Free Republic

On Friday, Senators Rand Paul (R-KY) and Corey Booker (D-NJ) offered a medical marijuana amendment on the floor of the Senate. The bill is a massive win for states’ rights, as it outlaws the Department of Justice and the Drug Enforcement Agency from undermining state marijuana laws and prohibits the DEA from interfering with the production of hemp in states where it is legal. There is simply no reason the federal government should be trampling over state laws to perform armed SWAT-team raids on state-legal medical marijuana dispensaries. Destroying property and hauling entrepreneurs off to jail is not the proper...

As the old saying goes, “A fool and his money are soon parted.” Four years ago we saw the “fool and his money…” play out with a great flourish on the Oprah Winfrey Show. Oprah did a show telling us what a great guy Mark Zuckerberg, the billionaire owner of Facebook is for pledging to donate $100 million to the City of Newark. Zuckerberg naively believed the money would be used to improve Newark’s school system. Of course the then mayor of Newark Cory Booker was only too happy to take this White Liberal sucker’s money to complete the “..are...

One week to the June 3rd GOP primary for senator in New Jersey! This week is CRUCIAL for Rich Pezzullo, as he is running in perhaps the most underwatched yet IMPORTANT primary in the country. He is polling either #1 or #2, depending on the poll or the flavor of the day. Nonetheless, he is the most consistently conservative candidate in the race who will caucus with the Ted Cruz / Mike Lee wing of the Republican Party if he wins the primary, then beats Cory Booker. I'll be blunt: This race is not just important for the senate seat,...

Newark, April 10–New Jersey Sen. Cory Booker (D) may be headed for a more difficult reelection campaign this fall than many political professionals seem to think. The reason: the mainstream press, which has been his biggest booster, is now beginning to question not only his veracity but his competence as Newark mayor, which recently took a hit from a report issued by the state comptroller. When he announced his intention to seek a Senate seat, Booker was considered a shoo-in. But the Senate campaign turned out to be no coronation. Although polls in early August had Booker with a 35-point...

New Jersey state senator Ron Rice, a Democrat, calls it “Newark-gate.” He is referring to a state comptroller’s report that details how a contractor swindled the city out of millions in public funds, and to the larger culture of “white-collar crime” that he says former Newark mayor Cory Booker allowed to flourish on his watch. For over a month now, Rice and one of his colleagues, Republican state senator Sam Thompson, have been calling for the New Jersey Legislative Select Committee on Investigation, which is currently investigating the Bridgegate scandal, to look into the “government abuses of power and cover-ups”...

The race to permanently replace Cory Booker as mayor of Newark has gotten a little crazy: Right now, former Newark city council head Luis Quintana is finishing out the term that Booker left when he became New Jersey's junior Senator, but he isn't trying to hold onto the seat after the scheduled election on May 13. Two Democrats — activist Ras Baraka and attorney Shavar Jeffries — are running against each other for the office. In mid-February, a surveillance camera caught a man setting fire to an empty Baraka campaign bus and, for good measure, pouring sugar in the gas...

“First of all, he’s a Texas meat-eating cowboy, I’m a Jersey boy, vegetarian, so choosing the restaurant alone,” Booker joked Thursday when asked about the meeting on “Good Day New York” on the local Fox affiliate.Booker and the Texas Republican were spotted dining together at Capitol Hill restaurant Bistro Bis last week.(Also on POLITICO: Booker shuns spotlight)“We went to a place close to the Capitol and we sat, what was going to probably be an hour meeting, we sat for three hours,” Booker said. “He and I sat for three hours looking for common ground. We found some good areas...

While you try to wrap your mind around that self-absorbed bit of self-serving political theater, take a break and enjoy the clip above where Cory Booker actually begins to muse nostalgically about first getting his driver’s license as a teen in New Jersey. His eyes turn misty as he remembers the “only trip” he ever took was to drive to Hawaii, and it was a beautiful – wait, what?!

Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D., Fla.) has become a major obstacle to a new bipartisan Iran sanctions measure, according to multiple sources on Capitol Hill and in Florida. Wasserman Schultz has broken with leading pro-Israel Democrats like New York Senator Chuck Schumer and New Jersey Senators Robert Menendez and Cory Booker, privately urging her fellow Democrats to follow the White House’s lead by opposing a bipartisan House resolution backing new sanctions on Iran, according to multiple congressional sources close to the debate. The Iran resolution fell apart in the final days of 2013 after House Democratic Whip Steny Hoyer (Md.)...

Authorities say a 15-year-old boy faces 2 counts of murder in the Christmas night slayings of two Newark children. […] The juvenile was apprehended in connection with the fatal shootings of a 13-year-old girl and a 15-year-old boy outside a home in the southern end of Newark near Interstate 78. […] Newark will end 2013 with more than 100 murders, the most the city has had since 2006. …

Senator Cory Booker (D-N.J.) joked on Twitter Wednesday afternoon that he would "bet a roll of chocolate chip cookie dough" that he won't run for president in 2016.

Tennessee Senator Lamar Alexander (R) Montana Senator Max Baucus (D) Alaska Senator Mark Begich (D) Georgia Senator Saxby Chambliss (R) Mississippi Senator Thad Cochran (R) Maine Senator Susan Collins (R) Texas Senator John Cornyn (R) Massachusetts Senator William "Mo" Cowan (D) Illinois Senator Dick Durbin (D) Wyoming Senator Mike Enzi (R) Minnesota Senator Al Franken (DFL) South Carolina Senator Lindsey Graham (R) North Carolina Senator Kay Hagan (D) Iowa Senator Tom Harkin (D) Oklahoma Senator Jim Inhofe (R) Nebraska Senator Mike Johanns (R) South Dakota Senator Tim Johnson (D) Louisiana Senator Mary Landrieu (D) Michigan Senator Carl Levin (D) Kentucky...

Republican Steve Lonegan is blasting fellow party members for not giving him enough financial support in his failed Senate bid against Newark Mayor Cory Booker. He continued, "The National Republican Senatorial Committee, whose job it is to elect Republicans, actually sent out an e mail that asked people to send money to the campaign," adding, "But they kept every penny. And now I’m left holding the bag."

Newark, N.J., Mayor Cory Booker, recently elected to the U.S. Senate and a keynote speaker at the Christian Catalyst conference in Atlanta earlier this month, had a protester removed from City Hall Monday after the man responded to his call for objections to a gay wedding ceremony by yelling that the marriage was "unlawful in the eyes of God and Jesus Christ." "OK, ladies and gentlemen, it is officially past midnight. Marriage is equal in New Jersey," Booker bellowed to a crowd of spectators, civic officials, and gay and lesbian couples waiting to tie the knot while gathered early Monday...

Opinion polls show New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie is leading in his race for re-election by a 2-to-1 margin, but his fellow Republicans may not take control of the legislature. And, USA Today reports, the potential 2016 presidential candidate, may not want them to. Presenting himself as a leader who can work with Democrats in the legislature and as a Republican who can win Blue State voters could give him more political mileage if he runs for president, the newspaper reported Thursday. Christie is on track to be the first Republican to win more than 50 percent of votes cast...

The consensus (more or less) among political analysts was that the GOP was likely to lose in the shutdown showdown, but was unlikely to suffer serious electoral consequences. The first prediction appears to be the case (but see Peter Beinart's smart contrarian take). How about the second one? It is early, but what evidence we have seems consistent with the idea that the GOP didn’t take on much electoral water from this loss. This isn’t to say that there isn’t any evidence that the shutdown hurt Republicans, but the idea that their prospects were seriously jeopardized is thin. Start with...

(CNN) - Senator-elect Cory Booker will move forward with his support of same-sex marriage even before he is sworn in, with plans to grant the marriages of several same-sex couples 12:01 a.m. Monday after a court ruling goes into effect. The story was first reported by Buzzfeed. The New Jersey Democrat, who's the mayor of Newark, re-tweeted that article to his celebrity-sized Twitter crowd of 1.4 million followers. According to Buzzfeed, Booker will recognize the weddings of at least 10 same-sex couples at Newark City Hall. The weddings will come after a New Jersey judge ruled last month that the...

Booker, 44, will become the Senate's seventh youngest member, and its ninth-ever African American and only the fourth black senator ever popularly elected. Even before winning the race, he was widely seen as a potential vice presidential contender as soon as 2016, though his credentials took a hit when the race turned out far closer than many expected. With nearly all of the vote counted, Booker led Republican Steve Lonegan by about 10 percentage points - a convincing margin in most races, but much smaller than many had predicted for a rising star facing an underfunded opponent with views out...

WASHINGTON - Will Cory Booker be another Ted Cruz? The next Hillary Clinton? Or something entirely different? After winning a Senate seat Wednesday, will Booker, a rising political star, follow Clinton's example and try to blend in to the slow-moving Senate, sticking with the tradition of freshmen quietly earning their place? Or will he join the ranks of lawmakers who use the Senate as a platform to build their profiles and shape the national debate, seniority be damned? "He is somebody who does like to make a splash, but I would hope that he would be a little more cautious...

Democrats did everything they could to portray yesterday’s special election for a Senate seat in New Jersey as a referendum on Republicans and the Tea Party. They clearly fell short of their expectations as Democrat Cory Booker underperformed his showing in almost all the polls, and wound up winning by only 10.3 points. By contrast, President Obama won New Jersey by 18 points just last November. At the same time, Democratic senator Robert Menendez cruised to a 19-point victory over a veteran moderate Republican state senator. In a video released on Monday, President Obama had urged people to vote for...