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The Maryland House has passed a measure prohibiting the transfer or renewal of a license plate depicting the Confederate battle flag to another vehicle. [...] Maryland does not now offer plates with the Confederate battle flag. But prior to November, the Motor Vehicle Administration offered a Sons of Confederate Veterans organizational special registration plate that included it. ...

Mississippi legislators this year won't attempt to redesign the last state flag that features the Confederate battle emblem because leaders say they can't find a majority to remove the symbol from the 122-year-old banner. Tuesday was the deadline for legislative committees to act on general bills, and flag proposals are among hundreds of measures that died without being brought up for debate. Some bills proposed redesigning the flag to remove the rebel cross, while others would have stripped state money from colleges and local governments that refuse to fly the current banner. One bill offered separate-but-equal flags, keeping the current...

When asked whether he supported South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley’s decision to call for the Confederate battle flag to be taken down from out front of the State Capitol building, Trump said he did. “I would take it down, yes,” the billionaire real estate mogul said. “I think they should put it in a museum and respect whatever it is you have to respect.”Then, when asked what woman he would like to see on the new $10 bill, he responded — to laughter — “My mother.”The questions came after Trump spoke outside his Trump National Golf Club in Virginia. There,...

The South Carolina primary is about to get under way today, so of course Ted Cruz is up to his last minute shenanigans. You remember Iowa, of course, where he told voters Ben Carson was dropping out of the race and lied that the news came from CNN. This time, according to Schuyler Kropf at The Post and Courier, a Ted Cruz super pac, the Courageous Conservative Political Action Committee, has a new robocall going out to South Carolina voters that the Confederate flag is “Our flag.” Yes, it is your flag, and the first time you ran her up...

WEST COLUMBIA, S.C.-- A super PAC backing Ted Cruz is running robocalls and radio ads that remind voters Donald Trump supported removing the Confederate flag from South Carolina statehouse grounds. "Trump talks about our flag like it's a social disease," intones the spot, which is playing on about 30 radio stations in South Carolina, as well as a few in neighboring states. It includes clips of Trump saying, "Put it in the museum, let it go." "That's Donald Trump supporting Nikki Haley removing the battle flag from the Confederate memorial in Columbia," says the spot, which is paid for by...

A pro-Ted Cruz robocall in South Carolina is slamming Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump — and tying him to Gov. Nikki Haley (R) — for supporting the removal of the Confederate battle flag from public property. The call was put out by the Courageous Conservative Political Action Committee, which supports Cruz.

SEC-wide: Georgia, Alabama, Texas, Tennessee, Arkansas and Oklahoma all have higher proportions of evangelicals than Iowa. That bodes well for Ted Cruz. (Washington Post) Texas: The University of Houston will host a Feb. 25 GOP president debate, televised by CNN. The host and broadcaster had been in flux, and the event was moved back one day. (Texas Tribune) The mother of Sandra Bland, a Texas woman who died in police custody in a case that made national headlines, will campaign with Hillary Clinton in Chicago. (Associated Press)

Because of their opposition to issues like same-sex marriage, abortion and others, many Christian conservative voters in the South and elsewhere feel their faith and the moral code by which they live is under siege and look to the political arena for support. Inside the Sunshine Coin Laundry near the Piggly Wiggly supermarket, Lagretta Ellington removed her family's clothes from one of the large dryers and began to neatly fold them on a nearby table. The air was moist and smelled of detergent. The floor was concrete. Her views of the presidential race were anything but. She was unsettled, and...

Confederate monuments first erected after the Civil War to honor Southern soldiers have increasingly been targeted by civil rights activists who say they are offensive to blacks and should be taken down. An Alabama legislator wants to make sure that doesn't happen without state lawmakers' approval. Republican Sen. Gerald Allen of Tuscaloosa has proposed a bill that would prohibit the removal of historic monuments, plaques and statues from public property unless a committee of lawmakers grants a waiver. "I think there is an undercurrent, not just in Alabama, but throughout the nation" of people who "want to kind of rewrite...

Andre Perry, a New Orleans education consultant, said he was shocked on Sunday (Jan. 31) afternoon when he noticed that his 5-year-old son had caught a necklace of Mardi Gras beads studded with plastic Confederate flags, thrown from a float in the Krewe of Carrollton parade. "When I noticed what he caught," Perry wrote in a text message, "I took them away from him." Perry, who is African-American, said that he later did his best to help his son understand the implications of the symbol. He also posted a photo of the beads on his social media account, which attracted...

A Republican lawmaker who says he's grown weary of what he calls "Confederate cleansing" is working to preserve the famous carving of Robert E. Lee and other Confederate leaders on Georgia's Stone Mountain. "I'm tired of the anti-Confederate rhetoric toward Stone Mountain and any other Confederate monument that's out there," state Rep. Tommy Benton told the Morris News Service. "We're entitled to our heritage just like other people are entitled to theirs, and there seems to be an attempt to do Confederate cleansing." He continued: "I refer to that more as cultural terrorism than anything. They're attacking us for no...

GREENBRIER, Ark. Recent high school graduate Anthony Bauswell wanted to join the U.S. Marines, but contends he was rejected by a recruiter because of the color of his skin. On his left rib cage Bauswell has a Confederate flag tattoo, with a banner across it reading “Southern Pride,” and he told Arkansas Matters that the Marines recruiting center in Conway insists it disqualifies him from serving his country.

Last July, Anthony Hervey, an outspoken black advocate for the Confederate flag, was killed in a car crash. Arlene Barnum, a surviving passenger in the vehicle, told authorities and the media that they had been forced off the road by a carload of "angry young black men" after Hervey, while wearing his Confederate kepi, stopped at a convenience store en route to his home in Oxford, Mississippi. His death was in no small part caused by the gross level of ignorance, organized deceit and anger about the War of 1861. Much of the ignorance stems from the fact that most...

Civic leaders, activists, artists and others are celebrating, marching and paying homage Monday to Martin Luther King Jr., marking the 30th anniversary of the federal holiday honoring the slain civil rights leader. In South Carolina, civil rights leaders planned a march to their state capitol as in past years when their rally highlighted calls to remove the Confederate flag from Statehouse grounds. The King Day at the Dome gathering began in 2000 with that call. Last July, organizers got their wish as South Carolina swiftly removed the flag which had flown at the capitol for more than 50 years after...

U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz arrived Jan. 4 at the first stop on a six-day tour of Iowa. The Republican presidential candidate was set to visit 28 counties by bus. (Photo by Patrick Svitek) WASHINGTON — In the more than 200 events he's held since launching his campaign for the White House 10 months ago, Ted Cruz has tested out an unorthodox strategy, one that could rewrite the rules of Republican presidential politics.Since the Texas senator declared his candidacy in March, 40 percent of his public events have taken place in Iowa, according to a Texas Tribune analysis of his travel schedule as of Saturday. But...

TRUE HISTORY OF THE WAR FOR SOUTHERN INDEPENDENCE IN THIS AGE OF POLITICAL CORRECTNESS there has never been a greater need and greater opportunity to refresh our understanding of what happened in America in the years 1861-1865 and start defending our Southern forebears as strongly as they ought to be defended. There is plenty of true history available to us. It is our job to make it known. All the institutions of American society, including nearly all Southern institutions and leaders, are now doing their best to separate the Confederacy off from the rest of American history and push it...

Rubio wants a piece of the March states too, but his rivals have the momentum. "Amongst a lot of the grassroots, Sen. Cruz is definitely picking up momentum, there's no doubt about it," said Ryan Haynes, the unaligned chairman of the Tennessee GOP. NASHVILLE, Tenn.:The battle for the South has settled into a race between two candidates, and neither is Marco Rubio. In interviews with more than two dozen party officials, political operatives and activists, Ted Cruz and Donald Trump were repeatedly named as front-runners and likely winners in one of the most conservative regions of the country. Both contenders...

The unique base of support that has pushed Donald Trump to the top of the Republican presidential field in national polls is also likely to give him boost this spring when the campaign shifts to the South. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas has drawn wide attention for his own efforts in Southern states, many of which will vote as part of the big, March 1 "SEC Primary," when more convention delegates will be awarded than on any other day. Mr. Cruz, who is surging in the polls, is focusing on evangelical Christian voters and other social conservatives, which form the...

The unique base of support that has pushed Donald Trump to the top of the Republican presidential field in national polls is also likely to give him boost this spring when the campaign shifts to the South. Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas has drawn wide attention for his own efforts in Southern states, many of which will vote as part of the big, March 1 "SEC Primary" when more convention delegates will be awarded than on any other day. Mr. Cruz, who is surging in the polls, is focusing on evangelical Christian voters and other social conservatives, which form the...

DAPHNE, Ala.- After several days of the most intense scrutiny he's faced as a presidential candidate, Ted Cruz took the stage here on Saturday and delivered a fiery performance to a crowd of more than 1,300 cheering fans, aiming to put a turbulent week behind him.He roared threats to ISIL. He cracked jokes with the talkative audience members. And he received a big assist from Jeff Sessions, among the party's staunchest immigration hardliners and, the 2016 contender suggested, a possible secretary of homeland security in a Cruz administration."One of the things you've been hearing about is criticism of Ted and...