Free Republic

This year’s cast of GOP convention speakers could be future rivals, each jockeying for prime positioning in case 2016 opens up, Republican strategist Steve Schmidt said on MSNBC Monday night. The emerging five: New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and Rep. Paul Ryan. “All of these people in their own right are people who may have presidential aspirations and the ability to run a formidable campaign,” he said. “You maybe see the next generation of rivalries in the Republican Party.… You may see them all previewing what’s going...

A fundraiser Mitt Romney held Wednesday for New Jersey state Sen. Joe Kyrillos (R) brought in $400,000, a campaign aide said. Romney traveled to Bernardsville, N.J., for the $5,000-per-plate dinner, where about 80 supporters showed up. A close friend and ally of Gov. Chris Christie (R-N.J.), another Romney backer, Kyrillos is running to unseat Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.), who is seeking his second term in the Senate. Christie has been fundraising for Kyrillos, too, but Menendez has a more than 4-to-1 advantage over Kyrillos in cash on hand.

Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.)'s lead over his likely Republican opponent has narrowed to 9 points, a new poll showed. Menendez takes 44 percent to 35 for state Sen. Joe Kyrillos (R) in a Quinnipiac University poll released Thursday. Eight in 10 New Jersey voters don't know enough about Kyrillos to form an opinion, but 35 percent have a favorable opinion. Menendez's approval, meanwhile, climbed from 42 percent in October to 45 in April — within the margin of error. A Rutgers-Eagleton poll released in February had Menendez up 22 points on Kyrillos, but pollsters in the state have been anticipating...

Gov. Chris Christie tonight helped rake in $600,000 at the first fundraiser of Republican state Sen. Joe Kyrillos' bid to unseat Democratic U.S. Sen. Bob Menendez. More than 500 people were expected to attend $250 a plate dinner at PNC Arts Center in Holmdel. Besides Christie and Kyrillos, Lt. Gov. Kim Guadagno and Ocean County GOP Chairman George Gilmore were on the bill. Kyrillos (R-Monmouth) acknowledged the one-term incumbent will have the fundraising advantage, but said his supporters believe he's the candidate to turnaround the state's unemployment and underemployment rate, the debt crisis and America's standing in the world. “I’m...

New Jersey Sen. Joseph Kyrillos announced Thursday he intends to seek the Republican nomination for U.S. Senate to run against Democratic Sen. Bob Menendez in November. The 51-year-old Monmouth County legislator said he converted his federal exploratory committee to a campaign account and will formally announce his candidacy soon. "As the father of two young children, I believe we can and must restore the limitless opportunities and freedom that made America great and inspired people like my own father to immigrate to this country," Kyrillos said in a statement. Menendez campaign consultant Brad Lawrence responded late Thursday, saying, "New Jersey's...

Forget about Mitt Romney vs. Newt Gingrich. In a tantalizing GOP undercard, Sarah Palin is now picking a fight with Chris Christie after the New Jersey governor and top Romney backer called Gingrich an "embarrassment" to the GOP. Christie made the charge about the former House speaker Sunday in an interview on NBC's "Meet The Press.""I think Newt Gingrich has embarrassed the party over time," Christie said, referring to an ethics fine Gingrich paid and his being "run out of the speakership by his own party." "Whether he'll do it again in the future, I don't know. But Gov. Romney...

As the race for the Republican presidential nomination hots up, the candidates have been dropping hints about their possible running mates. Newt Gingrich today said he would 'certainly' consider asking Sarah Palin to join him on the ballot, while Mitt Romney was accompanied on a campaign stop this morning by Chris Christie, the popular Governor of New Jersey. Both those GOP heavyweights were thought of as potential candidates for the top job before announcing that they did not intend to run. Mr Christie endorsed the frontrunner Mr Romney in October, but Mrs Palin has yet to give her support to...

Larry Sabato, an election prognosticator, predicts another candidate may jump in the race in February. He also says the Republican nominating process may go all the way to the convention in late summer. Sabato says since a lot of February primaries have moved up to January not much is going on voting-wise that month. This may lead to another candidate, Republican or third-party, jumping in the race. "I think for the Republicans, they would go back to the big stars who said no. Chris Christie," Sabato said on FOX News this afternoon. "We'll go over this many times between now...

Someone attempted to grill New Jersey Governor Chris Christie at a town hall again, and thanks to that brave (or some would say, attention-seeking) soul, the media has a new viral video of the Governor getting sassy with a constituent. This time, the town hall attendant asked whether the governor planted questions at town hall meetings, citing a situation where he saw someone ask a question at another event who claimed to be a friend of Christie’s. After scolding him for “wasting time,” Christie asked, “if I plant questions, why the hell did I call on you?”

So. A man who wasn't running for president isn't running for president and won't be trying to run for president. Got that? Still awake there, at the back? In front of the starried ranks of America's finest political press corps, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie finally put an end to the weeks of frenzied speculation about his White House ambitions. "Now is not my time", he told reporters. "New Jersey, whether you like it or not, you are stuck with me." Moment in the spotlight Clearly relishing his big moment on the national stage, the Governor admitted he had been...

Speculation is rampant as to whether New Jersey Governor Chris Christie will enter the 2012 Republican presidential primary. Almost all the media focus thus far has been on political calculations, such as Christie’s ability to raise money, put together a national campaign organization, and withstand the rigors of the race. For the most part, however, pundits are ignoring the most important consideration of all: Is Christie actually ready to be President of the United States? The Washington Examiner’s Byron York, to his credit, did the math and points out that on October 10, 2011, Christie will have been governor for...

* Christie has many critics among N.J. conservatives * From subsidies to guns, Christie has liberal bent * Could weight become a factor? Is tough-talking Republican Chris Christie tough enough for the Tea Party? Christie's potential entry into a 2012 White House race dominated by conservatives would electrify the campaign but trigger scrutiny of his record as a Republican governor in heavily Democratic New Jersey. Hailed by conservatives for staring down public employee unions in New Jersey, he may face questions about whether his beliefs on such hot-button issues as illegal immigration and climate change match up with the conservative...

It's happened. The build-up and anxiety over whether folks like Chris Christie and Sarah Palin are going to throw their hats in the ring for the GOP presidential primary has reached critical mass. And now, the will-they-or-won't-they game has flipped from fun and energizing to damaging to the party. Christie and Palin now do conservatives more harm than good. With the question marks still lingering in the ether, and pundits on both sides of the aisle still performing their daily trapeze act -- swinging back and forth between "yes, he's running" and "no, she isn't" -- the focus on Christie...

Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s recent stumbles — his rambling attempt at last week’s GOP presidential debate to attack former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney’s flip-flopping is a prime example — have renewed speculation that New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie might rethink his “no go” decision on the 2012 race. Even as some Republican donors make the case — again — that this is Christie’s moment, his closest advisers insist that nothing has changed, pointing to comments he made last week at New Jersey’s Rider University in which he said he still isn’t interested. Of course, at that same event, Indiana Gov....

John Driscoll, the Republican state Senate candidate from Paramus, is hitting the hustings Friday with "my congressman," Scott Garrett, politely pestering voters hovering over their eggs and coffee in diners. The duo had better hope that some voter doesn't pour a pot of tea over their heads. The Driscoll-Garrett campaign tandem comes amid the first wave of debt ceiling–S&P downgrade reviews panning Congress's performance — especially the conduct of Republican congressmen. And especially Republican congressmen closely allied with the Tea Party zealots whose intransigence brought the United States to the brink of default. Garrett is a Republican congressman who voted...

President Obama ’s class warfare rhetoric definitely helps him rally his progressive base, but it may be turning off some major political donors who supported him in 2008. Politico’s Mike Allen names a few of the high-profile fundraisers who tried to persuade Gov. Chris Christie to run for president at a meeting yesterday, and it looks like at least one – hedge fund billionaire Paul Tudor Jones – was a major Obama bundler in 2008. According to financial disclosures, Jones raked in between $100,000 and $200,000 for the campaign, but he doesn’t appear on Obama’s recently-released list of 2012 bundlers....

Sarah Palin continued her whirlwind tour of the city Wednesday, making stops at Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty before visiting her bosses at Fox News. Palin, whose much-hyped journey to the nation’s historic sites has fueled speculation that she’s gearing up to run for President, traded in her bus for a National Parks Service boat when she began her day at Ellis Island. Tourists visiting the former first stop for immigrants entering the United States did a double-take when they spotted the celebrity pseudo-candidate. “She shook students and hands and said ‘Hi kids, how are you doing?’” said...

Donald Trump may be extremely successful in the business world, but he already received a vote of no confidence from the president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the chief lobbying group for many influential business leaders. Thomas Donahue appeared on the Fox Business Network and when asked whether he would vote for Trump for President, Donahue bluntly said “no.” Donahue dismissed Trump as “a great real estate magnate and a lot of other things, but he wouldn’t be my choice to be President.” Instead, Donahue argues we need somebody with a “broad range of global experience and somebody that...

If you were planning on running in the GOP primary for president — this year or any year — would you fight with New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) in public? Probably not. Check out a piece by Christian Heinze in The Hill about the feud between Christie and former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R), a story neither side would comment on. Apparently it all started when Palin offered to campaign for Christie as he made his bid for governor in 2009, and he declined the offer. At the time he said "this is about New Jersey issues and New...

Chris Christie is a very ambitious man whose bombastic style and war with public unions matches the mood of today's Republican Party base almost perfectly. What's more, the 2012 GOP presidential race is unusually late-starting -- while the field that is preparing to run is exceptionally underwhelming. In other words, it's hard to argue with Christie's recent boast to the National Review that he sees an opening in next year's primaries and that "I already know I can win." And yet, he continues to insist in unusually blunt terms that he won't take the bait and run for president next...