Free Republic

Now that Newt Gingrich has become one of the top two contenders for the Republican presidential nomination, he is falling under intense scrutiny. The closer a Republican candidate comes to winning the nomination, the more their conservative credentials are called into question. Gingrich had a very successful tenure as Speaker of the House in the mid 1990’s, as architect of the Republican Contract with America, which helped usher in the first Republican-controlled Congress in 40 years. But after achieving several victories for conservatives, he abruptly resigned from Congress in 1998, days after winning reelection to another term. The Republicans’ Contract...

Early and volatile, the Republican Presidential nomination race—at least for now—appears to be settling into a contest between consistent front runner Mitt Romney, and the latest surging, “non-Romney alternative”, former House Speaker, Newt Gingrich. Unfortunately the CNN/Heritage Foundation/American Enterprise televised debate of last week did not highlight the yawning gap between these front running contenders’ views on the existential threat doctrine of our Islamic enemies: jihad and its motivational, sacralized religio-political “law”, Sharia. During an interview with US News reporter Dan Gligoff published June 3, 2009, Mitt Romney offered the following bizarre observation about the living Islamic institution of jihad,...

For over a year, I've been bullish about Newt Gingrich's presidential candidacy. Friends and fellow pundits mocked my insistence that the former House speaker be taken seriously, that he had a real chance of winning the GOP nomination. Mr. Gingrich's personal story — his multiple marriages, the Tiffany's spending — is too problematic, they said. The former speaker is flinty, not particularly organized or well-funded, and he long ago passed his political sell-by date: a 1990s curio seeking not so much the White House as attention and relevance. These failings may ultimately doom Mr. Gingrich's bid for the Republican nomination....

Rep. Barney Frank (D-Mass.) was never known for holding his fire, and in a press conference announcing his retirement the liberal lawmaker saved some of his most memorable barbs for former House speaker and now presidential candidate Newt Gingrich. “I did not think I lived a good enough life to see Newt Gingrich as the Republican nominee,” the 30-year House veteran said. “He would be the best thing to happen to Democrats since Barry Goldwater ... It’s still unlikely, but I have hopes.” The pair have been snapping at each other since the 1980s, when Gingrich was rising to power...

Now that Newt Gingrich has become the latest in a series of Republican front-runners, he is getting the kinds of scrutiny and attacks that have done in other front-runners. One of the issues that have aroused concern among conservative Republicans is that of amnesty for illegal immigrants, especially after Gingrich said that it would not be "humane" to deport someone who has been living and working here for years. Let's go back to square one. The purpose of American immigration laws and policies is not to be either humane or inhumane to illegal immigrants. The purpose of immigration laws and...

Last summer, when all of the pundits had pretty much written off Newt Gingrich’s presidential candidacy, my niece, a college sophomore whom I always believed to be apolitical, remarked, “My friends and I like Newt – he tweets a lot on Twitter.” I should have remembered that. Two years earlier, I had heard Gingrich speak at the National Rural Health Association’s Annual Conference. At the beginning of his remarks, he took out his new mobile phone, and thus began a 30 minute dissertation on social media as the new paradigm in communications, and challenged us all to learn it, understand...

I have not taken a position on any candidate in the Republican primary but wanted to weigh in over Rep. Michele Bachmann’s recent attack on former House Speaker Newt Gingrich on immigration. The most recent criticism from Bachmann centers on a statement Newt Gingrich signed along with other conservatives and released back in 2004 by my organization, the National Foundation for American Policy, and the Manhattan Institute. The statement did not propose an amnesty. (A copy of the statement, published in The Wall Street Journal on February 6, 2004, can be found here.) The “Conservative Statement of Principles on Immigration”...

"I already said that if he wants to use a teleprompter, then it would be fine with me. [applause, laughter] It has to be fair. [laughter] If you [were] to defend ObamaCare, wouldn't you want a teleprompter?" Gingrich said.

New Hampshire's largest newspaper, the Union Leader, endorsed Newt Gingrich today in a front-page editorial signed by publisher Joseph W. McQuaid. The paper's contrarian conservatism -- they rarely endorse frontrunners -- has a history of shaping the New Hampshire Republican primary. The Union Leader endorsement helped propel Pat Buchanan to a surprisingly strong (given that he faced a sitting president) 40% of the vote in 1992, and to an upset victory over Bob Dole in 1996. Their endorsement of John McCain (a striking departure from the UL's hostility to McCain eight years earlier) was a key factor in his New...

WASHINGTON — Newt Gingrich isn’t backing off his “humane” immigration stance despite complaints from Republican hardliners and fellow Presidential hopefuls — he’s embellishing it. The former House speaker issued “10 Steps to a Legal Nation” this week, expanding on his remarks during Tuesday’s GOP debate (snip) Those guilty only of sneaking into the U.S. would have a path “to legality, but not citizenship” similar to the existing naturalization process, plus a penalty fee of at least $5,000.

... Gingrich paused the line of about 500 people waiting to have books signed to take Katrina’s questions. He leaned in endearingly, with his hand to his cheek, letting down his usual gruff Speaker of the House guard. “Have you met a president? If so who was your favorite one?” “My favorite president is George Washington,” Gingrich said. “I’ve met Nixon, Ford, Carter, Reagan, Bush, Obama and myself, but I’m not president yet but with your help I might be.”

"ABO, 'Anybody But Obama' at this point in time," Michael Reagan said when asked who his father would be supporting in the Republican primary. "He would support the nominee. Never got involved in the primaries, he believed the party should choose their person but he would have said this about last night's debate, which he would have thought was very good, as I thought it was very good. He would [have] supported probably Newt Gingrich's position on immigration. My father never would have broken up a family to try to make in fact a point on immigration, and so he...

Mike Reagan said, "He (my father) would have supported Newt Gingrich's position on immigration. My father never would have broken up a family...."

GOP presidential candidate Newt Gingrich defended his immigration stance Friday, claiming that he was "not for amnesty." “I am not for amnesty for anyone. I am not for a path to citizenship for anybody who got here illegally,” Gingrich said at a town hall event in Naples, Florida according to media reports. “But I am for a path to legality for those people whose ties run so deeply in America that it would truly be a tragedy to try and rip their family apart," said the former House Speaker. Gingrich has been under fire from some anti-illegal immigration groups since...

Almost immediately upon Sarah Palin's announcement that she would not seek the Republican nomination for president, the phone calls from almost all of the GOP candidates began pouring in. They wanted her endorsement. While Palin has characteristically kept her cards close to her chest, advisers suggest that the 2008 Republican vice presidential nominee is likely to endorse before someone emerges as the inevitable nominee -- and that Newt Gingrich appears to be best-positioned to secure her support. "They speak very favorably of Newt and what they see as his credentials as compared to Perry and Romney," one member of Palin's...

The most sought-after endorsement of this political cycle will be from a woman who holds no political office and is not currently seeking one. That is why each of the Republican candidates have done the equivalent of kissing Sarah Palin's ring. RealClearPolitics believes that former House Speaker Newt Gingrich has the inside track for getting the Palin endorsement. Of course, reports about what Palin will or will not do is largely conjecture, even if it is sourced from people said to be within the Palin inner circle. Only Palin will know who she intends to endorse and when. Any definitive...

Newt Gingrich’s political groups raised more than $4.2 million in the last three months of 2010, bringing the former House speaker’s total to $14.5 million for the year – a sum that far eclipses his potential rivals for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination. Gingrich, who has increasingly signaled his desire to enter the race to take on President Barack Obama, raised more last year than the three next most prolific fundraisers eying Republican presidential bids combined – former Govs. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts (whose political committees brought in $6.3 million in 2010), Sarah Palin of Alaska ($3.5 million) and Tim...

The rumblings around the political community seem to be that Newt Gingrich is thinking about running for President. Apparently the scuttlebutt is that he is likely to announce an exploratory committee within the next several weeks. He's certainly well-known enough to get attention-- so do you think he should run for President?

Now that Newt Gingrich is officially running for President, I decided to do some research and to see who the former Speaker of the House really is. The political is good, the polling is bad, and the personal is downright ugly. Campaigns Gingrich was elected to the House of Representatives eleven times (resigning after the 1998 election), his only two losses came against a popular incumbent Democrat in the 1974 and 1976 elections. When he was elected Speaker of the House in 1995 - it was the first time in four decades that a Republican had been able to reach...

It remains a foregone conclusion that Mitt Romney is going to be the Republican Presidential nominee. The only problem is, the polls suggest something else, and there is no evidence to suggest any degree of momentum or support rallying the former Massachusetts governor. What the polls show, increasingly, is that Newt Gingrich is solidifying his position as the anti-Romney, and in the last week, 3 national polls have come out showing that the former Georgia Congressman and Speaker of the House holds a 2-5 point lead in national Republican primary polls. More specifically though, Gingrich is leading in a couple...