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Influential Iowa Rep. Steve King has officially endorsed Ted Cruz for president, giving the GOP Texas senator a boost ahead of February’s Iowa caucuses. “Cruz has a proven record of standing up to both Democrats and Republicans to put the American people first, and I believe he is the only one who can unite conservatives around his campaign and build the organization needed to beat Hillary Clinton,” King said in a statement put out by the Cruz campaign. “With Ted Cruz, conservatives no longer have to accept a Republican nominee who doesn’t truly share our values.” King is a key...

Now, 25 Republican governors – and one Democrat too – have said they don't want Syrian refugees in their states, as President Obama recommitted the U.S. to take a portion of this population fleeing from ISIS. In a press conference this morning in Turkey, Obama said that 'the United States has to step up and do its part,' while chiding those in the opposition party for suggesting there be a 'religious test' for entry into the United States. There's concern, after Friday's brutal attack in Paris, that ISIS fighters are infiltrating those fleeing Syria and will carry out future violence...

This makes two major endorsements for Cruz in Iowa, the first being talk-radio host Steve Deace back in August. Probably the biggest among Iowa social cons is Bob Vander Plaats, head of the Family Leader, which is hosting its presidential forum this Friday. Vander Plaats endorsed Huckabee in 2008 and Huckabee won the caucuses; he endorsed Santorum in 2012 and Santorum won that year. (King, by contrast, endorsed Fred Thompson in 2008 and made no endorsement in 2012.) Vander Plaats, discussing the Christian conservative vote, also told NRO last month, “Our destruction in the past has been division we divide...

Congressman Steve King has endorsed Ted Cruz for President - saying Cruz is the "answer to my prayers" and that Ben Carson and Donald Trump's lack of Washington, D.C., experience makes the job "harder" for them. "I do believe that Ted Cruz is the full package, the constitutional conservative that can restore the soul of America," King told reporters in a conference room at the Des Moines Marriott. ... King is an influential voice in Iowa politics who was courted by many conservative Republicans including Bobby Jindal, Rick Santorum and Mike Huckabee. He said he made his decision Friday following...

Congressman Steve King Endorses Ted Cruz for President (video) Influential Iowa Rep. Steve King has officially endorsed Ted Cruz for president, giving the GOP Texas senator a boost ahead of February's Iowa caucuses."Cruz has a proven record of standing up to both Democrats and Republicans to put the American people first, and I believe he is the only one who can unite conservatives around his campaign and build the organization needed to beat Hillary Clinton," King said in a statement put out by the Cruz campaign."With Ted Cruz, conservatives no longer have to accept a Republican nominee who doesn't truly...

'I believe Ted Cruz is the candidate that's the answer to my prayers,' King said. Iowa Rep. Steve King on Monday endorsed Ted Cruz, a coup for the Texas senator who is seeking to gain ground with the first-in-the-nation caucus state's conservative activists, with whom King is deeply influential.He made the announcement at a press conference in Iowa and in a video released on Twitter."I believe Ted Cruz is the candidate that's the answer to my prayers," King said. "A candidate whom God will use to restore the soul of America." Cruz beat King to his own announcement, tweeting out...

Iowa representative Steve King will back Ted Cruz in the 2016 caucuses, handing Cruz an influential conservative endorsement in the crucial early-voting state. King, a firebrand who holds sway in social-conservative circles and in his western Iowa district, made the announcement Monday morning in Des Moines. "I believe Ted Cruz is the answer to my prayers: the candidate that god will use to restore the soul of America," he said at his press conference. The optics and organization of the press conference, announced late Sunday afternoon, were odd for King and Cruz, two politicians who have never shied away from...

In a speech on Senate floor last week, New York Sen. Chuck Schumer said Iowa Republican Rep. Steve King was controlling the party’s position on immigration and derailing immigration reform. (SNIP) Thursday, King responded to Schumer’s comment on the House floor saying it was Schumer not him who represented the fringe. Specifically King said Schumer represented “socialists, marxists, progressives, liberal Democrats.”

Iowa representative Steve King, one of the loudest opponents of comprehensive immigration reform in Congress, says he is not troubled by an amendment Ted Cruz proposed during the 2013 debate over the Gang of Eight reform bill, which has been used this week by Cruz’s opponents to portray him as soft on the issue. Cruz, who has long painted himself as the ideological purist in the race, found himself in an odd position this week: under fire from Marco Rubio, a co-sponsor of the failed Gang of Eight bill, for being in favor of expanded immigration. The attack stems from...

FORT DODGE, IOWA – Billionaire candidate Donald Trump raised further questions about Dr. Ben Carson's biography and character, questioning the story about the doctor attempting to stab one of his friends when he was young. In the course of a rally here, Trump questioned Carson's story that his friend's belt buckle stopped the knife, causing it to break.

This is the smartest possible response from a man who's admired by voters for his piety and service as a healer. He turned the other cheek: "It's so sad watching and listening to him," Armstrong Williams said on CNN's "New Day." "I mean, a man who is so accomplished, who has been so blessed, but yet cannot fathom why Dr. Carson or anyone else would be doing better than he in the presidential race right now.""He just cannot accept leading from behind," Mr. Williams said. "He cannot accept being challenged. He cannot reconcile how this is happening. Obviously, he only...

FORT DODGE, IOWA – Billionaire presidential candidate Donald Trump thrilled a crowd of over 13,000 supporters here during a speech that lasted over 90 minutes.Trump spent time criticizing some of his fellow Republican candidates such as Ben Carson, Gov. John Kasich, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), and even former New York Governor George Pataki.His most dramatic criticism, however, was saved for the mainstream media and the political pundits.“The media is very dishonest, unbelievably dishonest, they’re terrible,” he said, just days after finishing his debate performance.He said he thought he did well during the debate, but mocked pundits...

In 28 states, a hotel can refuse service to a transgender person, or discriminate against them in other ways, and face no legal repercussions. But this sort of discrimination is illegal under Iowa law, so a black trans woman filed a civil rights complaint Tuesday against a hotel that called the police on her, forcing her to spend eight days in jail.In July, 23-year-old cosmetology student Meagan Taylor and her best friend, who is also black and trans, checked into the Drury Inn, a hotel in West Des Moines, Iowa. The two were traveling from Illinois to Kansas City, Missouri,...

Last Thursday night, more than 100 community members gathered at the Waterloo Center for the Arts for a panel discussion of Racial Justice. The forum engaged the philosophy behind the Black Lives Matter movement and discussed the system of racial injustice here in the Cedar Valley and in the nation. Panel members included the Reverend Abraham Funchess, the Reverend Belinda Creighton-Smith, the Reverend Mary E. Robinson, Public Defender Aaron Hawbaker, and Chief Dan Trelka. As panelists eloquently explained, the Black Lives Matter movement is about reasserting the inherent dignity and respect of a group of people who have been diminished...

Have you had the feeling that your elected representatives were not representing you? Of course, you have. We have all felt that way and not just when we were represented by those against whom we voted. But, if you could, would you remove them? Most of us would not resort to such drastic measures, but one city has. Christian News reports Members of a city council in Iowa voted Monday to remove a veterans memorial that included a cross from a local park, and in turn, members of the community voted on Tuesday to remove the council members from office....

We have exhaustively outlined the GOPe road map to insure the nomination of Jeb Bush for the Republican Presidential Candidate in 2016. While the road map is rather complex, it essentially boils down to a strategy of small accumulated delegate pickups using 15-20% electoral support. GOP candidates 3 ADVERTISEMENT Candidates George Pataki and Jim Gilmore have already been disqualified from the Alabama Primary, yet they remain in the race. Only a handful of candidates (Bush, Trump, Cruz and to a lesser extent Rubio & Fiorina) have efforts underway to qualify for ballot placement in all of the states with primary...

Passionately professing that the Supreme Court decision allowing same-sex marriage must be overturned and laying out their conservative credentials, Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal pulpiteered to over 1,700 conservative Christians in Des Moines, Iowa, Friday for a two-day National Religious Liberties Conference.Before hearing from the presidential contenders, evangelical families collected name tags, perused a table filled with books like "What does the Bible Say About That: A Biblical Worldview Curriculum for Children" and connected with other like-minded conservatives. In the dimly lit hall, Kevin Sawnson, executive director of Generations, which was...

There are whispers in Iowa that volunteer supporters of Ted Cruz have been spreading malicious rumors about Dr. Ben Carson, claiming he is a supporter of mandatory vaccinations and conducted research using the tissue of aborted babies. Though they could hurt Carson with the evangelical voters who have flocked to him in Iowa and across the country, none of these attacks have gotten much oxygen on the national stage - certainly not from Cruz himself. Cruz has the ability and desire to appeal to the Christian conservatives who tend to dominate the Iowa caucuses, but Carson has emerged as the...

Donald Trump is back in the lead in Iowa, according to a new CNN/ORC International poll. Trump wins 25 percent of likely Republican caucusgoers in the poll, compared to 23 percent for Ben Carson. Those findings represent a much closer race between the two candidates compared to recent surveys that put Carson several points ahead. Still, half of Iowa GOP voters in the CNN poll released Friday are still trying to decide on a candidate to support in the February caucuses. Twenty-seven percent have "definitely decided." The latest CNN survey in Iowa finds Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) running in third...

Tapper to Cruz: Are You 'Endorsing Conservative Intolerance' by Attending Event with Activist Pastor Wrapping up his interview with 2016 Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz on Thursday’s edition of The Lead on CNN, host Jake Tapper asked Cruz about the upcoming National Religious Liberties Conference he’s attending in Iowa this weekend and if Cruz is “endorsing conservative intolerance” since its organized by an activist pastor named Kevin Swanson. Tapper arrived at his concluding question by providing background on Swanson and what he described as a history of “very inflammatory things about gays and lesbians” that included calls for Christians to...