Free Republic

<p>NASHVILLE, Tenn. (AP) -- Republican Ted Cruz's presidential campaign is rejecting a call to drop an anti-Shariah activist as his state chairman for Tennessee.</p> <p>Kevin Kookogey, a former chairman of the Williamson County GOP, once criticized Republican Gov. Bill Haslam over the role of a Muslim staffer and a council that has advised two state departments on Islamic affairs.</p>

Republican presidential hopeful Ted Cruz has named former Williamson County GOP chairman Kevin Kookogey, a critic of Sharia law, as his Tennessee chairman. Now, the U.S. senator is drawing fire from the Council on American-Islamic Relations which on Tuesday urged Cruz to drop Kookogey because of what the group called "his longstanding support for anti-Muslim and Islamophobic causes." In announcing Kookogey's appointment, Cruz on Monday called him "a consistently strong voice for conservative principles and an active member of our party for a number of years. "His experience and knowledge of both the landscape in Tennessee and the issues that...

NASHVILLE, Tennessee — Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz has named anti-Shariah activist Kevin Kookogey as his state chairman for Tennessee. Kookogey, a former chairman of the Williamson County Republican Party, was unsuccessful in his bid to coalesce tea party support for a primary challenge to U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander last year....

NASHVILLE — Republican Kevin Kookogey said today that after spending months preparing to become the Tea Party activists’ choice to oppose U.S. Sen. Lamar Alexander, R-Tenn., he is suspending plans to enter the race. The former Williams County Republican Party chairman said his plans went awry when state Rep. Joe Carr, R-Lascassas, entered the race nearly two weeks ago. Kookogey, who was preparing to formally announce his candidacy Wednesday, said he decided to withdraw over the weekend out of concerns tea party and other staunch conservative groups would be divided. “I spent most of my summer preparing to run against...

The tea party settled one question this afternoon at a meeting to audition candidates to challenge Sen. Lamar Alexander in next year’s GOP primary. Both Joe Carr and Kevin Kookogey promised they'll drop out of the picture if tea partiers are rallying behind the other guy. Carr, a three-term state representative from Murfreesboro, took the pledge in his opening statement to the crowd of roughly 300 at the Sheraton Music City Hotel. It was the first of five meetings to vet potential challengers to Alexander and to conduct secret straw polls. At the end of September, tea partiers will add...