Free Republic

WASHINGTON – Incredulous lawmakers tore into IRS Commissioner John Koskinen over the agency's claims that subpoenaed emails of ex-official Lois Lerner and other employees are gone forever because a hard drive was destroyed. “This is unbelievable," Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wis., angrily told Koskinen. That’s your problem. Nobody believes you.” Koskinen responded, “I have a long career. That’s the first time anyone’s said I don’t believe you.” "I don't believe you," Ryan shot back again. [...]

Presidential hopefuls Sen. Rand Paul, Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal and former Sen. Rick Santorum are in Iowa to deliver their prescriptions for how to unite the Republican Party. […] It is Paul’s third trip to Iowa since the 2012 election. The Kentucky senator says the GOP should maintain its core message but make the party more attractive to black and Hispanic voters. …

Madison — Felon and former state Sen. Gary George will be able to mount his long-shot primary challenge to U.S. Rep. Gwen Moore after all. The state elections board voted unanimously to reject a challenge to George's nomination signatures and allow him on the ballot to challenge fellow Democrat Moore for Congress. The Government Accountability Board met at the Capitol on Tuesday to certify candidates for the Aug. 12 ballot. Milwaukee union official Sheila Cochran had challenged hundreds of the signatures George submitted on his nomination papers, saying they were collected by convicted felons, among other problems. Board staff said,...

Challengers see themselves in the Texas senator, even in races where their odds of an upset are considered steeper than Cruz’s surprise victory over a GOP establishment figure two years ago. He’s made endorsements in the Oklahoma and Nebraska Senate races, plus the Nebraska gubernatorial race, and sent almost $26,000 to federal candidates through his leadership PAC. “Ted Cruz would be extremely helpful as an endorser and a fundraiser,” said C. Edmund Wright, a consultant to longshot South Carolina Senate hopeful Lee Bright, in an email. “Rand Paul and Mike Lee would be great also.” But, he said, “the reason...

An illegal immigrant who killed a police office while driving the wrong way in on an Arizona freeway Monday had a blood-alcohol level almost three times the legal limit, the Associated Press reported Friday. Raul Silva Corona had driven 35 miles in the wrong direction on three freeways with a blood alcohol level of .238 percent in the wee hours of Monday morning before he killed Mesa Police Officer Brandon Mendoza, according to the AP's report. In Arizona, a driver is considered intoxicated with a blood-alcohol level of 0.08 percent. Mendoza, who served for thirteen years at the Mesa Police...

Sal Russo, co-founder of the Tea Party Express, announced his support for amnesty on Wednesday, reversing his organization’s statement from a year ago that it would not take a position on immigration reform. If you take a look at Russo’s background, this isn’t exactly the revelation that some in the media are making it out to be. What’s interesting, though, is the dichotomy between Russo’s position and the principles of the organization he helped to create. The Tea Party Express bills itself as anti-establishment, but Russo’s immigration proposal is nearly identical to the principles pushed by GOP House Leaders --...

Barack Obama opens the prisons as Round 1 in his amnesty scheme A few thousand murderers, rapists, kidnappers and other violent thugs are on the streets, thanks to Barack Obama for handing out a “get out of jail free card” to aliens in the country illegally, no matter how many felonies he or she may have committed. The Center for Immigration Studies provides proof that, last year, federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials “freed 36,007 convicted criminal aliens from detention who were awaiting the outcome of deportation proceedings.” Those 36,000-plus perps weren’t in jail for jaywalking or keeping a...

BASED ON 287 RESPONDENTS WHO DESCRIBE THEMSELVES AS REPUBLICANS AND 186 WHO DESCRIBE THEMSELVES AS INDEPENDENTS WHO LEAN REPUBLICAN, FOR A TOTAL OF 473 REPUBLICANS -- SAMPLING ERROR: +/- 4.5 PERCENTAGE PTS. May 2-4 2014 Bush 13% Paul 13% Ryan 12% Huckabee 10% Christie 9% Perry 8% Walker 7% Cruz 7% Rubio 6% Santorum 2% Someone else (vol.) 4% None/No one (vol.) 4% No opinion 7%

Rep. Paul Ryan is meeting with the Congressional Black Caucus. Let's hope they give his ideas a fair hearing. Rep. Paul Ryan (R., Wis.) is scheduled to meet with the Congressional Black Caucus on Wednesday to discuss his plans to address poverty and his March 12 comments in a radio interview about a "tailspin of culture" in our inner cities where "generations of men [are] not even thinking about working or learning the value and the culture of work." Mr. Ryan's statement sparked liberal accusations of racism. Rep. Barbara Lee (D., Calif.) called it "a thinly veiled racial attack" that...

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.), who spoke Saturday at the Maine Republican Convention, was the big winner in the party’s straw poll. Paul took 26 percent of the vote, to 14 percent for the second-place finisher, Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas). With 690 ballots cast at the convention in Bangor, the order of finish was: Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.): 176 Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas): 98 Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker: 70 Dr. Ben Carson: 62 New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie: 60 Jeb Bush: 57 Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.): 37 Mike Huckabee: 28 Condoleezza Rice: 26

The House could come up with a bill to overhaul the country’s immigration system by August, according to the House’s No. 4 Republican. “I believe there is a path that we get a bill on the floor by August,” Rep. Cathy McMorris-Rodgers (R-Wash.) the Republican conference chairwoman, told The Spokesman-Review last week. An August deadline would resolve the troubled issue months before November’s midterm elections, where the GOP is looking to grow its advantage in the House and pick up enough seats to take over the Senate. Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) has pushed for a bill and even mocked members...

CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa – Rep. Paul Ryan is having his “I-told-you-so” moment. During a speech here to the Iowa Republican Party, on his second trip back to the Hawkeye State since losing in 2012, Ryan said that one reason he and Republican nominee Mitt Romney couldn’t top President Barack Obama was they had to “shadow box against big government in theory.” Now, Ryan said, Americans have “big government in practice, and the theory is a whole lot different than what it looks like in practice.” “We kept trying to say this is what Obamacare is going to do, this is...

UPDATE- The House has passed the Ryan budget 219-205. The 'Path to Prosperity' received 217 more votes than the president's budget. You can read the GOP's plan here. My summary is here. *** Original Post *** Last we checked in on the budget battle in DC, our post-partisan president was smirkingly denouncing House Republicans' fiscal blueprint as a "stink burger" and "meanwich." The wit! The erudition! With Congress' lower chamber poised to pass Paul Ryan's 'Path to Prosperity' -- which reduces the rate of federal spending increases, reforms Medicare and balances within ten years -- the House first took up...

Sen. Marco Rubio and Rep. Paul Ryan are collaborating on an Obamacare alternative and could announce the proposal as early as this month, according to Republican sources. Both Republicans have been regularly engaged in pushing legislation on major issues — and both have made it a habit to form cross-chamber partnerships to further those endeavors. But this particular partnership is notable given the high-profile nature of health care reform and that Rubio, Florida's junior senator, and Ryan, the House Budget Committee chairman from Wisconsin, are both considered possible contenders for the Republican presidential nomination in 2016. Aides to Rubio and...

With the January 2016 Iowa presidential caucuses on the horizon, Hillary Clinton is the far-and-away favorite among self-described Democratic caucus-goers, according to a Suffolk University statewide Iowa poll. And while some Republicans have begun visiting the Hawkeye State, the survey shows no favorites among prospective GOP presidential candidates. Meanwhile, the Suffolk University poll of likely general-election Iowa voters shows Republican Gov. Terry Branstad with a strong advantage heading into the June 3 Republican gubernatorial primary, and he leads the sole Democrat in the race, State Sen. Jack Hatch, by 10 points in a general-election match-up. Branstad, the longest serving governor...

It's not likely the race for president in 2016 will pit former Florida Republican Gov. Jeb Bush and former Democratic Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Weekly Standard Editor Bill Kristol predicted. "I'm willing to go out on a limb," Kristol told MSNBC's "Morning Joe" on Tuesday. "I think there's no way there will be a Bush-Clinton race in 2016."

Democrats are facing a senior problem that could get even worse this year. The party has traditionally had trouble with older voters, losing the group aged 65 and over by 21 points in 2010 — when Republicans picked up 63 seats — and by 12 points in the 2012 presidential race. Seniors are the GOP’s most reliable voting bloc in midterm years, turning out in higher numbers than Democratic base voters. A recent Gallup poll showed seniors have become even more Republican over the last two decades; in 2013, 48 percent considered themselves Republican. That spells trouble for Democrats, who...

House Budget Committee Chairman Paul Ryan said he rejects the premise that President Barack Obama’s healthcare law can’t be repealed now that its first class of 7 million enrollees has signed up. “I don’t think it can last,” Ryan said in an interview with Bloomberg Television to air on “Political Capital with Al Hunt” this weekend. Ryan this week unveiled a budget plan that seeks to repeal the 2010 law known as Obamacare and would revise the U.S. safety net in an effort to eliminate the deficit in 10 years. The House will vote on the plan next week. House...

resident Obama was doing his favorite thing this week: talking to crowds of adoring young people who already agree with him while acting like he persuaded them about something. They also seemed to give Obama the impression that he's a really funny guy. On Wednesday, he told a crowd of 1,400 at the University of Michigan that he visited a local deli, Zingerman's. He proceeded to tell a long story about ordering the small Reuben sandwich, which he said was "killer." That description got a good laugh. Then he explained how he thought the sandwich was too big, so he...

Our post-partisan President reached a new low yesterday. Speaking at Zingerman’s in Ann Arbor, Michigan he declared Paul Ryan’s budget a “stinkburger” or “meanwich.” Obama is apparently promoting an increase in the minimum wage. He went to Zingerman’s because they allegedly offer a “fair” wage. The left doesn’t seem to understand that a “fair” wage is whatever an employee agrees to work for. In other words, it isn’t determined by government bureaucrats or academics. That’s beside the point of course, we know Obama believes everything in our lives must be decided in Washington. The problem of course is that Zingerman’s...