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Washington (AFP) - Hillary Clinton and Marco Rubio are early frontrunners to become the next president of the United States, according to a well-regarded poll released Thursday. The youthful but relatively inexperienced Rubio launched his campaign earlier this month, calling for a new era of American leadership that is not "stuck in the 20th century." Rubio was the only Republican candidate to have double-digit support among hardline Tea Party supporters, evangelicals and party liberals.

State of the 2016 Race A column for The Hill analyzing the current state of the 2016 presidential race. The Coming GOP demolition-derby circular firing squad: 1. With the announcement two weeks ago that four super-PACS — headed by the mysterious Robert Mercer from Long Island, N.Y. — had donated a stunning $31 million to Sen. Ted Cruz's (R-Texas) presidential campaign, a new era of GOP primary battles was launched. 2. In the past, the GOP establishment wing always handsomely funded their candidate. 3. It was always the conservatives who were underfunded. 4. And thus the primary outcome was preordained:...

2016 presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz (R) spoke to a sold-out Newberry Hall during an Aiken Republican Club luncheon April 4. After the luncheon, The Bell Ringer interviewed Cruz about his views on education, including his wish to shut down the Department of Education. “It is because education is so important that it shouldn’t be governed by unelected bureaucrats in Washington, that it should be instead at the state or local level,” Cruz said. “And what we’ve seen right now is the Department of Education has grown into a bloated bureaucracy where what’s happening is they’re putting red tape, they’re...

“RUNNING for office is real simple,” Ted Cruz told supporters in New Hampshire recently, within earshot of a Politico reporter. “You just surgically disconnect your shame sensor. Because you spend every day asking people for money. You walk up and say, ‘How are you doing, sir? Can I have money? Great to see you, lovely shirt, please give me money’.” This year should be a good one for shame surgeons: the Republican field for 2016 so far consists of 20 men and one woman who have either declared their candidacy for president, set up the machinery for a run or...

Cruz and Rubio climb, and Paul slides, after their official campaign launches.Three Republicans have officially announced they're running for president—but only two of them improved their standing since Hotline's previous edition of its GOP Presidential Power Rankings. Sens. Ted Cruz, Rand Paul, and Marco Rubio kicked off their campaigns in early spring, with Cruz and Rubio in particular demonstrating unexpected financial might and taking advantage of the moment. Meanwhile the most memorable moment from Paul's rollout was a clash with the press. Still, as we mentioned last time, if you're going to make mistakes in the presidential race, it's better...

What began as a banner day for Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker in his quest to secure his party’s presidential nomination on Monday ended as a unique disaster. According to Nicholas Confessore’s reporting in the New York Times on Monday, the libertarian billionaire David Koch told a crowd at a Manhattan fundraiser that Walker had all but secured his endorsement and the support of his and his brother’s donor network. “When the primaries are over and Scott Walker gets the nomination,” Koch is reported to have told the crowd. “We will support whoever the candidate is,” Koch supposedly added in a...

First he had the Koch endorsement. Then he didn't. Why? A Glenn Beck interview where Walker moved wackier than Cruz. According to a number of well-respected journalists, the Koch brothers are putting their heft and muscle behind Scott Walker for president. Or maybe not. It depends on whom you ask. First, let’s acknowledge once again that the Great Whitebread Hope from Wisconsin seems to have everyone in the political establishment mesmerized by his alleged strategic and tactical brilliance. Sure, he makes epic gaffes over and over again, but that cannot take anything away from the fact that he barely won...

The money fueling Sen. Ted Cruz’s campaign for president comes in both trickles and torrents. And the sources of much of it are murky. A hedge fund billionaire is reported to have poured $30 million into the cause isn’t talking. So it’s unclear why he picked Cruz and how much he’s willing to spend to keep the Texas Republican’s hopes alive as the race plays out. Nor will Cruz identify supporters who’ve agreed to raise up to $500,000 from their networks of friends and associates — bundlers who’ll be rewarded with special access to the candidate in coming months. “Some...

Boston Globe columnist Jeff Jacoby has written that “liberalism has superseded Judaism as the religion of most American Jews.” While President Barack Obama has consistently been hostile towards Israel, one wonders if this election cycle may finally see Jews swing to the Republican Party. Jacoby rightfully previously noted, “This liberalism isn’t rational. It isn’t sensible. It certainly isn’t good for the Jews.” While the Jewish community overwhelmingly votes Democrat, what Republicans need more than Jewish votes is the support of Jewish donors. The New York Times recently noted in a front-page feature story, “G.O.P.’s Israel Support Deepens as Political Contributions...

More than other 2016 presidential entrants Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) seems to have positively affected, even excited, Republicans. Ross Douthat writes, “Rubio more than most candidates fits the way most Republicans want to think about their party and ideology and cause.” There is much to that, and certainly Republicans want to get away from the dig that they are “grumpy,” “angry” or downright “mean.” So how does Rubio do it? Arthur Brooks, head of the American Enterprise Institute and arguably the godfather of reform conservatism, likes to say: “My movement shouldn’t be fighting against things. My movement should be fighting...

Picking another establishment GOP presidential nominee in the mold of Mitt Romney, John McCain or Bob Dole to run against Democrats in 2016 will guarantee that Hillary Clinton wins the White House, GOP presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz told Newsmax TV on Wednesday. "It will in effect be a third term for Barack Obama," the Texas Republican said in an exclusive interview with "MidPoint" host Ed Berliner. (VIDEO-AT-LINK) As president, said Cruz, he would put an end to the domestic and foreign policies of President Barack Obama, both of which he said have been a "disaster." As a primary candidate,...

Next year, the country will elect a new president. But next year is already here. Notice how candidates are already positioning themselves for the primaries and caucuses? It is urgent that now–not next year–is when all candidates must realize that American voters of Asian and Pacific heritage will play a major role in the 2016 elections. Republican Jeb Bush was first at the gate, albeit unofficially, in next year’s presidential elections. Bush is of course, former Florida governor and son and brother of two former presidents. In a crowded Republican field, Senator Ted Cruz was the first to officially launch...

Too soon, too soon, of course. After observing close-up the kind of headwinds her husband has met in Washington, D.C., and beyond, there is absolutely no indication that first lady Michelle Obama is looking to place her own name on any ballot. She has, in fact, said the opposite, although in his just-released book, Michelle Obama: A Life, veteran journalist Peter Slevin reports that she has always been a full partner in her husband’s political career. But it is significant that former first lady, U.S. Sen. and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has hired Michelle Obama’s former communications chief as...

On Monday, The New York Times — and, in turn, Mediaite — reported that billionaire brothers David and Charles Koch had settled on Gov. Scott Walker (R-WI) as their preferred Republican candidate to back in the 2016 presidential election. “We will support whoever the candidate is,” David Koch reportedly said at a fundraising event. “But it should be Scott Walker.” Now, however, in an interview with USA Today, Charles Koch has said that their field of potential endorsees is larger than just one. He confirmed that they are actually looking at five candidates who they believe have “a good chance...

The Upshot’’s Nate Cohn is making the contrarian case for Mike Huckabee. I give him credit for seeing things that others might not, but—despite the optimistic headline: “Mike Huckabee Would Be a More Important Candidate Than You Might Think,” he actually underestimates Huck’s potential as a disruptive factor in this campaign. It’s unclear what’s in the water in Hope, Arkansas, but that Bill Clinton and Huck are both from the same hamlet is nothing short of miraculous. Put aside the snake oil salesman stuff, and the numerous ridiculous things Huckabee has said to get attention, and you’re left with a...

Republicans often rail about undocumented immigrants. But Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker, an expected GOP presidential candidate, took it a step further Monday by sounding some critical notes about the number of those who immigrate to the U.S. legally. "In terms of legal immigration, how we need to approach that going forward is saying -- the next president and the next Congress need to make decisions about a legal immigration system that’s based on, first and foremost, on protecting American workers and American wages. Because the more I’ve talked to folks, I’ve talked to [Alabama Sen. Jeff] Sessions and others out...

Ten months from now, on February 13, 2016, all eyes will be on South Carolina, which will host the first-in-the-South Republican presidential primary. The candidates are already assembling on-the-ground operations in the state, hoping of course, that their campaigns will still be viable after the Iowa caucuses, the New Hampshire primary and contests in the West and Midwest. Here’s an early look at how the Palmetto State campaign organizations are taking shape for the three announced Republican candidates – Ted Cruz, Rand Paul and Marco Rubio – as well as the state’s favorite son, Lindsey Graham. Ted Cruz, a freshman...

Rubio’s out-polling Rand Paul among tea partiers now, eh? Interesting footnote to the CNN results: Of the three Republicans who’ve formally announced they’re running, only two have seen their numbers improve since last month. Cruz gained three points (not coincidentally, Ben Carson, a competitor for the social conservative vote, lost five) and Rubio gained four points. Rand actually lost a point after jumping in. Maybe all of that is just an artifact of the margin of error, or maybe it’s an early warning that Rand’s “conservatarian” ceiling will be lower than everyone thinks.

In 2008, John McCain, straight-talking principled maverick that he was, got into a Republican primary and saw that a position in favor of comprehensive immigration reform was causing him problems, so he disavowed the reform bill he had co-authored not long before, going so far as to say that if it came up again in the Senate, he'd vote against it. And now Marco Rubio, who like McCain attempted to pass a bipartisan comprehensive reform bill, is doing something similar. When the "Gang of Eight" bill Rubio championed passed the Senate in 2013 but died in the House, Rubio was...

Call it the anti-Rand primary. There are at least three Republicans who seem likely to run for president in part so they can attack Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul’s libertarian-leaning foreign policy stances on the campaign trail. These anti-Rand candidates — South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, former U.N. ambassador John Bolton and New York Rep. Peter King — are ramping up their criticism especially now that Paul has officially entered the race for the White House. All three are the longest of long shots when it comes to actually winning their party’s nomination. But each of them — national security hawks...