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Rep. Marlin Stutzman is a member of the anti-leadership House Freedom Caucus, a conservative in the mold of Ted Cruz and a three-term Indiana congressman who voted against John Boehner as speaker. Now, he wants a promotion to the Senate -- and Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and his allies want to stop that. Privately, McConnell has made clear to his confidantes that he wants to bolster the candidacy of Stutzman's chief GOP rival, Rep. Todd Young, and push him over-the-top in the May 3 primary, according to sources familiar with the conversations. Publicly, McConnell's super PAC has made Indiana the...

Link only due to copyright issues: http://www.mycentraljersey.com/story/opinion/2016/04/07/cruz-teavangelical-can-win/82711226/

"Rule 40(b) - Each candidate for nomination for President of the United States and Vice President of the United States shall demonstrate the support of a majority of the delegates from each of eight (8) or more states, severally, prior to the presentation of the name of that candidate for nomination. Notwithstanding any other provisions of these rules or any rule of the House of Representatives, to demonstrate the support required of this paragraph a certificate evidencing the affirmative written support of the required number of permanently seated delegates from each of the eight (8) or more states shall have...

Wisconsin businessman Paul Nehlen announced Tuesday that he is the tea party-allied candidate who is challenging House Speaker Paul D. Ryan in the Republican primary, saying he’s “had it” with the speaker betraying conservatives. Sources first confirmed to The Washington Times earlier this week that a wealthy businessman was mounting a primary challenge to Mr. Ryan in Wisconsin’s 1st Congressional District, but Mr. Nehlen did not reveal his identity until now. “Paul Ryan’s embrace of big government spending, his continued support of illegal immigration and imported workers, and his championing of the job-killing trade deal known as the Trans-Pacific Partnership...

Just a few miles from his family home, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) felt the wrath of the tea party Saturday, when activists in his congressional district booed and heckled the second-most powerful House Republican. (SNIP) “When I sit here and I listen to Mr. Brat speak I hear the inaccuracies — my family’s here.” Cantor said. As he was interrupted by the raucous crowd, Cantor’s anger was evident: “That’s enough — we are a country of free speech, so decency’s also part of this.” (SNIP) “It is easy to sit in the rarified environs of academia, in the...

A wealthy businessman with tea party ties confirmed Sunday that he is mounting a primary challenge to House Speaker Paul D. Ryan, saying that after donating to the Wisconsin Republican’s past campaigns he feels “betrayed” by the speaker on trade deals and immigration. The businessman, who is not yet revealing his identity, promised that his run will “shake up the establishment in a profound way,” according to a political consultant close to the prospective candidate. The emergence of a viable Republican challenger in Wisconsin’s 1st Congressional District is the culmination of a monthslong recruitment effort by tea party activists who...

Tea party activists are heartened by a federal appeals court ruling that strengthens their legal push against the Internal Revenue Service for alleged targeting in past election cycles. A three-judge panel of the Cincinnati-based 6th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals chastised government foot-dragging while ordering the agency to give attorneys for tea party groups details on tax-exempt applicants. A U.S. district court judge in Cincinnati earlier this year certified the case as a class action. …

The big question for Cruz is whether this baton pass does more damage than good among anti-establishment voters, even if it does boost movement conservatives. Newsmax’s Nick Sanchez believes that Jeb’s conservative track record in Florida will buffer the downside, and giving Cruz and the Tea Party access to the “establishment” donor base will pay dividends as well: 3. The Bush family has a national network of supporters — Money alone cannot win an election, and — as Cruz demonstrated right off the bat in the Iowa caucus — tapping into the network of bottom-up grassroots organizing can often ensure...

A federal appeals court spanked the IRS Tuesday, saying it has taken laws designed to protect taxpayers from the government and turned them on their head, using them to try to protect the tax agency from the very tea party groups it targeted. The judges ordered the IRS to quickly turn over the full list of groups it targeted so that a class-action lawsuit, filed by the NorCal Tea Party Patriots, can proceed. The judges also accused the Justice Department lawyers, who are representing the IRS in the case, of acting in bad faith — compounding the initial targeting —...

There is one good thing about people who insult our intelligence; they're probably misunderestimating the true level of our understanding. I’ve been called a fascist by communists and a communist by fascists. I’ve been called a pagan by Christians and a Christian by pagans. I’ve been called an optimist by pessimists and a pessimist by optimists. All of us have been labeled by others. We’ve all been called this by that and that by this, we’ve all had people try to insult us by how they refer to us, but when people insult our intelligence they are usually showing their...

[SNIP]The argument against Cruz is that he’s obnoxious.His colleagues don’t like him,and exit polls show he doesn’t do nearly as well among moderate and somewhat conservative voters as he does among hardcore conservatives....That’s why,when my colleague Jamelle Bouie was betting on Cruz,I put my money on Rubio...I stand refuted.Cruz hasn’t overcome the Trump wave,but he has proved that in an angry party,his organization,discipline,and message can beat a broadly appealing rival.Republicans who vote for Trump in 2016,only to see him abandoned by elements of their party and defeated in the general election,would be at least as angry in 2020.The notion that...

Republican Christine O'Donnell returned to political debate on Thursday to slam GOP presidential front-runner Donald Trump. "I have no desire to get in the fray. Now it looks like he's going to be the nominee. I can't sit back anymore. I can't hold my tongue," O'Donnell said during an interview on CNN. "He did nothing to liberate the middle class from political correctness until he decided to run for president," O'Donnell added during her interview with Brooke Baldwin. O'Donnell is known in political circles for a stunning upset during the Tea Party wave of 2010 when she defeated establishment favorite and former...

It was one of the tea party’s few highlights in Tuesday’s congressional primaries. But laying claim to former GOP House speaker John Boehner’s old seat (in all likelihood) is a big one, both for the bragging rights and the momentum it gives House conservatives in their ongoing fight to purify their party ideologically. Warren Davidson, a businessman and former Army Ranger, won a 15-way Republican primary Tuesday in the special election for Ohio’s 8th Congressional District. The tea party candidate rather easily bested more moderate candidates, including two state lawmakers, in a campaign that quickly became ground zero for the...

It was one of the tea party’s few highlights in Tuesday’s congressional primaries. But laying claim to former GOP House speaker John Boehner’s old seat (in all likelihood) is a big one, both for the bragging rights and the momentum it gives House conservatives in their ongoing fight to purify their party ideologically. Warren Davidson, a businessman and former Army Ranger, won a 15-way Republican primary Tuesday in the special election for Ohio’s 8th Congressional District. The tea party candidate rather easily bested more moderate candidates, including two state lawmakers, in a campaign that quickly became ground zero for the...

If Marco Rubio’s campaign flames out in Florida tonight, as polls suggest, it will be delicious revenge for the Tea Partiers who have been waiting years to embarrass the senator in his home state. “We’re going to have a sweet taste in our mouths tomorrow when little Marco gets embarrassed by those he betrayed. He betrayed all of Florida, but mostly he betrayed people like me who worked hard to get him elected,” said Dan Ray, a founding member of Tea Party group in The Villages, a large retirement community in Florida, where Rubio campaigned earlier this week. When Rubio...

Hartford Tea Party co-founder endorses Ted Cruz and denounces Donald Trump. As one of the co-founders of the Hartford Tea Party in 2009, I was appalled to read the statement of Debbie Dooley, claiming that Donald Trump was the choice of someone who once claimed membership in a genuine grass roots organization dedicated to upholding the Constitution, reducing the size of government, eliminating government health care and opposing high government spending. In her endorsement for Donald Trump, she claimed the following:"I have been an activist fighting for conservative principles since 1976, so I reject individuals and publications that try to...

Here are five video segments of Donald Trump's remarks at a Florida Tea Party rally held in 2011. There appear to be few if any significant differences between what he said then and what he says at his current rallies, although he his minimized the "birther" attacks on Obama because that matter is now of little relevance. Trump's remarks seem to have been received as well in 2011 as now.H/t The Last RefugeThe video segments appear to be in proper sequence. Congressman Allen West introduced Trump at the beginning of this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kVztgvpe4FM   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zd9pMfMling   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JoFnWfUF6SU   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZfvKjYKvMd4  ...

A crowd of well over 100 people turned out at the hearing, and several New Hampshire lawmakers defended Jerry DeLemus, 61, of Rochester, telling a judge that he is a law-abiding peacemaker who deserves to be released on bail. DeLemus is accused of being a "mid-level leader" and organizer of a conspiracy to recruit, organize, train and provide support to armed men and other followers of rancher Cliven Bundy. DeLemus was among a dozen people in five states arrested last week, raising to 19 the number accused of inciting and leading an armed insurrection in April 2014 to stop a...

Jack Kimball was working the phones hard on Friday morning. The Tea Party organizer and former chairman of the New Hampshire Republican Party was drumming up support for his friend and Tea Party associate Jerry DeLemus of Rochester. DeLemus, a Marine Corps veteran and former candidate for Strafford County sheriff, faces a slew of federal charges in connection with his role in a 2014 stand-off between ranchers and federal authorities in Nevada over grazing rights on public lands. The 60-plus-page indictment handed up Thursday against DeLemus and others involved in the standoff can be read here: www.unionleader.com/delemus. - See more...

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