Free Republic

Mr. President, when it rains it pours, but most Americans hold their own umbrellas. Today in the Rose Garden you dismissed the idea of a Special Counsel to investigate the IRS scandal. With that, your galling political hubris shined bright in the midst of today’s dark clouds. Mr. President, how can we trust your Justice Department to conduct an independent investigation when there is a systemic violation of the Hatch Act throughout your administration? Surely you are aware that the Hatch Act prevents certain federal employees from engaging in political activity. Specifically, it’s illegal for these federal employees to engage...

The Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday adopted a substitute amendment to immigration reform legislation with a strong bipartisan margin, signaling which Republicans are most likely to support the bill. Only four Republicans voted against the substitute amendment, which expands the legislation to 867 pages and increases funding for implementation of reform by $900 billion. It passed by a margin of 14-4. Sens. Chuck Grassley (Iowa), the ranking Republican on the panel, Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), Ted Cruz (R-Texas) and Mike Lee (R-Utah) voted against the substitute, which sponsors characterized as a bundle of technical fixes. Four Republicans on the panel voted...

Senate Republicans say the Labor Department appears to be spending millions in taxpayer dollars to establish labor unions and promote collective bargaining in foreign countries and is asking top Obama administration officials for a full audit. The request was sent by Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch, the leading Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, and Tennessee Sen. Lamar Alexander, the top Republican on the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee. “At a time when our federal budget is deteriorating rapidly … it is troubling to us that the department appears to be spending millions of dollars of taxpayer funds to establish...

Sens. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), three key Republican players on immigration, told The Hill they're ready to start working on broad-based reforms next year that could include a pathway to citizenship for the 11 million undocumented immigrants currently in the United States.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius will soon be back to doing what she does best — campaigning for President Obama. Sebelius will travel to New Hampshire this weekend for a swing of “grassroots events” with Obama, according to the New Hampshire Union Leader. The campaign trip comes after the Office of Special Counsel found that Sebelius had violated federal campaign law by campaigning for Obama during an official event. “OSC concluded that Secretary Sebelius violated the Hatch Act when

Rare is the Tea Party-tested Republican senator who hangs an image of the Kennedys' Hyannisport home over his desk and shows off the painter's personal inscription. "Orrin," reads the note, scribbled below a cobalt-blue sea. "We'll leave the light on at the compound for you anytime. Ted Kennedy, '91." The beacon of bipartisanship that defined their odd-couple relationship still guides Utah's Orrin Hatch. He didn't advertise it as he wooed and won over the tea partiers who, two years ago, toppled fellow conservative Robert Bennett from his Senate perch. But now, with his state's Senate GOP nomination in hand and...

The polite word is pivot. For two years, Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch cozied up to the tea party — scoring perfect ratings from the American Conservative Union — and avoided getting dumped in a primary like former colleague Bob Bennett did in 2010. But now, after winning his late-June Republican primary, Hatch is pushing a bundle of special-interest tax breaks that hard-core conservatives liken to handcuffs on the free market. He wrote the bill with Finance Committee Chairman Max Baucus (D-Mont.) and watched Thursday as five of the 11 Republicans on the panel voted to kill it. The bill stops...

The Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) has a General Counsel and legal staff to ensure that the agency’s actions are lawful. Did they take the day off last Thursday?We have to question whether the department lawyers were consulted at all about the “Information Memorandum” issued by HHS last Thursday that invites states to come up with creative excuses (aka “demonstration projects”) to suspend the work requirements in the welfare reform law.Given the clear, unambiguous, and binding legal prohibition for that type of waiver, if they were consulted, the lawyers involved were embarrassingly careless in approving language that is...

Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Nev.) said Monday he “still has a very high opinion of Chief Justice John Roberts," despite Roberts opinion upholding the individual mandate in Obamacare as constitutional. Hatch, the ranking Republican on the Senate Finance Committee and a senior member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, had been one of the earliest and most forceful voices in the Senate speaking out against the constitutionality of the individual mandate when it was first proposed in 2009. On Monday, however, Hatch told CNSNews.com that Roberts “certainly had the right” to rule that the mandate is constitutional as a tax. “Naturally, I...

With 43% of precincts reporting, veteran U.S. Senator Orrin G. Hatch is the projected winner over challenger Dan Liljenquist in a primary election held in tandem with the final presidential primary in the nation.The 2-1 margin of victory was a surprise to some observers considering that Hatch's fellow former senator Bob Bennett was defeated at the convention even before the state primary vote in 2010.

About five weeks ago or so, Governor Palin endorsed Senator Orrin Hatch in his primary contest with Dan Liljenquist. I join other conservatives like Mark Levin, Sean Hannity, and Tea Party leaders like Sal Russo in encouraging Utah voters to return Orrin Hatch to the U.S. Senate. Since Mark Levin has always got a way with words, read what he recently told Senator Hatch: “I feel that you would be… a terrific elder statesman to a lot of these other young guys who I’m going to be pushing in these other states.” I’m with Mark. That’s spot on. We need...

"If you want to get involved in business," Sen. Orrin Hatch warned technology companies at a conference in 2000, "you should get involved in politics." Hatch was referring to the shortcomings of then-software king Microsoft, which he had spent most of the previous decade harassing from his perch as Judiciary Committee chairman. The message was clear: If you become successful, you must hire lobbyists, you must start a political action committee, and you must donate to politicians. Otherwise Washington will make your life very difficult.

Orrin Hatch is responsible for the Dream Act, the provisions of which Obama is now implementing through executive order. Hold him accountable! Remove him from office on June 26th!

A storm is not a good time to be at the wheel of a ship and a worldwide economic disaster is not a good time to be at the wheel of the ship of state. Hard times are supposed to bring great men to the fore, but instead we have some of the sorriest men in history trying to find the wheel, sleeping off a bender in their cabins or debating whether a wheel even exists. Obama is bad, but he's not exactly up against rival statesmen. After parading around with a one-man cult of personality, launching international projects with...

Six-term entrenched incumbent Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, is attacking his conservative challenger, Dan Liljenquist, over his alleged support for tax hikes in Washington. My sides ache. Liljenquist has never voted for federal tax hikes or massive entitlement spending or multi-billion-dollar bailouts or serial debt-limit increases in Washington because he has never served in Washington. Never. Hatch, by contrast, has spent the last 36 years racking up a Big Government record that cannot be whitewashed away. Outside the Beltway/Hatch fog machine, Liljenquist’s integrity and commitment to reining in runaway spending are unassailable. In state legislative policy circles, he’s known as the...

Dan Liljenquist’s campaign has stated that he would never label himself a “Tea Party” candidate, and now we see why. http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=YgIUmxoEO7Y Update by Doug: I’m stunned. For a couple of reasons. First, all these alleged Tea Party proponents are supporting a guy who’s already signaled his willingness to compromise with liberals on what’s supposed to be one of the Tea Party’s core principles: Tax increases. Isn’t TEA an acronym for “taxed enough already”. Not that Liljenquist would know since, as Stacy noted above, he doesn’t consider himself a Tea Party candidate anyway. I can certainly see why.

IÂ’m not going to tell readers that IÂ’m Senator Orrin HatchÂ’s biggest fan, but I can tell you, I certainly understand why Sarah Palin has endorsed him, and agree with her 100%. After breaking the news on GretaÂ’s show, Governor Palin eloquently laid out her reasons for backing Senator Hatch on Facebook. Watch the video and read her note here. As Sarah notes, Orrin Hatch has consistently been the strongest, loudest voice, championing Conservative nominees to the Supreme Court. This is a big deal, as the next president will likely appoint two or as many as three new Justices to...

The two people least surprised by Sarah Palin’s endorsement of Senator Orrin Hatch this week are Palin and Hatch. In the Twitter and Facebook era, they became political allies the old-fashioned way: through handwritten letters and personal phone calls. It’s an unlikely, politics-fueled friendship that’s fit for a Robert Caro book. Hatch, a soft-spoken grandfather, is one of Palin’s top outside mentors. He encourages her and cheers her. They share family stories, they discuss history, and they talk about legislation. “It’s true,” Palin tells National Review Online. “He’s a warrior.” She respects his record, especially his work on the Senate...

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R) has endorsed Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), who is facing a Tea Party challenge from former state Sen. Dan Liljenquist (R). "I want him to win. I join Sean Hannity and Mark Levin and other conservatives who would like to see Mr. Balanced Budget return to Washington," Palin said on Fox News on Tuesday night. "He wants to apply that common-sense economic principle of balanced-budget fiscal responsibility, and I want to see him reelected." Palin is the latest big-name conservative to signal she has no problem with the six-term senator. Hatch has a big advantage...

Sarah Palin has just announced that she is endorsing Sen. Orrin Hatch in the Utah Senate primary. Palin revealed this on Greta Van Susteren’s show. She emphasized Hatch’s record and position on balancing the budget........"

Sen. Orrin Hatch fell 31 votes shy of winning the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate, forcing him into a primary election for the first time since his first election in 1976.

The Tea Party movement is alive in Utah. With representatives from FreedomWorks in the audience, delegates at the Utah Republican Convention managed to force Sen. Orrin Hatch into a June 26 primary. He got 59.2 percent of their votes against Dan Liljenquist, a 38-year-old state senator. Hatch needed 60 percent to avoid the primary. He couldn’t do it. In two rounds of voting, he went from 2,243 votes to 2,313 votes. If he’d gotten 32 more votes, he would have wrapped this up… FreedomWorks and other Tea Party groups now have two Causes to distract them from their failure to...

Folks, just heard, Hatch in a run off ! Liljenquist and Tea Partiers did it !!!

Utah Republican Orrin Hatch has spent 36 years in the U.S. Senate, including stints as chairman of the Judiciary and Labor committees. He's in line to become chairman of the Finance Committee if Republicans gain control of the Senate in November. But back home in Utah, Hatch's quest for a seventh term is not the cakewalk he had in the last five elections, in which he didn't even have to run in primaries. In fact, the Hatch campaign has spent more than $5.7 million in the past 15 months just to make sure he'll survive the Utah Republican nominating convention...

Indianapolis (AP) -- Sen. Richard Lugar sounded wistful in his gratitude when he thanked supporters packed in the skybox of the Indiana Pacers' home court, as though he could see the approaching end of a political career that has spanned nearly half a century. "I thank all of you, the 50 or 60 of you who are co-sponsors of the rally. We appreciate very much your willingness to put your own names on the line and be helpful in bringing together this assembly," said the 80-year-old Indiana Republican who was first elected to the Senate in 1976. That characteristically understated...

Do I agree with Obama's interpretation of Luke 12:48? No. Do I agree with Obama in his 2004 interview "I have a deep faith" in which he said that there many paths to heaven/the Father and his words which were contrary to Jesus saying He is the "Way, Truth, Life...no man comes unto the Father but by me." Absolutely not. Do I agree with Mormon teaching that Jesus and Satan are brothers? Again, absolutely not. (link below in comments section.) The point of the this thread is to point out that Orrin Hatch was wrong. In fact, I believe that...

GOP's Hatch: Someone needs to remind Obama he's not Jesus ChristBy Josiah Ryan - 02/02/12 06:43 PM ET Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) on Thursday evening said President Obama needs a reminder that he is not Jesus Christ. "In 2008, the president declared that his nomination was the world historical moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal," Hatch said in a a speech from the Senate floor. "Someone needs to remind the president that there was only one person who walked on water and he did not occupy the Oval Office." Hatch...

Washington, DC --(Ammoland.com)- Two pro-gun conservatives recently announced they were running against Utah Senator Orrin Hatch. This is welcome news for gun owners. In a Senate career that has lasted more than thirty five years, Hatch has not been a particularly good friend of the Second Amendment. During negotiations over the 1986 McClure-Volkmer Firearms Owners Protection Act – designed to protect gun owners from abuses of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms -- Hatch sat at the negotiating table next to officials of the ATF and argued against the pro-gun positions of Sen. Jim McClure. Though a senior member...

WASHINGTON - Recognizing the need to revamp outdated and restrictive gun laws, U.S Senators Mark Begich (D-Alaska) and Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) have introduced the Firearms Interstate Commerce Reform Act. The bill allows for the interstate sale of firearms and removes several antiquated and unnecessary restrictions imposed on interstate firearms transactions.“Utahns and Americans everywhere have a right to bear arms, and this legislation ensures that onerous and outdated restrictions on everyone’s Second Amendment rights are no longer in place,� Sen. Hatch said. “By removing these restrictions, we can ensure that the constitutional freedoms we seek to protect remain intact.�“Current laws restricting interstate commerce of firearms...

Sen. Mike Lee's bold, outspoken conservatism isn't sitting well with many of his more senior Republican colleagues in a chamber where even the staunchest of rivals tend to refer to each other as "my good friend." The freshman Utah Republican's willingness to offer opinionated advice on policy and political strategy during closed-door Conference meetings has irked Members accustomed to Senate tradition, which values the input of tenured Members and expects the newly elected to maintain a deferential profile. Lee ousted Sen. Bob Bennett last year in a GOP primary, a factor that might have contributed to the tension. "He's not...

While Obama’s out there pointing at bridges that might need repair, Orrin Hatch reveals that there were 35 states that got less stimulus money for their roads, highways, and bridges than Solyndra did in a guaranteed loan for their green jobs scam.

WASHINGTON (Legal Newsline) - U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) is asking National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) member and former Service Employees International Union (SEIU) official Craig Becker to explain his involvement in alleged union intimidation efforts. Hatch wrote to Becker in response to the SEIU's "Contract Campaign Manual" document that went public. The handbook instructs union members to purposefully ...

Sen. Orrin Hatch, Utah Republican, asked National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) member Craig Becker on Tuesday if he helped the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) write its “intimidation manual.” “According to several recent news reports, some controversial documents have come to light in the course of SEIU’s current litigation with Sudexo, Inc., [sic] including a ‘Contract Campaign Manual,’ which provides details regarding the strategies employed by the union during organizing and contract campaigns,” Hatch wrote to Becker. “Among other things, the manual explicitly advises union members to engage in tactics designed to attack the reputation of an employer as well...

Yes, Tea Party organizer David Kirkham is “very seriously” considering running against Sen. Orrin Hatch for the GOP Senate nomination next year. But not until after Track Day on Sept. 10. What’s Track Day, one may ask? It’s Kirkham’s power car restoration business’s annual event at the Miller Sports Park where his customers from around the world come to enjoy the fun and trills of driving a high-performance automobile on a professional racetrack. “This really is a big event for my company,” said Kirkham, talking to UtahPolicy by phone from his auto shop with banging and hissing noises in the...

SALT LAKE CITY (ABC 4 News) - Republican Senator Orrin Hatch doesn't think Democratic Congressman Jim Matheson will run against him next year. What's more, Hatch isn't ruling out yet another run in 2018. (snip) Senator Hatch, not surprisingly, thinks Jason Chaffetz made the right decision to stay in the House of Representatives. Not that the senator was worried about getting the boot from the former BYU kicker. ABC 4: "I always got the impression you were confident you could beat him?” Senator Hatch: “Well, let's put it this way. I am a hard worker and no one is going...

Not only are factions of the Tea Party working to dump Utah Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch, but now they're attacking the movement's darling, Sarah Palin, for going all lovey-dovey over Hatch.

GOP Rep. Jason Chaffetz had raised the hopes of grass-roots conservative activists outside the Beltway for months with strong indications that he would mount a David vs. Goliath challenge to the four-decade incumbent Hatch: The Chaffetz calculus is not simple. On one hand, Hatch is widely seen as vulnerable to a conservative challenger and Chaffetz is well-known and liked among Utah’s tea party base. However, Chaffetz was a leading spokesman for House conservatives during the recent debt ceiling debate and sponsor of the Cut, Cap and Balance proposal, which advocated slashing government spending and requiring Congress to pass a balanced...

Utah Republican Senator Orrin Hatch may have dodged a conservative primary challenge — at least from one possible opponent. The Salt Lake Tribune reports that sources say Utah Rep. Jason Chaffetz, who has acknowledged that he is considering challenging Hatch for the GOP nomination, will announce Monday afternoon that he is not going to campaign for Hatch’s Senate seat. Chaffetz did not immediately return a message from The Daily Caller left on his cell phone.

Link only, per FR posting rules

New documents obtained by Judicial Watch through a Freedom of Information Act request show that the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) spent over one million taxpayer dollars promoting Obamacare in coordination with the 2010 mid-term elections. The documents include correspondence between HHS officials and representatives from The Ogilvy Group, the public relations firm hired to drive web traffic to an HHS site promoting Obamacare as "the Affordable Care Act." On October 25, 2010, HHS New Media Communications Director Julia Eisman sent an email to Ogilvy Senior Vice President Imani Green, reading, "Given the high performance, we're wondering if...

In a bombshell accusation, the government watchdog group Judicial Watch announced today that the Obama administration used taxpayer money to help orchestrate an internet search engine manipulation campaign specifically promoting Obamacare. Judicial Watch obtained 2,328 pages of records pursuant to a March 23, 2011, Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) lawsuit. The FOIA information included correspondence between the Department of Health and Human Services and the Ogilvy Group, the public relations fire hired by the White House to push Obamacare on the American people. Judicial Watch listed the following as major points of interest from the FOIA request (all bullets quoted):...

As faithful readers of this blog know, I was reporting on the Tea Party movement long before it was even called the Tea Party movement — and long before a legion of Johnny-come-latelys in Washington had grabbed their fiscal conservative costumes and joined the parade. I can remember not being able to get mainstream media coverage on the day of one of the first taxpayer protests in Denver in February 2009. We’ve come a long way, baby. From day one, I emphasized that the grass-roots activists leading the Tea Party charge have been as opposed to Big Government Republicans as...

I am not a Sarah Palin hater. As an Alaska native, I have some appreciation for the political skill needed to knock off Frank Murkowski and Tony Knowles in the same election – political skill that simply isn’t possessed by idiots. And I’ve watched with admiration as she has continually kept herself in the news while shaping the national conversation in subtle (and sometimes not-so-subtle) ways. But over the last several months, Palin’s unique brand of activism seems to have shifted – whether consciously or unconsciously – towards the will of the Republican Establishment. Consider: Palin’s first break with grassroots/TEA...

I just read a very bizarre blog post about entrenched incumbent Utah Sen. Orrin Hatch by Fox News anchor Greta van Susteren and then watched an equally distressing interview van Susteren conducted last night with Sarah Palin regarding Hatch. First, the title of van Susteren’s blog post: “Is someone trying to manipulate the UTAH Tea Party vote unfairly away from Senator Orrin Hatch?” Van Susteren absurdly suggests that dark, sinister, unnamed, and uninformed forces in Utah with outside backing are somehow trying to take away Hatch’s seat through nefarious means. She’s clearly talking about D.C.-based fiscal conservative groups like FreedomWorks...

Calling himself a tea party true believer, Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) on Tuesday in the same interview both praised the debt ceiling deal and said he plans to vote against it. Hatch, who faces a looming primary challenge from the right from Rep. Jason Chaffetz (R-Utah), took to Fox News’s “Fox and Friends” to tout his own tea party credentials. “Look, I think the tea party people deserve a lot of credit,” he said in response to a question about Democrats and Vice President Joe Biden reportedly calling freshman GOP members of Congress terrorists. “We wouldn’t be where we are...

Hannity endorses Hatch during the same interview that Hatch praises McConnell and Boehner for extracting "significant cuts" from Obama. Hatch also endorsed Romney during the interveiw. His conservative votes lately are so transparent. Jason Chaffetz for Senate.

Utah U.S. Senator Orrin Hatch blasted President Obama in the weekly GOP address, calling for a balanced budget amendment in exchange for supporting an increase in the debt ceiling. "Instead of sending that amendment to the states for ratification, and addressing the need for fiscal balance, 14 years later, our nation faces a debt crisis of epic proportions," Mr. Hatch said. "Our national debt has gone from roughly $5 trillion in 1997 to over $14 trillion today." The Utah Republican, who has repeatedly criticized the Obama administration’s handling of the debt talks, said congressional Republicans should limit Washington's ability to...

Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) doesn’t yet have an official primary opponent, but he might as well be running against the Club for Growth. A nasty war of words has erupted between the two sides, setting the stage for what appears to be a likely effort by the Club to unseat Hatch next year. (snip) The Club earlier this week released ads in Utah and Indiana (where it is also considering targeting GOP Sen. Richard Lugar), urging the two men to resist raising the debt limit, while also taking some shots are their records on government spending. But as we’ve written...

...MYTH: Tax Expenditures are Loopholes FACT: This is deliberately inaccurate. A loophole is something that Congress did not intend and would generally shut down, at least going forward, once it learned of the loophole. Tax expenditures, by contrast, were generally placed by Congress into the tax code deliberately. For example, the largest tax expenditure is the exclusion for employer-provided health insurance and benefits. The second-largest: the home mortgage interest deduction. Whether you agree with a particular tax expenditure or not, an honest debate requires recognition that tax expenditures were designed by Congress with economic or social goals in mind and...

A new TV ad campaign from a conservative anti-tax group seeks to harden key Republican lawmakers against compromising with Democrats on a deal to raise the debt ceiling. The ads by the Club for Growth target two key Republican senators trying to ward off primary challenges from the right and another ad, which will run nationally on cable TV...