs. Mike Huckabee and Martin O'Malley brought in $1.2 million each; Sen. Lindsey Graham raised $1.1 million; Gov. Bobby Jindal raised about $580,000; former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum raised $390,000; former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore raised $105,000; former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who dropped out last month, brought in $287,000; former New York Gov. George Pataki raised $153,000; former Rhode Island Gov. Lincoln Chafee raised $15,000; former Virginia Sen. Jim Webb raised about $700,000; and Harvard professor Larry Lessig brought in $1 million.
Those amounts are less than the amounts most Senate candidates in tough 2016 races raised in the same time period, according to fundraising numbers announced by the campaigns.
Some of the top Senate fundraisers include Ohio Sen. Rob Portman, who raised more than $2 million; New Hampshire Sen. Kelly Ayotte, who raised $1.6 million; former Wisconsin Sen. Russ Feingold, who raised $2.4 million; Rep. Tammy Duckworth, who raised $1.5 million for her Illinois Senate bid; Wisconsin Sen. Ron Johnson, who raised $1.4 million; and North Carolina Sen. Richard Burr, who raised $1.3 million.
Kanye, Harley Davidson, and $700,000 worth of hats.
Presidential candidates filed their fundraising reports Thursday, revealing how quickly they are burning through cash, who is funding their campaigns and what they are spending their money on.
Here are some highlights from the reports that cover the last three months:
Joe Raedle / Getty Images
Joe Raedle / Getty Images
Michael B. Thomas / Getty Images
“…what you do is you create greater disappointment in the hinterlands, because you gave them a false hope, knowing that you couldn’t accomplish it, but it was about yelling, and screaming, and waving the flag.”
Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images
Former Republican Sen. Tom Coburn said Thursday night that his former colleague Sen. Ted Cruz's rhetoric and failure to deliver on promises is creating a "Cruz effect" that leads the public to have less confidence in Congress' ability to do its job.
"I call it the 'Cruz effect,'" Coburn, who retired from the Senate in 2014, told Sirius XM host Pete Dominick. "Look, when you tell people you can accomplish something that you can't, for example, shutting down the government over the Affordable Care Act. When, in fact, you promise people in your speeches and your talk that we can do this, and by dinghy, we're gonna get rid of the Affordable Care Act, and all we have to do is shut down the government.
"Well, that's one thing to tell 'em that," the former Oklahoma senator said. "It's a whole other thing to be able to accomplish that, and build a coalition that once you shut it, that it doesn't get opened up 'till you win.
"So what happens to that is, once you've told people that, and you've put your finger -- 'everybody that doesn't believe exactly like I believe, you're not a patriot, you don't care about the country' -- what you do is you create greater disappointment in the hinterlands, because you gave them a false hope, knowing that you couldn't accomplish it, but it was about yelling, and screaming, and waving the flag," he continued. "And so what happens is, there becomes less confidence in the Congress and its ability to do its job.
"You know, I came out of the Senate with one of the most conservative ratings ever in the history of the Senate. You know, it was like 98.8% in terms of conservative," Coburn concluded. "And yet, I compromised all the time to accomplish things that were good for the country."
The agreement between inmates and Oklahoma is the latest fallout from the state calling off an execution at the last minute on Sept. 30 because it obtained the wrong drug from its supplier.
Scott Pruitt, left, Oklahoma attorney general, and Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin, right.
Sue Ogrocki / AP
WASHINGTON — There will be no more executions in Oklahoma this year under an agreement the state has reached with inmates, the latest fallout from the halted execution of Richard Glossip this past month.
In a filing in ongoing federal litigation over the state's execution process, the state and inmates challenging the process agreed — and the federal court agreed — that the case "should be administratively closed for an indefinite period of time" because the Oklahoma Attorney General agreed not to seek an execution until 150 days after the inmates' lawyers are provided with the results of an investigation into to the state's execution procedures.
Glossip's scheduled execution was halted by Oklahoma Gov. Mary Fallin on Sept. 30 when it was discovered that the state had been provided with a drug for use in Glossip's execution that was not a part of the approved execution procedures. Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt announced an investigation, and shortly thereafter all upcoming executions were put on hold indefinitely later that week.
A week after that, further questions were raised when it was revealed that the state actually had used the incorrect drug — potassium acetate in place of the authorized potassium chloride — in the January execution of Charles Warner.
Under the Friday filing in the federal case, the inmates agreed to "administratively clos[ing]" the lawsuit because Pruitt's office agreed not to set an execution until 150 days after any investigations are conducted and results of those investigations are provided to the inmates' lawyers, after any changes to the state's execution protocol are made and provided to inmates' lawyers, and after the lawyer are given "notice that the Oklahoma Department of Corrections will be able to comply with the express terms of the Protocol."
Once the state does all of that, the inmates will have 14 days to reopen the litigation. The federal judge hearing the case signed off on the agreement, administratively closing the case in an order on Friday.
The agreement led Pruitt's office initially to claim in a statement, "Attorney General Scott Pruitt announced Friday attorneys representing death-row inmates in Glossip v. Gross have agreed to dismiss their federal lawsuit challenging the state's execution protocol." Pruitt's office tweeted out a similar comment, with a link to the news release.
After being questioned about the tweet, the office deleted the tweet. The news release remained unchanged initially, but it, too, eventually was changed, with a note that the new version "UPDATES to clarify the agreement is one to administratively close the litigation." The new version states, instead, "Attorney General Scott Pruitt and attorneys representing death-row inmates in Glossip v. Gross on Friday agreed to administratively close the federal lawsuit challenging the state's execution protocol." A new "clarification" tweet was posted as well.
Pruitt's office did not immediately respond to a message seeking comment about the cause of the apparent mix-up.
“I mean, the Republicans don’t want people dying in the street. There are gonna be some people that aren’t gonna be able to have — they don’t have any money!”
Steve Helber / AP
Donald Trump said on Wednesday that he wouldn't put a label on whether his vision for America's health care system amounts to "socialized medicine," arguing that "people dying in the streets" would lead to a revolution.
"If a person has no money, you can't let the person die," he said. "You can't let the person die on the street. You just can't let it happen," Trump said. "And you know, I keep talking about the Republicans — they have heart. But some people would cri — 'Oh, is this socialized medicine?' I don't put a label on it. We have hospitals that can handle it easily and frankly inexpensively."
The Republican presidential candidate was discussing the broad contours of his yet-to-be-released health care platform with Iowa radio host Simon Conway, saying first that "I wanna go private" and explaining his intent to eliminate inter-state barriers that stop people from buying health care in different states, a system he called a "phony line situation."
Trump then added that, though he wants to decrease the government's role in the health care market and "get rid of all the restrictions," he also doesn't want people "dying in the streets."
"I don't want to see people dying in the streets, Simon, and neither do you," he said. "And neither do great Republicans. I mean, the Republicans don't want people dying in the street. There are gonna be some people that aren't gonna be able to have — they don't have any money!"
Claiming that he planned to "make a deal where we take care of people with hospitals," Trump went on to suggest that, if people were dying in the streets, "it would be a revolution."
"But we can't have people dying in the streets, Simon, and right now, you're gonna have a problem — I mean, it would be a revolution," Trump said. "We can't have people because they have no money that they don't have a clinic that they can at least go to to get a pill to straighten themselves — you know, in many cases it's not even like an operation — it's they need a pill or they need something. And I don't think, we just can't have people dying in the streets."
Bern, baby, Bern.
Astrid Riecken / Getty Images
Missouri Democratic Sen. Clair McCaskill, a supporter of Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign, says Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders is not electable in this country because he identifies as a socialist.
"I mean, Barack Obama has been called a socialist since the day he came into office, and he's no socialist," McCaskill said Tuesday on WHYY public radio. "But Bernie wears that label, and I'm – you know, Bernie's my friend, and his wife Jane is my friend, and he believes very much in what he's saying, and he is talking about things were need to be talking about. He is doing my party and our country a great service, by making the dialogue about things that really matter to a whole lot of Democrats and Americans.
"So I'm not down on Bernie. I just don't think somebody who calls himself a socialist is ultimately electable in this country – and I say that coming from a state where I'm confident Bernie would struggle because of how he identifies himself."
McCaskill said she took heat from "those who feel the Bern" after a interview in July on Morning Joe in which she said Bernie Sanders was "too liberal" to be president but struggled to identify areas in which Sanders was outside of step with the Democratic Party.
McCaskill, who endorsed Barack Obama over Hillary Clinton early in the 2008 contest, is now a surrogate and prominent supporter of Clinton's bid for the White House.
"No, I mean, it's really interesting — I got a lot of heat from those who feel the Bern over that interview," McCaskill said to WHYY public radio in an interview. "I was the first person to kind of say out loud — not, I wasn't labeling Bernie Sanders. That's how he labels himself. In fact, just Sunday he was asked on Meet the Press, this past Sunday: 'Are you a capitalist?' And he said 'no — I am a democratic socialist.' So, that's how identifies himself, as a socialist. That's not something that anyone has put on him."
The Missouri senator further question why Sanders was allowed to run as a Democrat.
"He doesn't call himself a capitalist, and he certainly doesn't call himself a Democrat," said McCaskill.
Still, she conceded Sanders had pushed Clinton to left on certain issues.
"I think that's a fair opinion," she said. "I wouldn't quarrel with the basis of that opinion. I think if you look at Hillary Clinton's record, she voted for trade agreements, and she voted against trade agreements. She publicly was skeptical of NAFTA. In her book that she wrote, she talks about the investor state provisions in the TPP with concern. And when she said good things about the TPP is when she was secretary of State in an administration that wanted to get a TPP done. So this notion that she doesn't have the right to independently analyze the TPP in its final form – at the time she said good things about it, we were a long way from having a negotiated deal.
"The notion that she can't, at this point, make an independent analysis of it I think is terribly unfair to her, and to make her unprincipled or weak because she has, I don't think is fair. But certainly I think Bernie has kept the heat on, in terms of some of the positions that he feels strongly about, and that's not a bad thing. That's not a bad thing. I think she ultimately will be a stronger candidate because of his candidacy."
Steve Pope / Getty Images
After Scott Walker left the race, the big question was who his financial backers would support.
His biggest backers — the Ricketts family, of Chicago Cubs-owning and TD Ameritrade-founding fame — still remain uncommitted to a candidate. But Walker was considered a serious presidential candidate with people in the establishment and in more conservative circles, as well.
So we ran the numbers with the latest campaign fundraising reports to see where Walker’s campaign donors have gone with the two candidates everybody speculated would get Walker’s donors (Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio) and two candidates that have fundraised well and might also get his supporters (Carly Fiorina and Ted Cruz).
We considered a campaign to have "picked up" a Walker donor if that donor a. had contributed to Walker before he dropped out, b. had not contributed to the other campaign since April 1 (the earliest date covered by the July quarterly filing), and c. contributed to the other campaign after Walker dropped out on Sept. 21.
Finally, because FEC filings are long and complex, we used a script that matched first name, last name, and zip code to identify the donors; that’s a pretty good measure, but because we didn’t confirm each individually, though, we use the word “approximately” below.
(For more details on the methodology and findings, click here.)
Jeb 2016, Inc. picked up approximately 17 Walker donors, who've contributed $40,750 since Sept. 21.
Marco Rubio for President picked up approximately 33 Walker donors, who've contributed $33,216 since Sept. 21.
Cruz for President picked up approximately 26 Walker donors, who've contributed $25,355 since Sept. 21.
Carly for President picked up approximately 27 Walker donors, who've contributed $24,100 since Sept. 21.
It’s pretty evenly split — there’s no clear beneficiary here where it comes to hard campaign cash. Rubio might have picked up the most, but not significantly more than Cruz or Fiorina, and still raised less from the Walker donors than Bush.
The Bush fundraising clearly is the work of a smaller group of donors either maxing out or coming close to doing so. For instance: Richard Graber, a senior executive at Honeywell, gave the $5,400 max to Walker on July 16. Then, on Sept. 28, a week after Walker dropped out, he gave the $5,400 max to Bush.
“And to blame George Bush for what happened on September 11 is, again, that shows a lack of knowledge and it’s too much of a cheap shot at the president.”
Drew Angerer / Getty Images
Rep. Peter King, a Republican from New York, slammed Donald Trump on Friday for an interview in which Trump suggested President George Bush is to blame for the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks.
"When you talk about George Bush, I mean, say what you want, the World Trade Center came down during his time," Trump said Friday morning on Bloomberg TV, before he was interrupted by the interviewer, who said he couldn't be serious about blaming Bush.
"He was president, OK? Blame him, or don't blame him, but he was president. The World Trade Center came down during his reign," Trump added.
King took aim at Trump on Fox News radio's Kilmeade and Friends on Friday.
"I think Donald Trump is totally wrong there," said King. "That sounds like a Michael Moore talking point. Anyone who has any real knowledge of that, you can get all the CIA people, all of the career people, no one saw the attack of 9/11 coming."
"What George Bush did is totally revamp the intelligence system, the information sharing system," King continued. "He set up defenses so that we have not been successfully attacked in any large way since September 11. Nobody would have known that on September 12 or expect that on September 12. And to blame George Bush for what happened on September 11 is, again, that shows a lack of knowledge and it's too much of a cheap shot at the president."
King added he thought Bush was an "outstanding president," and that again, Trump was totally wrong.
Take a listen:
“Unless Paul comes out and says: ‘Look, I want to be Speaker, here’s why I want to be Speaker, and here’s why I think I’d be different and better than John [Boehner],’ it’s a real hard sell.”
John Gress / Getty Images
South Carolina Rep. Mick Mulvaney, a founding member of the House Freedom Caucus, said Thursday that Rep. Paul Ryan would "have a real hard sell" in the race to replace John Boehner as speaker of the house unless he promises a return to "regular order."
"You don't get to win just because you're Paul Ryan," Mulvaney said, in an interview posted to Hugh Hewitt's TownHall Audio Vault on Thursday. "Everybody will look to you, and give you a long look, because you're Paul Ryan, but you don't win just because that's your name."
Mulvaney acknowledged that "if Paul gets in, clearly it's a game-changing type of move," but said that "unless Paul comes out and says: 'Look, I want to be speaker, here's why I want to be speaker, and here's why I think I'd be different and better than John [Boehner],' it's a real hard sell."
Mulvaney did say that he thinks Ryan has "that potential to be a unifying factor" in a fractured Republican caucus, because "it's rare for politicians to actually have some credibility based upon intellect and hard work."
"Ordinarily we elect our leadership based upon their ability to raise money, and slap somebody else on the back and give out favors," said Mulvaney. "Paul has earned his reputation as a deep thinker – as a really smart guy, as a good guy – through his work, and his his dedication to his craft, and that carries a lot of weight in our business."
"But again, just because you're a really smart guy doesn't mean you'd be a great speaker," said Mulvaney, "and I think he's still gonna have to speak to what he would do if he were the speaker."
The South Carolina Republican said that he would advise Ryan to promise to restore "regular order" to the House legislative process, which he said had become deeply dysfunctional.
"People think, John, that Congress is broken, and actually they're right," said Mulvaney. "The system is broken, and the system that you and I studied in civics class, government class, that I watched on Saturday morning television when I was a kid – about 'I'm just a bill, I'm only a bill' – that doesn't work, that's not how we do it anymore."
"I wasn't there when Pelosi was Speaker, but we were so upset with the way she ran things that we promised people we would run it differently," said Mulvaney. "And honestly we haven't, and that's been very disappointing."
Chip Somodevilla / Getty Images
WASHINGTON — Establishment Republicans can’t catch a break.
The House Republican conference has fallen into turmoil, still without a clear successor to John Boehner. CNBC has caved into demands for the third presidential debate after Donald Trump and Ben Carson threatened to pull out the event in a disastrous call with the Republican National Committee on Thursday afternoon. Trump’s “summer fade” still hasn’t happened yet. And now some top-tier candidates are struggling to raise campaign cash — or, at least, they certainly aren’t blowing away their conservative rivals.
Carson, who brought in $20 million, outraised all GOP candidates. And Sen. Ted Cruz — seen as the leader of the conservative movement in Congress — ended September with nearly $14 million in the bank, or the most of any GOP contender. By comparison, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush raised $13.4 million and Sen. Marco Rubio had nearly $6 million.
Even Trump, who has said he wants to self-fund and doesn't want to be beholden to donors, raised nearly $4 million from donors who gave $200 or less.
The traditional advantages of the establishment — superior fundraising and favorable debate rules — don’t seem to be holding now. And the latest fundraising reports, combined with disarray in the House, ahead of an election year after two terms of a Democratic president, has caused a lot of uneasiness within the party.
Minnesota billionaire GOP donor Stan Hubbard acknowledged it was “healthy” for the party to go through internal debates, but said conservatives could mess up 2016 for Republicans. “You can’t be like a little child kicking your feet and saying, ‘I want it my way.’ That’s not helpful. If they’re stupid and foolish enough to attack whoever ends up being the Republican nominee, we will have a Democratic president.”
Hubbard, who previously supported Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker and contributed to his super PAC, has since given the maximum individual contribution amount to five candidates. But told BuzzFeed News he won’t be giving to any more presidential super PACs until the nominee is chosen.
California GOP Rep. Devin Nunes recently went so far as to suggest conservatives should break off into their own party if they can’t unite. "I would strongly urge those who don’t want to be part of a caucus structure within our party, that they should form their own party,” he told reporters last week as some right-wing members interviewed candidates for speaker behind closed doors.
Conservatives celebrated a major victory when Boehner announced he was stepping down last month. The good times have continued to roll for them since. House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, who was widely expected to replace Boehner, stunned his colleagues when he told them last week he was dropping out of the race. One of McCarthy’s reasons for dropping out: rule changes that the Freedom Caucus had demanded.
"They've lost two speakers in two weeks,” said Kansas Rep. Tim Huelskamp of the Republican establishment after McCarthy dropped his bid. “This is the introspection we've asked for — demanded — for years. This frustration was bubbling.”
These divisions aren’t helping the party nationally, Republican strategists admitted. Some argue that the election is far enough away that it won’t matter, ultimately. But the problem with the divisions are grounded in very distinct views about the party, and deep tensions.
"There's no question that any intra-party fighting is unhelpful heading into an election year and it's sad that interest groups like Heritage Action and candidates like Ted Cruz are trying to raise money by attacking Republicans and sowing that discord,” said Brian Walsh, one of those strategists who previously worked in the House and Senate and the National Republican Senatorial Committee.
“The good news though is that the election is still 13 months away and obviously the Democrats have many problems on their own side,” he said. “So hopefully these issues will work themselves out and Republicans can go on offense in 2016."
Not everyone agrees that the time between now and the election to smooth over the situation — or that it can be smoothed over. Trygve Olson, a Republican strategist formerly aligned with Rand Paul, argued that the struggle in the House of Representatives over the speakership is a sign that the party is in for an even more epic struggle when it comes time to nominate a presidential candidate at next year’s Republican national convention.
“I see what’s going on with the House as maybe the canary in a coal mine that sets people off that this could be repeating itself on a far bigger scale with the nomination process,” Olson said. "We’re moving into uncharted territory. I really think the congressional thing is the canary in the coal mine. I believe that the nomination process could lead to somebody who gets their ass kicked, but I believe it’s more likely that it leads to complete chaos in Cleveland."
Kevin Madden, a GOP strategist and former Romney adviser, said there have been concerns that the other campaigns have ceded too much ground to Trump. “Every day we take a step away from the excuse 'it's still early" and a step towards 'it's too late' in the minds of many donors and party leaders,” he said.
Some conservatives believe the situation could have a much more positive outcome, especially for Cruz. Erick Erickson, the conservative writer and radio host, compared this cycle to the 1980 presidential election in which Ronald Reagan won despite opposition from major establishment figures in his party.
“This election feels a lot like 1980 to me because there is much more unanimity among the challengers than the Establishment,” Erickson wrote in an email to BuzzFeed News. “Sure you’ve got Trump, Carson, and Cruz all vying to be that outside guy, but I think they will consolidate more. The Establishment was divided between Walker, Bush, Kasich, Christie, Rubio, and Fiorina as their own outsider. They are still much more divided than the challengers.”
“That’s what makes this so unique and so much like 1980,” he said. “The Establishment hasn’t consolidated so quickly and the outsiders, though still plenty of them, are all showing that their second choice is still one of only three outsiders. That’s why I think Ted Cruz continues to have an advantage between outsider sentiment and cash on hand.”
Conservatives argue that their victories in recent weeks reflect a turning point in the tea party movement and are pushing the Republican Party to better represent its base outside the beltway. The House Freedom Caucus has been focusing on reforming the way the House operates to diminish the power of GOP leadership in the House, which the establishment wing believes could be dangerous for the whole party.
They are also trying to curb the establishment wing’s money advantage in congressional races by asking candidates for speaker to pledge they will defend them against the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which is expected to target conservatives in primaries this cycle.
A number of well-funded conservative outside groups such as Senate Conservatives Fund, Club for Growth, and Tea Party Patriots have also been bringing in millions to counter attacks from the chamber and other establishment-friendly groups.
Despite the growing unrest within the party, some Republicans believe it is now becoming business as usual and the chaos isn't something to be especially worried about.
Fred Malek, a top Republican fundraiser, pointed out that although “there is definitely a thirst for new faces or outsiders,” establishment candidates like Bush, Rubio, and Christie can raise money without having to spend millions on direct mail just to raise money. Carson spent roughly $11 million just to raise his $20 million haul.
Republican strategist Ana Navarro, a Jeb Bush supporter, said: "It doesn't feel like a sudden crisis. Nobody is hiding under the bed, rosary in hand, waiting for the world to end.”
“The dynamic of competing factions within the GOP has been going on for several years and by the looks of things will continue to go on,” Navarro said. “It is what it is.”
“I think Jeb Bush has got the best chance to come out of it and become the nominee of the Republican Party.”
Sean Rayford / Getty Images
A prominent Jeb Bush supporter says he believes there's going to be a brokered Republican convention.
Tommy Thompson, the former Wisconsin governor who went on to serve as secretary of Health and Human Services under President George W. Bush, told WTMJ radio on Friday, "I think when the campaign gets going, and you got to realize in the month of March, there is going to be 28 states are going to vote, Super Tuesday is going to have 14. I don't know if any other candidate except Jeb Bush, that's going to have an organization and the money to put up a strong campaign in those 14 states.
"And I think he's going to come out of the 14 states with not enough delegates, because I don't think any candidate between now and the Republican convention is going to get the necessary number, 11,088, to get the nomination," he added. "I think this was the first time since 1976, in Kansas City, when Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan were going at it. And I was at that convention, I think the same thing is going to happen in 2016."
Thompson endorsed Bush in early October. He ran unsuccessfully for the senate in Wisconsin in 2012.
Thompson predicted Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, Ohio Gov. John Kasich, and either Ben Carson, Donald Trump, or Carly Fiorina would be a contender at convention time along with Bush.
"I think we are going to have a convention in which nobody has enough votes, and I think you are going to go there, I think one of the three, Carly, Donald Trump or Dr. Carson, are still going to be in," he said. "I think Senator Cruz is still going to be in, I think Jeb Bush is going to be in, I think John Kasich is going to be in, and I think at that particular point in time, I think the party, the organization, I think Jeb Bush has got the best chance to come out of it and become the nominee of the Republican Party."
Via youtube.com
WASHINGTON — Wayne Simmons, a TV military analyst who was charged this week with lying about having worked for the Central Intelligence Agency, hoodwinked not only Fox News, but the Pentagon.
Media coverage of Simmons's arrest has focused on his TV analysis for Fox News, but Simmons was also involved in a Pentagon program for military analysts that gave them direct access to top officials during the George W. Bush administration. The program, in which officials in former Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld's Pentagon recruited former military officers to receive briefings from top officials and transmit talking points on television news, was described at length in a New York Times article from April of 2008. Several dozen military analysts participated in the program.
The Times article does not specifically name Simmons, but he wrote a letter to the newspaper along with other participants in the program refuting the article after it came out.
A source who worked in Rumsfeld's Pentagon said that Simmons was indeed part of the program, and that he met with Rumsfeld himself. Simmons's online bio notes his involvement with the Pentagon analyst program: "In 2004, under the direction of Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld, he became a part of the Pentagon Outreach Program for Military and Intelligence Analysts."
The former Pentagon staffer said the revelations about Simmons's alleged lies about his credentials were "shocking" because the analysts in the program "went through some vetting process that assured that they had some credentials."
The 2008 Times article describes the extent to which the analysts in the program were given access: "a powerfully seductive environment — the uniformed escorts to Mr. Rumsfeld’s private conference room, the best government china laid out, the embossed name cards, the blizzard of PowerPoints, the solicitations of advice and counsel, the appeals to duty and country, the warm thank you notes from the secretary himself."
The analysts were also taken on government-sponsored tours of Guantanamo Bay, according to the Times.
"It’s become a media story when it’s really much bigger," said the former Pentagon staffer of the media coverage of Simmons. "The story to me is not, 'Fox has a hack on to talk about whatever.' It’s more like, this guy was given access to senior officials."
"They met, they got briefings from everyone," the former staffer said. "When [General David] Petraeus was in town he would come brief them."
Simmons was arrested on Thursday and charged with having lied about having served in the CIA. Simmons has claimed that he was recruited into the CIA as part of an "Outside Paramilitary Special Operations Group" and that he served in the agency for 27 years.
Simmons used his alleged lies about having worked for the CIA "in an attempt to obtain government security clearances and work as a defense contractor, including at one point successfully getting deployed overseas as an intelligence advisor to senior military personnel," according to a press release from the U.S. Attorney's office for the Eastern District of Virginia. The indictment alleges that Simmons did indeed obtain an interim security clearance at one point to work on a government contract. Simmons is also accused of having defrauded someone out of $125,000 in a real estate scam.
He has been charged with wire fraud, major fraud against the U.S., and making false statements to the government, and he potentially faces up to 35 years in prison, according to the U.S. Attorney's press release.
BuzzFeed News reached out to Simmons via email but the request for comment was not immediately returned.
LINK: Fox News “Analyst” Arrested And Charged With Lying About CIA Ties
“Do you think women are going to nominate some guy who judges people by their appearance and calls another candidate ugly?”
Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, who is running for the Republican presidential nomination, continued his war of words with Donald Trump on Friday.
Speaking with The Hard Line on NewsMaxTV, the Kentucky senator said Trump -- who called Paul "truly weird" at one point -- is the worst candidate to be the party's nominee.
"Do you think women are going to nominate some guy who judges people by their appearance and calls another candidate ugly? Do you think they're going to nominate somebody who implies that most Hispanics are rapists and drug dealers? 'Oh yeah there might be a few of them who are not,'" Paul said.
"We'd get just swamped in a landslide," Paul, who is currently struggling in the polls and fundraising efforts, argued of the Republican Party if Trump was the nominee.
The Kentucky senator said Republicans will wake up one day and freak out at the prospect of Trump being the nominee.
"The majority of Republicans will wake up and say, 'oh my goodness, we can't nominate this. This would be a disaster for our party and for the country,'" Paul said.
"He's the worst nominee that we could possibly think of and part of the reason is he's not really a Republican," Paul said of Trump, citing the businessman's past support for liberal policies.
“I think opening and closing statements are what politicians always want.”
Mark J. Terrill / AP
Carly Fiorina said on Friday that complaints from two of her opponents for the Republican presidential nomination about debate rules barring opening and closing statements say "something about their endurance" and their grasp of the political issues.
Ben Carson and Donald Trump had threatened to boycott the Oct. 28 CNBC debate if the network didn't agree to limit the program to two hours and guarantee that the contenders will be given opening and closing statements.
"Maybe it says something about their endurance and their comfort or discomfort with having a real debate about the issues," Fiorina said to Iowa radio host Simon Conway on Friday.
On Friday afternoon, after Fiorina's appearance on the radio show, CNBC met Trump's and Carson's demands.
In the interview, Fiorina took aim at both conditions set by her rivals, saying that "when you have ten people on the stage, while three hours is a long time, it's actually not that much time," and likened Trump and Carson -- the two candidates in the GOP race besides Fiorina to have never held political office -- to politicians.
"I think opening and closing statements honestly are what politicians always want," she said. "They're sort of canned, prepared statements. They certainly don't tell us anything new, they don't tell us about a candidate's thoughts on issues or whether they can think on their feet."
When Conway, the host, cited the lack of "real questions" in the previous Republican debate, aired on CNN, Fiorina said "I'm not sure that I agree with that," before adding that she viewed debates as "an opportunity for people to get to know each one of us and compare and contrast one with the other."
Happy Halloween.
According to AFP, Mexican Halloween costume maker Grupo Rev has made 250 Trump masks this year and is expected to make even more.
Trump launched his campaign by making disparaging comments about undocumented Mexican immigrants to the United States, saying many were criminals.
A price has yet to be set on the masks.
Check them out below:
Ronaldo Schemidt / AFP / Getty Images
Ronaldo Schemidt / AFP / Getty Images
Ronaldo Schemidt / AFP / Getty Images
His number most likely includes every American of retirement age and full time students.
Mandel Ngan / AFP / Getty Images
Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump says there are actually 100 million people who are unemployed in the United States.
Trump has previously said the number was 93 million, a number that independent fact-checking site Politifact said was "way too high."
"People are tired of being ripped off by every country that does business with us, by everything," Trump said on the Cats Roundtable on AM970 The Answer on Sunday. "Our vets are being horribly treated. We've got 100 million people in the workforce that aren't working, that people don't know.
"They see unemployment but that's a phony statistic because when you stop looking for a job you go down essentially as employed so it doesn't show," he continued. "But we have 100 million that are in the workforce, and they're not getting work. So we have a lot of problems and we'll solve those problems. You know that about me."
As noted by Politifact, Trump is including in his accounting every American of retirement age and those 16 years old and above and represents "a basic misunderstanding of the labor market." The Wall Street Journal brutally declared in a headline of Trump previous account, "Donald Trump Is Right: About 42% of Americans Are Unemployed (If You Include My 88-Year-Old Grandma)."
Trump, however, seems unfazed.
"Well, I actually say 22%, but who knows," Trump added Sunday. "All I know is it is too much and if you look at, you know, you could say 35% and 40% -- one of the economists actually said 42% the other day. You figure he takes those 100 million people and you take a big chunk of them and you add them into the numbers and that's the kind of number you're talking about. So it's not good. It's not good."
“I really am convinced we’re in danger of the sort of terrorist attacks that will make the bombing of the Trade Center look like kids playing with firecrackers.”
Al Bello / Getty Images
In 2000, 19 months before Sept. 11, 2001, Donald Trump wrote extensively of the terrorism threat the United States was facing.
Trump, who at the time was considering a presidential bid on the Reform Party ticket, went so far as to say that an attack on a major U.S. city was not just a probability, but an inevitability.
"I really am convinced we're in danger of the sort of terrorist attacks that will make the bombing of the Trade Center look like kids playing with firecrackers," wrote Trump in his 2000 book, The America We Deserve. "No sensible analyst rejects this possibility, and plenty of them, like me, are not wondering if but when it will happen."
Trump even mentions Osama bin Laden by name, in a criticism of an American foreign policy that too quickly jumps from one crisis to the next.
"One day we're told that a shadowy figure with no fixed address named Osama bin-Laden is public enemy number one, and U.S. jetfighters lay waste to his camp in Afghanistan," The Donald wrote. "He escapes back under some rock, and a few news cycles later it's on to a new enemy and new crisis."
Trump started a full-on war with former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush on Friday, when he suggested Bush's older brother and former President George W. Bush is to blame for the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001.
Jeb Bush took to Twitter to defend his brother, calling Trump's attack "pathetic," and told CNN's Jake Tapper on Sunday that Trump talks about foreign policy like he's still on his reality show, The Apprentice.
Four years before The Apprentice ever aired, Trump devoted an entire section of his book to keeping America safe from terrorism, arguing our ignorance of the threats we faced from terrorism was the biggest threat to national security.
"I may be making waves, but that's all right," wrote Trump. "Making waves is usually what you need to do to rock the boat, and our national-security boat definitely needs rocking. Let's point fingers. The biggest threat to our security is ourselves, because we've become arrogant. Dangerously arrogant. It's time for a realistic view of the world and our place in it. Do we truly understand the threats we face? And let me give a warning: You won't hear a lot of what follows from candidates in this campaign, because what I've got to say is definitely not happy talk. There are forces to be worried about, people and programs to take action against. Now."
"We face a different problem when we talk about the individual fanatics who want to harm us," The Donald continued, discussing the threat from individual terrorist organizations that despised American culture.
Trump said such people were determined to attack us.
"We can kid ourselves all we want by mocking their references to the Great Satan, but also keep in mind that there is no greater destiny for many people than to deal the Great Satan a major kick in the teeth," he wrote, adding they despised the U.S. support for Israel.
"Our teenage boys fantasize about Cindy Crawford; young terrorists fantasize about turning an American city (and themselves) into charcoal," Trump wrote.
Trump predicted a major attack on an American city that would involved weapons of mass destruction, writing, "Yet it's time to get down to the hard business of preparing for what I believe is the real possibility that somewhere, sometime, a weapon of mass destruction will be carried into a major American city and detonated."
Trump added that even if the U.S. mobilized, the country probably wouldn't be able to stop most attacks. Trump said many people would willingly sign up for a suicide mission in America, and that the many U.S. military incursions create more terrorists who want to harm us.
"Whatever their motives — fanaticism, revenge — suffice it to say that plenty of people would stand in line for a crack at a suicide mission within America," Trump wrote. "In fact the number of potential attackers grows every day. Our various military adventures — some of which are justified, some not — create new legions of people who would like to avenge the deaths of family members or fellow citizens.
"It is one cost of peacekeeping we should keep in mind. I am not a hard-core isolationist. While I agree that we stick our noses into too many problems not of our making and that we can't do much about, I strongly disagree with the idea that we can pull up the drawbridge to hide from rogue nations or individual fanatics."
