Free Republic

Democratic senators on Tuesday praised Sen. Jeff Flake (R-Ariz.) for his retirement-announcing speech, which called out the GOP for its "reckless" support of President Trump. "We must never regard as normal the regular and casual undermining of our democratic norms and ideals," said Flake, who has repeatedly clashed with the president and his advisers. Flake called out Trump for what he sees as his "coarseness," his "personal attacks" and his "flagrant disregard for truth and decency" in remarks made minutes after Trump met with Republican senators for a strategy lunch. "Senate is losing a good man in @JeffFlake. He made...

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell on Sunday said President Donald Trump doesn't get enough credit on all that he's done, such as the appointments he's made, which McConnell said will "get the country growing again." "I think President Trump doesn't get nearly enough credit for the changes that he's brought about that are unrelated to legislation," McConnell (R-Ky.) said in an interview with CNN's "State of the Union."

Republican Roy Moore leads Democrat Doug Jones by 11 percentage points in a new Raycom News Network Senate Election poll conducted by Strategy Research. The survey of 3,000 likely Alabama voters finds Moore receiving 51% support to 40% for Jones. Nine percent remain undecided in the exclusive poll conducted on Monday. "The value of a poll depends on a range of circumstances. A number of recent polls have shown us with a strong lead, but at the end of the day, the one poll that matters above all others is taken on Election Day," Moore campaign chairman Bill Armistead said....

California Democratic billionaire Tom Steyer should be applauded for his powerful efforts to support progressive causes and candidates and to strongly resist the egregious wrongs being done by President Trump. However, this week, Steyer went much too far by writing a letter demanding that Democrats running in the 2018 midterm elections make the impeachment of President Trump a central issue in their campaigns. Yes, as Steyer correctly charges, Trump creates a clear and present danger to the core values and institutions of the republic. But no, making impeachment a defining issue in the 2018 campaign is not a smart move...

El Paso Rep. Beto O'Rourke isn't betting his bid for toppling Sen. Ted Cruz entirely on backlash against President Donald Trump, or probes of Russian ties to his campaign, or his efforts to ban Muslim visitors, or deport young immigrants, or wall off the southern border. But he isn't shy about raising those topics and using them to tar the polarizing senator for his coziness with an even more polarizing figure in the White House. This being Texas, where Democrats haven't won a statewide contest since 1994, stoking misgivings about Trump may be O'Rourke's best shot at stopping Cruz from...

Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.) said in an interview broadcast Sunday that no law could have stopped the suspected shooter, Stephen Paddock, who was behind last week's mass shooting in Las Vegas. Feinstein spoke on CBS News’s “Face the Nation” about gun legislation in the wake of the attack launched from the 32nd floor of the Mandalay Bay hotel targeting a country music concert.....

President Donald Trump laid out his immigration principles for Capitol Hill on Sunday — a list of hardline policies that could seriously complicate the prospects of striking a deal with Democrats over the future of hundreds of thousands of young undocumented immigrants. “The priority for Congress ought to be to save American lives, protect American jobs and improve the well-being of American communities. These reforms accomplish that,” a senior administration official told reporters on Sunday night. “They live up to the president’s campaign commitment to have an immigration system that puts the needs of hardworking Americans first.” The broad parameters...

President Trump’s legislative affairs team met with a small group of House lawmakers at the White House on Thursday morning to discuss the administration’s plan for rebuilding U.S. infrastructure. Two Democrats and three Republicans attended the meeting, including two members who sit on the Transportation and Infrastructure Committee. The panel is expected to be a key player in Trump’s $1 trillion rebuilding proposal, which has yet to be released. The administration is also hosting an infrastructure briefing Thursday evening with state transportation officials, industry groups, union representative and other stakeholders. The event will be lead by Transportation Deputy Secretary Jeffrey...

'I’m sick and tired of nothing happening,' one contributor says of the party's legislative failures.

A pro-Trump group is calling on Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to put his financial muscle behind Roy Moore’s bid for the Senate in the Alabama special election, saying the investment would be the best way for the Kentucky Republican to “atone” for previous political sins. In a head-to-head runoff race for the GOP nomination last week, Mr. Moore defeated Sen. Luther Strange, who had been appointed to the seat earlier this year. The incumbent had received support from Mr. McConnell and the aligned Senate Leadership Fund, which invested millions into bolstering Mr. Strange’s bid and tearing down his rivals....

If Tennessee Gov. Bill Haslam enters the race he would immediately become a leading contender for the seat Corker has held since 2006 Gov. Bill Haslam said Thursday he is considering a U.S. Senate run, leaving the door open for the Knoxville Republican to take the post Bob Corker is vacating. Haslam made the comment after an event Thursday morning. "It merits spending some time thinking about it and praying about it," Haslam told reporters. The governor said he's talked to Corker about the idea in recent days, adding that he had fully expected the U.S. senator to run for...

Roy Moore is probably going to be the next senator from Alabama, and that’s true no matter what the Democratic Party says or does about it. Alabama is, for starters, Alabama. Jeff Sessions was rejected for a federal judgeship by the United States Senate on the grounds that he was too racist, and a couple of years later, Alabama Republicans nominated him for a Senate seat and he won. There’s no reason at all to think that Moore can’t follow the same trail he’s blazed. Beyond that, America is a much more polarized place that it was in the 1980s....

Washington stands by to see which brand of Trumpism will carry the day in a Alabama's special election primary between Luther Strange and Roy Moore, a race that has become something of a proxy war for the Republican Party. Polls close at 7 p.m. ET Tuesday and THE WEEKLY STANDARD will be tracking the vote count below, with data provided by DecisionDeskHQ:(CHART-AT-LINK) The race pits the incumbent Strange, a relatively conventional Republican who was appointed to fill Jeff Sessions’s vacated seat in February, against Moore, a religious firebrand who achieved notoriety through his uncompromising social stances as an Alabama judge....

A primary win by "Ray" Moore would open Alabama's U.S. Senate seat to Democrats, President Donald Trump told radio-hosts "Rick and Bubba" this morning. Trump called the popular syndicated radio show on Monday, just days after appearing at a Huntsville, Alabama rally for Republican Senate candidate Luther Strange. "Luther Strange is going to be a great Senator," Trump said. "He loves Alabama, he loves the state and he loves the country. He will absolutely win against the Democrat. Ray will have a hard time. If Luther wins, the Democrats will hardly fight. If Ray wins (Democrats) will pour in $30...

Sen. Thom Tillis will introduce his “conservative Dream Act” on Monday that would provide a pathway to citizenship for as many as 2.5 million young undocumented immigrants, but one that is long and involves “extreme vetting.” The North Carolina Republican and cosponsor James Lankford, an Oklahoma Republican, will pitch the plan as “merit-based” relief that must be earned — and, critically, not “amnesty,” according to Republican talking points obtained by McClatchy. But unlike other merit-based immigration proposals that limit new immigrants from entering the country based on their job skills, this proposal would limit who can remain in the country...

HUNTSVILLE, Ala. — Alabama Republicans have a choice between a Trump-like outsider and a Trump-backed insider Tuesday in a closely watched Senate GOP runoff that has the potential to wreak havoc on the Senate Republicans’ narrow majority. In a fitting conclusion to a sometimes nasty battle, supporters of GOP establishment-backed interim Sen. Luther Strange, R-Ala., are expected to rally on the eve of the election with Vice President Mike Pence. On the other side of the state, backers of insurgent candidate Roy Moore will stump with Trump’s former chief strategist, Steve Bannon, and controversial "Duck Dynasty" star Phil Robertson. Trump...

Sen. Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) on Saturday declared that the Statue of Liberty will continue to stand as the nation's iconic symbol of American immigration, "not that damned wall." "We are going to continue to have the Statue of Liberty be our symbol, not that damned wall," the Democratic lawmaker said during the Global Citizen Festival in New York City, seemingly referring to President Trump's proposed border wall. During the event, Schumer stressed that the importance of protecting foreign aid funding after Trump proposed a 30 percent cut to the foreign assistance package in his fiscal year 2018 budget. "We welcome...

Nigel Farage will speak in Fairhope, Alabama on Monday night, in support of Alabama Senate candidate Roy Moore. The Guardian has learned that the former leader of the United Kingdom Independence Party (Ukip) will join former White House advisor Steve Bannon and Duck Dynasty TV star Phil Robertson at an election eve rally. Moore, a fiery opponent of gay marriage who condemned “sodomy” in prepared remarks in a televised debate, is in a tight race against appointed incumbent Luther Strange, for the Republican nomination for a Senate seat formerly held by Jeff Sessions, Donald Trump’s attorney general. Farage is a...

U.S. Sen. Susan Collins all but said she would vote “no” on an Affordable Care Act repeal bill on Friday morning at an event in Portland. “I’m leaning against the bill,” the Maine Republican said after listing a series of serious deficiencies in the Graham-Cassidy repeal bill. “I’m just trying to do what I believe is the right thing for the people of Maine,” Collins said. She said Graham-Cassidy undermines pre-existing conditions, a major flaw in the bill. “I’m reading the fine print on Graham-Cassidy,” Collins said. She said insurers could charge sky-high rates to people with pre-existing conditions. “The...

Roy Moore, a Republican US Senate candidate in Alabama, said in a 2005 interview that he believes "homosexual conduct" should be illegal. Moore, a hardline conservative Christian and former chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court, made the comments in an interview with liberal commentator Bill Press on C-SPAN2's After Words. Moore appeared on the show to publicize a book he had just written about his expulsion from the court for refusing to take down a monument to the Ten Commandments. During the interview Press asked Moore if he believed homosexual conduct should still be illegal after the 2003 landmark...