Free Republic

PORTSMOUTH, N.H. – His campaign in difficult straits after disappointing showings on the stump and the debate stage, former Florida governor Jeb Bush insisted Thursday that he has the skills and the staying power to withstand a downturn. “It’s not on life support,” he said of the once-formidable campaign operation he has been forced to trim back as a cost-saving measure. “We have the most money, we have the greatest organization,” Bush told reporters following a brief campaign stop here. “We’re doing fine.”

Vice President Joe Biden says in a new interview that he would have run for president if he thought he could have won. “I’ll be very blunt. If I thought we could’ve put together the campaign that – that our supporters deserve and our contributors deserve, I’ll – I would have gone ahead and done it,” Biden said on “60 Minutes” late Sunday. The interview is the first the vice president has given since announcing his decision not to run for the Democratic presidential nomination last week. Biden had been mulling whether to enter the White House race for several...

HOUSTON — Right to Rise USA, the super PAC supporting former Florida governor Jeb Bush's campaign for president, is considering deploying ground staff to key states after focusing most heavily on running television ads so far. It's a notable strategic consideration that comes as Bush's campaign for the Republican presidential nomination has struggled to gain traction in early-voting states and as it makes moves to curtail costs in what began as a sprawling operation.

Jeb Bush #JebNoFilter: That time when you look down and realize @SenatorTimScott is wearing your dad’s socks… https://t.co/uCWBcWd7sH #JebNoFilter: Dad's Socks

HOUSTON -- Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush went after 2016 rival Ted Cruz over the weekend at a campaign stop in Charleston, South Carolina, by portraying the Texan as hypocritical and two-faced. "The guy (Cruz) that made this comment was supportive of the guy (John Roberts) he was critical of," Bush told Rep. Tim Gowdy and the audience at Bishop England High School. He was referring to the moment in the second Republican presidential debate in Californiawhen Cruz said, "Yes, it was a mistake" for President George W. Bush to have nominated Chief Justice John Roberts to the Supreme Court....

Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) has selected David Hoppe, a former adviser to Republican congressional leaders and a longtime Washington lobbyist, to serve as his chief of staff, should Ryan be elected House speaker this week, as is widely expected. The hiring was finalized after Hoppe and Ryan, both Wisconsin natives and proteges of the late New York congressman Jack Kemp, had conversations about Ryan’s desire to staff the speaker’s office with seasoned aides who are also deeply familiar with conservatism, according to people briefed on the talks.

He has given up his “C.S.I.” reruns, consuming campaign coverage on Fox News — intently but fretfully — when he is perched in front of the television in his Houston home. He reads three print newspapers daily, dials into briefings given by advisers to his son Jeb’s presidential campaign and stays up late to watch prime-time debates — after sitting through the so-called undercard, too. Former President George Bush, 91 and frail, is straining to understand an election season that has, for his son and the Republican Party, lurched sharply and stunningly off script. And he is often bewildered by...

EXCERPT Republican presidential candidate Jeb Bush had an awkward response Wednesday during a Q&A at the Libre Forum in Las Vegas when he was asked to name his favorite superhero. The answer: Batman. The addendum no one asked for: Bush has eyes for "Supergirl" star Melissa Benoist. "I saw that "Supergirl" is on TV,” Bush, the former Florida governor, said at the event, sponsored by the Koch brothers-backed Libre Initiative. “I saw it when I was working out this morning. There's an ad promoting ‘Supergirl.’ She looked kind of -- she looked pretty hot."

CNBC, which is hosting the third Republican primary debate next week, released its candidate lineups Wednesday, and there's a change for Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio: Bush will no longer stand next to frontrunner Donald Trump -- Rubio will. The reason: The polls CNBC averaged to rank candidates show Rubio in third place, after Trump and Ben Carson and before Bush.

GOP front-runner Donald Trump took to his favorite medium Wednesday afternoon to tweet his response to the news that Vice President Joe Biden had opted against running for president in 2016. "I think Joe Biden made correct decision for him & his family,” Trump told his millions of followers. "Personally, I would rather run against Hillary because her record is so bad.”

Jeb Bush is busily assuring donors that he's going to win the GOP nomination -- just as soon as he learns to communicate that point in as few words as possible. "They're training (Bush) to give better sound bites," says a well-placed insider who sat among 200 donors at a recent “Fat Cat breakfast” hosted by the well-funded Republican candidate at the Hilton Hotel in Midtown. “They know that Trump is King of the sound bite and Bush is a policy wonk,” we’re told. “They want to make him sound more energized.”

Since announcing his candidacy, Jeb Bush has touted his two terms as Florida’s governor on the campaign trail. But likely voters in the state’s GOP primary put their former governor in fourth place with support in single digits, according to a poll from the University of North Florida released Tuesday. If the primary was today, celebrity tycoon Donald Trump would earn 21.7 percent of votes, followed by retired neurosurgeon Dr. Ben Carson with 19.3 percent and Sen. Marco Rubio (FL) with 14.9 percent. Bush, at fourth place, would earn 9 percent.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Months before the first primaries of the presidential campaign, Jeb Bush and his allies are deep into building a data-driven operation to turn out voters in the general election much later — spending heavily on the assumption he will overcome his sluggish start and win the Republican nomination. (snip) Yet it's already hit an early roadblock. Bush and his advisers have abandoned plans to link some of the technology efforts of his formal campaign and an allied super political action committee by contracting with a single company. That firm could have provided both groups with the same...

Donald Trump is not letting Americans forget that the 9/11 terrorist attacks happened under former President George W. Bush. Trump’s relentless attacks on the issue come as he battles former Gov. Jeb Bush (R-Fla.), George W. Bush’s brother, for the GOP’s presidential nomination in 2016. “Interesting reading re: September 11th,” he tweeted Monday afternoon, referencing a New York Times story titled “The Bush White House was Deaf to 9/11 Warnings.” “Jeb is fighting to defend a catastrophic event,” Trump said of Jeb Bush in a separate post. “I am fighting to make sure it doesn’t happen again,” he added. "Jeb...

NEW YORK — GOP presidential frontrunner Donald Trump warned The Hill in an exclusive interview of a looming economic recession, arguing that the stock market has already entered into another bubble. He also slammed the 2010 Dodd-Frank Wall Street reform law as a “disaster” that has stifled economic growth. “It’s terrible,” he said in an interview with The Hill, saying that he would "absolutely” repeal it. “Under Dodd-Frank, the regulators are running the banks,” Trump said. “The bankers are petrified of the regulators. And the problem is that the banks aren’t loaning money to people who will create jobs.” Democrats...

If you’re looking for even more proof that the national media knows absolutely nothing about anything, not only is Republican presidential frontrunner Donald Trump beating home town boys Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL)80% and Jeb Bush in Florida, he’s beating them with Hispanic Voters. Bush has based much of his political identity on pandering to Hispanics, and Trump is trouncing him by +11 points. Rubio is Hispanic, and he’s losing to trump by -1%.

EXCERPT "Like many in New Hampshire, Lauren is a student at St. Anselm's who is passionate about and active in politics and attended this event on her own accord," Bush spokeswoman Allie Bradenburger said. "While this question was not sanctioned by the campaign, we can't help but notice Mr. Trump does seem to be very sensitive about being challenged by women." Bush's campaign confirmed to CNN that Batchelder has volunteered at events for the candidate but has never been paid as staff.

President tells CBS's Steve Kroft in interview previewed on-air Friday that Russian President Vladimir Putin's moves into Syria are out of weakness, not strength US has abandoned $500 million to train and arm rebels fighting to remove Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad from power (snip) 'He's moved troops into Syria, for one. He's got people on the ground,' Kroft said. 'Two, the Russians are conducting military operations in the Middle East for the first time since World War II... Bombing the people we are supporting.' 'He's challenging your leadership, Mr. President. He's challenging your leadership.' Obama replied, 'So that's leading, Steve?'...

Donna Shalala, the former president of the University of Miami who was brought in to lead the Clinton Foundation this year, had a stroke shortly after the closing ceremonies of the organization’s major fall event early Tuesday evening, officials said. Ms. Shalala, 74, fell ill after departing the closing events around the Clinton Global Initiative, which was held at the Sheraton New York hotel on Seventh Avenue in Manhattan, according to a statement from foundation officials.

Newt Gingrich is confident House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) will succeed Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) who is he retiring in October. Gingrich, who served as Speaker from 1995 to 1999, said McCarthy has broad appeal among Republicans in the lower chamber. “I think it’s very hard to replace him at this point,” Gingrich told host John Catsimatidis on "The Cats Roundtable" on AM 970 in New York on Sunday. “He’s a very bright, capable guy. He was the leader in the California assembly for the Republicans, he has been rising steadily, and he’s very widely liked and very widely...