Free Republic

DES MOINES, Iowa — Texans Ted Cruz and Rick Perry courted Iowa conservatives on Saturday at the first major gathering of the 2016 Republican field — a chance for more than a half-dozen White House hopefuls to throw elbows, shape narratives, generate buzz and frame the choice to their advantage.Perry, making his first foray as an ex-governor, cast himself as a seasoned executive who can actually point to achievements — unlike, say, a senator.“I got a feeling that after six years of disappointment, of mediocrity and decline, a slow-course correction is not what voters are going to be looking for...

After Elizabeth Warren and Ted Cruz attacked the 2015 spending agreement in the Senate last week from opposite ends of the political spectrum, Washington engaged in a little parlor game: Is Warren the Cruz of the left? Though there are superficial similarities between the Massachusetts Democrat and the Texas Republican, the question is actually easy to answer. Elizabeth Warren is not Ted Cruz. She cannot possibly be Ted Cruz — because she is Jim DeMint. DeMint, the former Republican senator from South Carolina who now runs the conservative Heritage Foundation, is widely seen as the godfather of the tea-party movement....

There's no official Sen. Ted Cruz presidential team — yet. But the Texas Republican is already surrounding himself with key strategists and advisers that could make his transparent White House ambitions a reality. The tea party firebrand relies on a small circle of advisers to inform his views and amplify his ultraconservative message. The inner circle breaks down into two groups: his chief advisers in the Senate office, and the chiefs of his nationally-focused political operation, which he beefed up in the summer of 2014 by hiring a crop of seasoned Republican campaign operatives. These are the key players that...

Former Sen. Bob Bennett says even though Republicans are set to take over Congress come January, don't expect Sens. Ted Cruz and Mike Lee to set the agenda. Bennett, speaking at a conference in Washington, says Sen. Mitch McConnell, who will be majority leader in the next Congress, has done a masterful job of "isolating" Ted Cruz. "There is no cannier politician in Washington than Mitch McConnell," said Bennett. "Yes, Ted Cruz is an unsettling factor within the Republican conference. My sense of things is Mitch has very carefully, very methodically, very much under the radar isolated Ted Cruz. He's...

Bridget Johnson November 6, 2014 The first African-American senator to be elected from the South since reconstruction made dual history Tuesday as Tim Scott (R-S.C.) won the seat to which he was appointed after Jim DeMint’s retirement. Scott is also the first black senator to be elected in both the House and the Senate. “South Carolina voters vote their values and their issues and not my complexion. This is a great sign for what’s happening throughout the south. But certainly, a fantastic sign for the evolution that has occurred in South Carolina,” Scott told MSNBC this morning. His win versus...

In Dallas at an Americans For Prosperity event, Heritage Foundation president and former-Sen. Jim DeMint put his thumb firmly on the scale for Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) over fellow Texan Gov. Rick Perry for the coming 2016 presidential contest. “I think Cruz even more than Perry right now,” DeMint told the Associated Press. “Ted has become really the national conservative leader.”(continued)

U.S. Sen. Tim Scott easily won the Republican primary in South Carolina on Tuesday, setting up a general election that could make him the state’s first elected black senator. Early returns Tuesday showed Scott, 48, with about 90 percent of the vote over challenger Randall Young. Scott also is the heavy favorite to win in November in this heavily Republican state. …

Recently, I interviewed Jim DeMint for my radio show to discuss his new book, Falling In Love With America Again. Some remarks he made on the show, especially about slavery, have been burning up the blogosphere. Many of the articles imply or state that Mr. DeMint, former US Senator (R-SC) and now head of The Heritage Foundation, doesn’t know his US history. In the interview, I asked DeMint about the founding fathers, the Civil War, and slavery. He said: “Well the reason that the slaves were eventually freed was the Constitution, it was like the conscience of the American people....

Former Sen. Jim DeMint, the president of the Heritage Foundation, writes in his new book—“Falling in Love With America Again”—about the cozy relationship between big business and big government. “Almost all big corporations benefit from, advocate for, and downright like big government,” DeMint writes. […] “These big companies like to write regulations that make it harder for the smaller companies to compete with them,” DeMint said. “The large companies can deal with a regulatory maze much better than the small companies can. Like the big tobacco companies wanted the FDA to regulate cigarettes because they knew the smaller companies could...

On Friday, former Alaska Gov. Palin went to Nebraska and endorsed businessman Pete Ricketts for governor in the state in which her endorsement has proven to be the gold standard. Palin joined Kay Orr, Nebraska's former Republican governor whom Palin called the "original Mama Grizzly," to endorse to endorse Ricketts, whom Palin called the clear principled commonsense conservative choice in this race whose positions are clear: "he opposes amnesty and taxpayer funded benefits for illegal immigrants in any form and always has." Palin said the "alternative is woeful dependency on an inevitable sinking ship I call 'Liberal Lunacy.'" Palin has...

Machiavelli’s famous advice to politicians is that it is better to be feared than loved. Less often quoted is an equally valuable admonition: avoid being hated. Jim DeMint, the former senator-turned-Tea Party leader at the helm of the Heritage Foundation, never tried to win the love of the Republican establishment. He did, however, succeed over the past several years, first as the junior senator from South Carolina and since last year, as head of the GOP’s most prominent think tank, at being feared by his fellow Republicans. But now he finds himself in the position of being merely despised. Read...

Heritage Foundation president and former senator Jim DeMint defended Senator Ted Cruz’s brief filibuster this week that forced a 60-vote threshold to raise the debt ceiling, requiring Republican votes to do so.DeMint argued Cruz was merely holding to normal procedure: ”The normal rule is you take 60 votes to move to a final vote, [which] they call cloture. I think that several members, including Ted Cruz, were simply asking, ‘Let’s keep the normal rules here.’ And that didn’t suit some folks.”“The reason there’s a 60-vote rule in the Senate, and the reason Republican leadership fought so hard to keep it for nominations, is...

The Heritage Foundation of late has been subsumed to the bare-knuckle Heritage Action, the result being a diminution in the influence and intellectual integrity of the foundation. It is therefore cause for conservative celebration that Wall Street editorial board member Stephen Moore is being brought in as the foundation’s chief economist. Moore is pro-growth, pro-immigration — a cheery conservative warrior. If allowed free rein — and I can’t believe he would have taken the job unless he was assured of intellectual freedom — he has the ability to restore Heritage Foundation’s luster and to help introduce the far right to...

Fellow Conservatives: We have some very sad news to report. Dr. Tom Coburn (R-OK)U.S. Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) has announced that he will resign from the Senate this year. Dr. Coburn is battling a serious recurrence of cancer. This is a big loss for Oklahoma and the country. Dr. Coburn has been a tireless fighter against wasteful Washington spending. No senator has done more to research and expose our government's gross abuse of American taxpayers. He is a true citizen legislator and we need more like him in Washington. Please take a moment to read Jim DeMint's statement about the...

The leader of the Senate Conservatives Fund has become a controversial figure among Republicans for his willingness to back primary candidates against sitting GOP senators in the name of building a more conservative coalition. Matt Hoskins took over the fundraising operations for the group from former South Carolina GOP Sen. Jim DeMint when he left the Senate in 2012 to head up the conservative Heritage Foundation. Hoskins does most of his business from San Diego County, where he moved a few years ago to be closer to family. . . . . In this year's midterm elections, the Senate Conservatives...

Using a special method of fundraising that permits moving large amounts of funds to a candidate, a federal PAC has collected and forwarded more than $500,000 in earmarked contributions for five conservative Senate and House candidates. The Senate Conservatives Fund, a federal PAC that already gives contributions and makes independent expenditures for federal candidates, has reported collecting and forwarding $541,565 in earmarked contributions since May. During November they reported forwarding $201,460 to candidates. The PAC was founded by former Sen. Jim DeMint, R-S.C., and seeks to elect conservative candidates, but does not support liberal Republicans, and is not affiliated with...

As he was ascending to the pinnacle of power in the Senate Republican conference almost exactly seven years ago, Mitch McConnell planted the seeds of a feud that could conceivably end his career this May. Democrats, capitalizing on the public’s weariness with the Iraq War and outrage at the GOP’s Abramoff-era corruption, had taken control of both houses of Congress. And McConnell had been unanimously elected minority leader. As they are today, Republicans were searching for a way to reconnect with the public. McConnell, for example, canceled an annual lobbyist-funded retreat at the tony Greenbrier resort in West Virginia in...

The damage done to the Republican ad firm Jamestown Associates as punishment for working for the controversial outside group Senate Conservatives Fund could be even more substantial than first thought. It was originally reported that the National Republican Senatorial Committee would blacklist the company. But that might be just the beginning. Aside from the NRSC, Jamestown has, in the past, been awarded contracts to create independent expenditure ads for groups like the Republican National Committee, the National Republican Congressional Committee, and the Chamber of Commerce. In the campaign world, these I.E. accounts are considered especially lucrative business. But according to...

Think Republicans have been making fools of themselves? Blame Michael Needham. Link only to a very interesting article. Consider the source.

When Mitch McConnell wants to destroy you, you'll know it. The Senate minority leader has declared war against the Senate Conservatives Fund, an outside group supporting his Republican primary opponent, Matt Bevin. But rather than moving on and focusing on his Democratic opponent, McConnell and his allies have trained their attacks on SCF and its allies—with no apparent endgame in sight. The latest salvo came Monday, when National Review published a story that detailed the Kentucky senator's deep displeasure with Nebraska GOP candidate Ben Sasse for being endorsed by the conservative group. McConnell let him know about it during a...