Free Republic

Officials have said that more than half of all children initially placed in shelters have gone on to be reunited with at least one parent already living in the United States, and 85 percent of all children have been placed with a close family member.

Businessman David Perdue stunned Georgia’s Republican political establishment Tuesday by capturing the party’s U.S. Senate nomination in his first run for office. The former CEO of Reebok and Dollar General toppled 11-term Rep. Jack Kingston by a narrow margin, setting up a battle of political newcomers with famous kin in the fall. Perdue’s cousin, Sonny, was a two-term governor and Nunn’s father, Sam, was a four-term U.S. Senator....

Overall Georgia Senate Primary Runoff Results

In recent days the Weekly Standard and Washington Free Beacon have brought to light a now-scrubbed recommended reading list for students that had resided on Sen. Rand Paul’s website. Why the focus on a book list, and why was the book list scrubbed? The answer to the second question could lie in the answer to the first: the foreign policy recommendations in the reading list take a variety of controversial stances, suggesting that the U.S. is to blame for the rise of Islamic supremacism in the Middle East, that the “Israeli Lobby” controls U.S. foreign policy to America’s great detriment,...

Senator Pat Roberts (R-Kan) continued his refusal to debate challenger Dr. Milton Wolf prior to the upcoming August 5 primary election date on the grounds that “Wolf is not qualified to hold such a high office.” “I’ve been in this political racket for nearly 50 years,” the 78 year-old Roberts pointed out. “I didn’t just leap into the national arena as my first venture into joining the governing elite. I served on the staff of Senator Frank Carlson and Representative Keith Sebelius for over 12 years before I ran for Congress in 1980. Then I put in 16 years in...

Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) is calling for a wrongful death lawsuit against Russian assets on Friday after a commercial airline crashed in Ukraine near the Russian border. “I want to hear [during President Barack Obama’s speech today] that the Department of Justice will bring one hell of a wrongful death suit against Russian assets that are located in the United States to make sure there’s a significant cost paid by Russia for this action of shooting down an international airliner with a weapon system that is directly related to the Russian armed forces,” Kirk said on CNN.

Noah Rothman wrote up Quinnipiac’s gubernatorial poll yesterday, prompting me to wonder over at Townhall whether the polling outfit was holding back its Senate numbers for separate release. We now have our answer. A virtual deadlock, and advantage Gardner: The closely-watched U.S. Senate race is tied with 44 percent for U.S. Rep. Cory Gardner, the Republican challenger, and 42 percent for Sen. Mark Udall, the Democratic incumbent, according to a Quinnipiac University poll released today. Another 10 percent are undecided. This compares to the results of an April 24 survey by the independent Quinnipiac University showing Sen. Udall at...

The tell-tale sign Republicans expected to lose the Senate in 2006 appeared June 28 of that year. That was when the GOP turned to stunts to save themselves. Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., brought to the floor a constitutional amendment banning the burning of the American flag. Flag-burning had not been a serious issue for years. But after Hurricane Katrina, and with the Iraq War going poorly, Republicans were desperate to change the subject. “Flag burning is a form of expression that is spiteful or vengeful,” said the late Sen. Arlen Specter, R-Pa., whose chairmanship of the Judiciary Committee...

The final outcome for the Senate could be anything from a minor Republican gain to a GOP romp. At the moment, the state of play seems manageable from a Democratic perspective, but the party’s position is perilous. A tiny shift could tip the canoe and spill a lot of Democrats overboard.

Actually, per Breitbart, he’s working on two bills. One would repeal DACA, Obama’s 2012 executive order that suspended deportations for qualifying young illegals. The other, a more urgent priority, would block Obama from expanding DACA. That means no executive amnesty for the Central American children who’ve come here recently (although they could, I assume, still be allowed to stay under asylum laws) and, maybe, no executive amnesty for the five million adult illegals whom O has promised immigration activists he’ll help.Given the post-Romney terror within the GOP leadership over being demagogued as anti-Latino, I wonder if the bills will...

In a unanimous decision last month, the Supreme Court struck down a Massachusetts buffer zone law prohibiting pro-life free speech outside abortion clinics. The decision was a huge victory for pro-life sidewalk counselors who provide women with abortion alternatives. In their ruling, the Supteme Court struck down a Massachusetts law that created a 35-foot “buffer zone” restricting pro-life advocates from speaking with people entering abortion facilities. massachusettsSaying the abortion buffer zone is “inconsistent with the First Amendment,” the Supreme Court ruled that that the buffer zone violated the First Amendment because it “restricts access to ‘public way[s]’ and ‘sidewalk[s],’ places...

Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey, who ran as a pro-life advocate when he won a Senate term in 2006 and 2012, but who has disappointed pro-life advocates with repeated pro-abortion votes, continues to abandon his pro-life views.A couple years ago, he voted against a measure to revoke taxpayer funding from the Planned Parenthood abortion business. Today, Casey voted for a bill to “overturn� the Supreme Court decision protecting Hobby Lobby from being forced to pay for drugs that may cause abortions.Michael Ciccocioppo, Executive Director of the Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation, told LifeNews he is disappointed that Casey continues to abandon is publicly-stated...

<p>WASHINGTON—Senate Democrats' effort to push back against the Supreme Court's Hobby Lobby decision stalled Wednesday when their bill to restore employers' responsibility to provide contraception coverage under the health law was defeated on a procedural vote.</p> <p>In a 56-43 vote, which was largely along party lines, Democrats came up short of the 60 votes needed to advance their legislation. It sought to prevent companies from relying on a religious-freedom law to avoid complying with the Affordable Care Act's requirement to cover all forms of contraception approved by the government without charging workers a copayment.</p>

       This Candidate Has A History Of Taking On The Obama AdministrationHear what Dan Sullivan, the U.S. Senate candidate from Alaska, had to say In this week's "On the Campaign Trail" podcast, we are joined by Former Alaska Attorney General Dan Sullivan. Dan discusses his campaign for U.S. Senate in Alaska where he hopes to be the Republican nominee to unseat incumbent Democratic Senator Mark Begich. Dan has dedicated his life to serving Alaska and America. He has served on active duty and in the reserves in the U.S. Marine Corps for 20 years as an infantry officer....

Senate Democrats held a hearing today on a bill that wipes out virtually every pro-life law across the country, including state laws that came into play in Pennsylvania that held late-term abortion practitioner Kermit Gosnell accountable for killing babies who were born alive and killed during a gruesome late-term abortion procedure.S.1696 is deceptively titled the “Women’s Health Protection Act” even though it revokes protections for women and their unborn children. Instead, the bill would be far-reaching in how it would topple virtually every pro-life law passed in states across the country.During the hearing, Carol Tobias, president of the National Right...

Well, yet another Clinton White House expose has hit the stands, and this one not only further betrays their disingenuous and calculating nature, but makes clear that Hillary had powerful enemies within the Democratic party long before the Obama wing ever raised it's (horned) head... One person described as not keen on the idea of Clinton joining the Senate is Sen. Charles Schumer (D-NY), who was so fearful of being up-staged he coached Rep. Rick Lazio (R-LI), Clinton’s eventual Republican opponent, on his 2000 campaign, according to Lazio. “I thought he was generally . . . he was supportive,” Lazio said of Schumer....

WASHINGTON – The federal Highway Trust Fund, which contributes to road building and maintenance projects across the country, is expected to run out of money in early August, leading some states to issue plans to halt construction in case the well runs dry. The House and Senate are considering dueling packages and have not reached an agreement on how to address the fund’s impending insolvency. Transportation Secretary Anthony Foxx has advised governors that reimbursements may slow to a trickle if the chambers can’t agree in time. Foxx told the states his department “will continue to take every possible measure to...

I read this at NRO: Senate Democrats’ Religious-Freedom Deprivation BillUnder the guise of “protect[ing] women’s health from corporate interference,” the bill that Senate Democrats are proposing in response to the Hobby Lobby ruling would deprive religious entities of all religious-liberty protections against having the HHS mandate directly imposed on them. Specifically:1. The bill would apply to employers generally, not just (as the bill’s short title would suggest) to “corporate” employers. Subsection 4(a) would make it unlawful for any “employer that establishes or maintains a group health plan for its employees” to “deny coverage of a specific health care item or...

The Senate Appropriations Committee reviews President Obama's request for funding to address the child immigration crisis. (Live stream)

Republicans from Washington to Little Rock are privately distressed that Rep. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., – a candidate once hailed as their most talented U.S. Senate recruit of the cycle – has lost his luster in his challenge to second-term Democratic Sen. Mark Pryor. The overarching problem: While Cotton’s resume is sparkling, his persona is flat. He speaks with authority, but lacks warmth. His wooden delivery is more often academic, lacking an everyday, common touch that’s still essential in a place with slightly less than 3 million people, the smallest state in the south. His slender frame and boyish haircut makes...

Missouri GOP Chair:"Investigate Mississippi Primary Racism."Republican National Chairman Reince Priebus has been asked to open an investigation into the Mississippi Senate GOP runoff election—by a member of the RNC.In an interview with The American Spectator, Missouri State Republican Chairman Ed Martin says he believes what happened in Mississippi is symbolic of a “battle for the future of the party.” Martin says that RNC colleagues he has spoken to “are looking for Reince Priebus to show leadership” on the issue. “Leadership” defined as opening an investigation into what Martin and others see as race-baiting tactics used to win the primary runoff...

The Newborn Screening Saves Lives Reauthorization Act is waiting in the US Senate for a vote. Last week, before the House voted on it, Congresswoman Michele Bachmann went to the floor of the House and said parent consent should be required. But it passed without consent requirements. Now, the U.S. Senate is planning to vote on the Houseʼs newborn screening bill and send it to the President. The Senate wants to hotline it, but we want to stop it unless it has written informed parent consent for the government storage, use, analysis, and sharing of newborn DNA. Call your Senators...

Someone forgot to tell Joe Miller the party’s over, the Alaska GOP Senate primary has already been decided. Miller hasn’t noticed the lights are being turned out, the last of the balloons have fallen from the ceiling and the confetti is being swept up. He’s still partying like there is more than a month to go before Republicans decide Aug. 19 who will run against Sen. Mark Begich (D) in November. Maybe Miller is just having too much fun picking up endorsements from conservatives who also missed the “this party’s over” email, and poking fun at Lt. Gov. Mead Treadwell,...

The Republican Party has entered a new era of sectarian civil wars on multiple issues that bitterly divide and dangerously threaten the GOP through the 2016 elections and beyond. These intensely emotional and ideological issues create deep fissures in the tectonic plate of Republican politics, pitting warring GOP factions against each other and creating powerful strategic advantages for Democrats. A reverse realignment, which is possible for Democrats in 2016, would be achieved by subtraction if a smaller-tent GOP implodes from within while driving swing voters and demographic wave voters to Democrats.

The news that Howard Baker had passed at the age of 88 set off a kaleidoscopic swirl of memories, impressions, recollections and reflections -- so many it was surprising, for he was not a particularly memorable politician, and certainly not a colorful one. On the contrary, Howard Baker's great strength was an ability to meld into the background, to mediate between the political stars of his time, to serve rather than lead, to be the gray between black and white opposites, always the man in the middle, the one in the background when a president signs a bill into...

Federal Law requires that all U.S. defense systems be built with U.S. or allied components. The reality is that nearly every defense system in the U.S. arsenal is 100% reliant on China for rare earth materials and components. Even the small quantity of heavy rare earths mined in United States are shipped to China for processing. Solution: S. 2006 "The National Rare Earth Cooperative Act". Bill S. 2006 was introduced as a stand alone Bill in February 2014. Jim: "On May 19, shortly after a well received bi-cameral Congressional Briefing to Armed Services and Natural Resource staff, we were informed...

A Thad Cochran campaign call Wednesday afternoon tumbled into disaster when a questioner asked why the Cochran campaign was "harvesting black people" for votes. The call was held to push back against claims from the campaign of Mississippi state Sen. Chris McDaniel, Cochran's intra-party challenger who contends he won last week's Republican primary runoff election illegitimately by courting the votes of Democrats and African-Americans. But the call was quickly hijacked by callers who later referred to themselves as supporters of McDaniel. One repeatedly interrupted Cochran campaign adviser Austin Barbour. "Quick question," said the caller, who did not identify himself. "Since...

A conservative group has taken up state Sen. Chris McDaniel’s cause, filing a lawsuit against the Mississippi Secretary of State and the Republican Party of Mississippi to challenge the results of the recent runoff for Senate. Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss., defeated McDaniel by a 6,700-vote margin in the June 24 runoff and won the GOP nomination. Now a conservative group, True the Vote, alleged Wednesday they were denied access to election records, specifically in Hinds and Rankin Counties. They also allege that they found evidence of unlawful “double-voting,” in which Mississippians who voted in the Democratic primary later voted in...

According to the work of Charles C. Johnson and Joel S. Gilbert, what we thought was just a racist campaign to get people out to vote in the Cochran vs McDaniel Mississippi Senate race was the tip of the iceberg. It now appears to be a vote buying scandal right out of the office of Thad Cochran himself: Reverend Stevie Fielder, associate pastor at historic First Union Missionary Baptist Church and former official at Meridian’s redevelopment agency, says he delivered “hundreds or even thousands,” of blacks to the polls after being offered money and being assured by a Cochran campaign...

As disconnected as the politicians in D.C. appear these days, Austin politicians are often no better. If you’re like me, you rarely, if ever, see your State Senator where you live. While some may have multiple offices within the district, they rarely venture outside of their hometown (especially if it’s outside of the district). With only 31 Senate seats in Texas, a State Senator has a great deal of power and influence. This makes accessibility to the people very important, and with little of it available, this can be problematic for many Texans. Most might begin by placing apathy as...

Stars are aligning for a big Republican victory this November – solidifying and expanding the GOP’s majority in the House and perhaps gaining one in the Senate. This is a best-case scenario, and any majority in the Senate would be a slim one. But the importance of removing Harry Reid as majority leader cannot be overstated. That’s why Democrats will pull every dirty trick in their deep bag to hold the Senate, and sadly many Republicans will help them in that quest. President Obama will have two years left to wreak havoc on the country after the next election, but...

WASHINGTON - A fear of voting has gripped Democratic leaders in the Senate, slowing the chamber's modest productivity this election season to a near halt. With control of the Senate at risk in November, leaders are going to remarkable lengths to protect endangered Democrats from casting tough votes and to deny Republicans legislative victories in the midst of the campaign. The phobia means even bipartisan legislation to boost energy efficiency, manufacturing, sportsmen's rights, and more could be scuttled. The Senate's masters of process are finding a variety of ways to shut down debate.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell began plotting his counter-attack just a few days after President Barack Obama made an end-run around Senate Republicans and unilaterally moved to fill slots on the National Labor Relations Board in January 2012. One night that month, McConnell called a small group of his top advisers into his conference room, a red-painted chamber that faces the National Mall and is lined with oil paintings of famous Republican statesmen. With the smell of a wood-burning fireplace wafting in from a nearby room, McConnell and his advisers talked about how to challenge what they viewed as an...

But wait a minute. We all know that Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is invincible and has the good-old boys GOP establishment working 'round-the-clock for him, right? Maybe they'll GOTV among blacks and Democrat voters? Folks, forget about Mississippi and think about what's occurring in Kentucky for a minute. Poll after poll after poll finds Mitch behind the 8-ball of his opponent, while he still hasn't made any of his other balls in the pool pocket yet. Grimes is completely running the table, and having shots of Jagermeister with her gal pals. Granted, these polls are within the margin...

Democrats were crossing their fingers that Chris McDaniel would be the Republican nominee in Mississippi. But since Sen. Thad Cochran has prevailed, they are trying to do the unthinkable — unseat a six-term GOP senator. McDaniel supporters are irate that Cochran won a GOP primary by reaching across the aisle. Now some of his backers are ambivalent about whether they’ll come out at all in November — and if they don’t, that could create a rare opening for a Democrat here.

Ok. I know we hate vanities but I have just realized the biggest problem with why we can't win these primaries

By the time Lois Lerner suggested auditing Sen. Chuck Grassley in a Dec. 4, 2012, email, the Iowa Republican had spent five years scrutinizing Lerner's IRS division. Grassley, during his tenure as top Republican on the Senate Finance Committee, zeroed in on abuses by charities and other nonprofit groups improperly claiming tax-exempt status under Lerner, and he spearheaded a 2006 change in federal law making it harder for organizations to improperly claim the credit. Grassley and Lerner were no strangers to each other, and it’s one of the reasons Republicans fear Lerner’s push to audit Grassley might have been politically...

CALL TO ACTION! All GOP/Conservative Mississippi Voters, Your help Is Needed on Friday!! Wayne Dupree on June 26, 2014 at 6:01 PM IMMEDIATE ACTION NEEDED!! All Conservative/Republican GOP voters in every Mississippi county, visit your county courthouse tomorrow and ask for copies of voter rolls from the Democrat/GOP run-off election.After you have done this, Contact Melanie Sojourner – melanie@mcdaniel2014.com Jay Craig – Jwcraig2@yahoo.comPic from the site, may be from Wash Post so only linking it...

In a June 26 decision, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled that 35-foot buffer zones around abortion clinics - meant to keep demonstrators away - violates First Amendment rights. The decision, a victory for pro-life groups, reversed an appellate court decision upholding a 2007 Massachusetts law that made it a crime for anyone other than clinic workers to stand within the yellow semicircular lines painted 35 feet from entrances of Planned Parenthood clinics in Boston, Springfield and Worcester. Eleanor McCullen, lead plaintiff in the case, McCullen v. Coakley, said she should be able to speak and offer advice to women...

Republicans are in the strongest position to win back the Senate since losing it eight years ago. Over several months, the party has expanded its range of targeted seats, and the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) has helped defeat insurgents it didn’t want representing the GOP in the midterm elections. This sober realization came to Democrats on Wednesday, as Tuesday night’s primary results showed they cannot count on Tea Party candidates upsetting more-electable incumbents. And Democrats are increasingly realizing that President Obama’s approval rating will probably remain mired at 45 percent or lower until Election Day, giving Republicans ammo. As...

It's an off-year election, and the White House is securely in the Democratic camp for two more years. That means the focus is turning instead to down-ballot races. In the House of Representatives, all 435 members are up for reelection. The current split is 233 Republicans, 199 Democrats and three vacancies, and the House is projected to remain a Republican stronghold. While there might be some momentary excitement on the individual race level (i.e., the recent primary defeat of Rep. Eric Cantor in Virginia), the real excitement concerns the Senate, where power could shift. Of the 100 Senate seats,...

Republican Party elders have learned well from their political idol, Barack H. Obama. After observing the total lawlessness of President Obama and Attorney General Eric Holder over the past five and half years, as both men ignored all checks and balances without consequence, ruling Republican elites have seen fit to adopt their strategy of overt lawlessness. Unburdened from ethics, state election laws, or voter accountability, national GOP party masters adopted and replicated Obama and Holder’s “best practices” in the deep red state of Mississippi. With obscene amounts of “walking around money” (vote buying cash) in hand, the GOP united with...

Do you think the Republicans just lost retaking the Senate due to the Thad Cochran campaign's smear tactics? Yes or No..opinions.

You have to hand it to the GOP establishment. When their interests are threatened, they pull out all the stops. They demonstrated that in dragging GOP senator Thad Cochran across the finish line in tonight’s runoff in Mississippi. Imagine if a tea-party candidate in some state had openly appealed to registered Libertarians to help him win a close primary runoff. There would have been howls of outrage that people who didn’t agree with Republican values on social issues and foreign policy were being invited to decide a GOP race. Well, Thad Cochran’s allies performed a version of that ploy tonight...

Sen. Thad Cochran’s (R-Miss.) primary challenger Chris McDaniel is looking into possible legal routes to challenge Cochran’s runoff win. Multiple sources tell The Hill that the campaign is evaluating their options after Cochran orchestrated an improbable win over McDaniel on Tuesday night, defeating the challenger by about 6,300 votes. The campaign’s concerns hinge on heavily African-American Hinds County, which includes the state capital of Jackson and where nearly 70 percent of the residents are black and the voting population is more Democratic than most counties in the state. Cochran netted about 7,000 more votes there in the runoff than the...

After the shameful and disgusting actions of the GOP Establishment in the Mississippi Republican U.S. Senate runoff, where they used Democrat tactics of screaming racism and promising big government to get the vote out to Democrat voters to cross over and help Thad Cochran win, is it time that conservatives realize that a GOPE can never be trusted? Time and time again, the ruling class aka Karl Rove, Boss Hogg Barbour, big donors, K Street lobbyists and RINO's continue to stab conservatives in the back and would rather risk losing an election to a Democrat than give up their power...

Yes, FReepU GOPe, but surrender? NUTS! The battle rages on. Landslide in November and again in 2016! Repeal all of Obama's Marxist disasters! Take our country back!! Rebellion is brewing!!

Chris got 155,000 votes 3 weeks ago, he'll probably need 200,000 this time to win. GOTV

On Friday, Senators Rand Paul (R-KY) and Corey Booker (D-NJ) offered a medical marijuana amendment on the floor of the Senate. The bill is a massive win for states’ rights, as it outlaws the Department of Justice and the Drug Enforcement Agency from undermining state marijuana laws and prohibits the DEA from interfering with the production of hemp in states where it is legal. There is simply no reason the federal government should be trampling over state laws to perform armed SWAT-team raids on state-legal medical marijuana dispensaries. Destroying property and hauling entrepreneurs off to jail is not the proper...

Friend, Remember how President Obama and the Democrats mocked Governor Romney’s predictions during the 2012 elections? It turns out, Mitt Romney was right. Mitt saw it coming. He warned the country about Russia, our “biggest geopolitical foe,” well before Russia began their belligerence in Ukraine. Mitt Romney also noted that the Department of Veterans Affairs desperately needed reform. His calls to action were mocked by liberals. Americans only recently learned that veterans in urgent need of medical attention were left on a waiting list; with some never receiving the treatment they were promised. That’s appalling and un-American. And there was...