Free Republic

Mitch McConnell reacted to Harry Reid's impending retirement. The Senate majority leader had kind words for his Democratic counterpart, who announced Friday he would be retiring in 2016. "Nothing has ever come easily to this son of Searchlight. Underestimated often, his distinctive grit and determined focus nevertheless saw him through many challenges," McConnell said in a statement. "They continue to make him a formidable opponent today."

Somewhere former Florida governor Jeb Bush and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker are having a good laugh. “The onetime friendship between Sens. Ted Cruz and Rand Paul has grown frosty as they both vie to become the leading conservative in the 2016 GOP presidential primary,” the Hill reports. “The Kentucky senator stepped on his Texas colleague’s campaign rollout this week by questioning his electability, a move that Cruz’s allies saw as a deliberate attempt to distract from his message.” Well, duh. This is a contest after all. Did Cruz expect his opponents to lay off? Paul says Cruz has no appeal...

Senate Republicans are proposing a budget amendment that would let states opt out of the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) controversial climate rule for power plants.Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) proposed the amendment Tuesday on behalf of Sen. Rob Portman (R-Ohio), who is up for reelection in 2016. ADVERTISEMENT Under the amendment, a state’s governor or legislature would be able to opt out of the rule’s requirements for a variety of reasons.In order to be exempt from the rule, a governor or legislature would have to cite one of the following reasons: that the rule would hurt low-income or fixed-income...

WASHINGTON — Senator Mitch McConnell of Kentucky has begun an aggressive campaign to block President Obama’s climate change agenda in statehouses and courtrooms across the country, arenas far beyond Mr. McConnell’s official reach and authority. The campaign of Mr. McConnell, the Senate majority leader, is aimed at stopping a set of Environmental Protection Agency regulations requiring states to reduce carbon pollution from coal-fired power plants, the nation’s largest source of greenhouse gas emissions. Once enacted, the rules could shutter hundreds of coal-fired plants in what Mr. Obama has promoted as a transformation of the nation’s energy economy away from fossil...

Warlords don’t have use for peace because peace doesn’t have use for warlords. Only hours after the results revealing the Likud Party’s lead in obtaining the most seats – 30 to its closest competitors’ 24 of the Zionist Union (formerly the Labor Party)– in the next Israeli Knesset (Parliament), the National Republican Senatorial Committee in the U.S. sent an email message to millions of U.S. residents congratulating Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for what most likely will result in his re-election for a fourth term. The announcement includes a congratulatory petition for people to sign, and states in part: “The...

The failure of congressional Republicans to take action to stop President Obama’s arguably unconstitutional and illegitimate executive actions, on immigration in particular, has created a growing unrest among those who put John Boehner in charge of the House and Mitch McConnell the Senate. While there have been failed revolts in the House against Boehner’s leadership, by and large the anger has been kept out of the official GOP organizational structure. Until now. In what may be the first such action since the so-called “Cromnibus” and DHS funding passed, on Thursday night, March 12, 2015,the Tompkins County (NY) Republican Party Executive...

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell doesn’t have to bring U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch, President Barack Obama’s nominee to serve as the next Attorney General of the United States, up on the Senate floor for a vote next week—or ever—if he doesn’t want her confirmed. But he’s doing it anyway, even though just four Senate Republicans have said they’ll vote for her—and even their support for her is questionable at this point. McConnell’s office has struggled to defend the Majority Leader’s decision—which flies in the face of a pre-election promise to not allow any attorney general nominee who supports Obama’s executive...

The U.S. will hit its debt limit on March 16 but with some "extraordinary measures" it will be able to fund the government on a temporary basis, according to U.S. Treasury Secretary Jack Lew, who urged Congress in a letter to raise the debt limit immediately. In the letter to House Speaker John Boehner and other House and Senate leaders, Lew said on March 13 his office would have to suspend the issuance of some local and and state securities, reports CNBC. "Accordingly, I respectfully ask Congress to raise the debt limit as soon as possible," Lew wrote in his...

The Talk Shows March 8th, 2015 Guests to be interviewed today on major television talk shows: FOX NEWS SUNDAY (Fox Network): Rep. John Lewis, D-Ga. ; former Gov. Mike Huckabee, R-Ark.MEET THE PRESS (NBC): Sens. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., and Claire McCaskill, D-Mo.; Lewis.FACE THE NATION (CBS): Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu; Sens. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., and Tim Scott, R-S.C.; Rep. Trey Gowdy, R-S.C.; Benjamin Crump, lawyer for the family of Michael Brown, the unarmed black 18-year-old shot to death by a white police officer in Ferguson.THIS WEEK (ABC): Mayor James Knowles of Ferguson, Missouri;...

Kentucky is one place in America where a tea-party firebrand and a Republican from the governance wing amicably meet.For two Republican senators from the same state, Rand Paul and Mitch McConnell could not be more mismatched. Senator Paul is a man in a hurry, with presidential stars in his eyes after a mere four years of serving Kentucky in Washington. The loquacious libertarian is a darling of young conservatives – a relaxed jeans-and-boots kind of guy. Senator McConnell, after three patient decades in office, has finally reached his dream job of Senate majority leader. A man of few words, he’s...

Well Mr. Speaker the charade is over. Obama has received just what he wanted and you and Mitch helped him. You can both now get back in line, knee pads in hand, ready to kiss the bony rear of your leader and ask, "What do you want next, Sire?" A real man once called some of our foes the, "Axis of Evil." Well I see another axis right here in what is left of America. Between you and McConnell and Obama you are destroying the America you grew up in and it apparently isn't going to stop. A more ineffective...

Jeb Bush reminded a CPAC audience what a conservative isn't; Ted Cruz of Texas reminded them what a conservative is. Friday, Governor Jeb Bush began to speak before the Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) in National Harbor, Md., when a sudden shuffling of feet signaled the exodus of conservative Tea Party activists from the Patomac Ballroom of the Gaylord National Resort & Convention Center. Bush now knows what New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio feels when an army of police officers turn their backs to him at every speech. William Temple, a Tea Party organizer from Brunswick, Georgia, led...

Congress closed in Friday on approving a short-term spending bill for the Homeland Security Department that would avert a partial agency shutdown hours before it was to begin. The legislation also leaves intact Obama administration executive actions on immigration that Republicans have vowed to overturn. But Republicans insisted that passing a short-term bill preserved their ability to keep fighting them. But Senate Republicans had already admitted defeat. As debate proceeded in the House, the Senate voted 68-31 to approve a full-year bill free of contentious immigration provisions. Some House Republicans predicted that they would eventually end up doing the same...

First Barack Obama decided to overreach and extend amnesty by executive order. One judge in Texas has told him no and Republicans are hanging their hat on that judge’s order. Then the FCC decided to declare internet a public utility. They overreached, rushed it through, and committed to as little transparency as possible to make it happen. Congress did nothing on this front and the FCC decided to replace the Congress on the matter. Now there are reports that Barack Obama, by executive order and agency regulation, will curtail the manufacture of certain ammunition. Again and again and again the...

I’ve been perplexed for six years as to why Hillary-the-Inevitable has already been deemed our next president. Likewise, I didn’t understand the Dems insistence on continually pumping up the deflated War on Women balloon and attempting to send it aloft again…and again when it clearly hasn’t been ready for prime time since the ‘80’s.Mylar; perfect.Then, as I was reading Daniel Henninger’s column, Captain America Won’t Save Us, it hit me: it was all part of “the deal” as I’ll explain in a bit. You have to feel sorry for the Democrats. In a world warming to presidential politics, what do...

Ken Cuccinelli Senate Conservatives Fund President Ken Cuccinelli calls Senate Republicans’ decision to push Homeland Security funding that includes money for President Obama’s amnesty a “total surrender” that proves GOP leaders “really don’t have any backbone.” Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., decided earlier in the week to stop pushing a Department of Homeland Security, or DHS, appropriations bill that strictly forbids funding for Obama administration executive action on immigration in 2012 and 2014. With Democrats blocking debate, McConnell agreed to bring a “clean” bill forward in exchange for Democrat promises to vote on a separate bill to defund...

Senate leaders from both parties will meet with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu during his visit to Washington, D.C., next week. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and Minority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) will meet with Netanyahu on Tuesday afternoon, after his address to a joint session of Congress on the Iranian nuclear threat. On Wednesday, Netanyahu declined an invitation to meet only with Senate Democrats, fearing it would “compound the misperception of partisanship” surrounding his visit. The bipartisan invite comes amid rising tension between the Obama administration and Netanyahu. National security adviser Susan Rice on Wednesday called Netanyahu’s visit...

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell faced a backlash Wednesday from conservatives after backing off demands that Congress reverse President Obama’s immigration executive actions as a condition for funding the Department of Homeland Security. Senate Democrats, meanwhile, voiced support for the new plan after initially staying coy. A day earlier, McConnell, R-Ky., effectively gave them what they’ve been demanding – by agreeing to hold a stand-alone vote on a DHS funding bill, with no immigration measures attached. “We are going to do everything we can to make sure it passes by an overwhelming vote. I think virtually every Democrat will vote...

Sad and disappointing but not a surprise. Sen. Mitch McConnell has showed himself to be the gutless wimp that we’ve all known he is. He has given the Democrats exactly what they have been demanding. In other words, Sen. Mitch McConnell, as majority leader, has shown the same feckless, flaccidity that he showed while minority leader. What he’s done is pass the buck back to the House: This is a shame. The issue is not only important but it is an easy win. It is the Democrats and the White House that need DHS funded. The GOP doesn’t. Something like...

Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) haven’t spoken to each other in two weeks despite the shutdown fight gripping the Capitol, House Republicans said Wednesday.During a closed-door House GOP conference meeting Wednesday morning, Boehner told Republicans that he hadn’t spoken to McConnell recently despite the looming Feb. 28 deadline to fund the Department of Homeland Security (DHS).“He said he hadn’t spoken to Mitch McConnell in a few weeks. We gave them a good bill. It funds the stuff we’re supposed to do, secure the borders,” Rep. Ted Poe (R-Texas) said after a morning conference meeting.Another...