Posted on 11/18/2002 6:23:24 PM PST by Mark Felton
November 18, 2002
Target: Tom Tancredo
Some Say GOPPrimary Challenge Likely
By Josh Kurtz He represents one of the most conservative districts in the nation. He just trounced his Democratic challenger by 37 points. Yet Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.) may be one of the most vulnerable incumbents in the 2004 election cycle.
Tancredo, a controversial, outspoken voice for the Republican right who is entering his third term, has angered leading Republicans back home and in the White House.
The House Member's criticisms of President Bush's immigration policy bought him a 40-minute rebuke earlier this year from Bush adviser Karl Rove, who, in the Congressman's own words, warned him "never to darken the door of the White House again." And his decision to renounce his pledge to serve only three terms has infuriated powerful Colorado Republicans, including his political patron, former Sen. Bill Armstrong (R).
"I'll be surprised if he doesn't have a primary [in 2004]," said Floyd Ciruli, an independent Colorado pollster.
Several Republicans, including popular state Treasurer Mike Coffman, who just won a landslide re-election of his own, are considering taking on Tancredo in the '04 primary.
Other potential candidates include state Sen. Jim Dyer (R) and former Arapahoe County Commissioner Steve Ward. "It's a given" that someone will run against the 56-year-old lawmaker, Coffman said. "There are questions about his term-limit pledge. When you have someone like Senator Armstrong, who was his mentor, backing away from him - I think that resonates."
Armstrong was instrumental in getting Tancredo elected in the first place, endorsing him over four strong opponents in a competitive GOP primary to replace retiring Rep. Dan Schaefer (R) in 1998. By Tancredo's reckoning, Armstrong's blessing was worth 3 points at the polls - which just happened to be his margin of victory in the primary.
Even though he may not seek re-election in 2004 - and would consider running for Senate if Sen. Ben Nighthorse Campbell (R) retires - he has chucked the term-limit promise nevertheless.
"The term-limit pledge in and of itself is not the deciding factor if he will run again," said Tancredo spokeswoman Lara Kennedy.
Like all Members who change their minds on term limits, Tancredo has cast his decision as being in the best interests of his district and pet causes. Tancredo wants to preserve his seniority for his suburban district south of Denver and angle for better committee assignments. Plus, he does not want to lose the momentum he has built fighting the government's open immigration policies, Kennedy said. Tancredo is the founder of the House Immigration Reform Caucus.
While plenty of politicians have broken their term-limit pledges before, including Rep. Scott McInnis (R-Colo.), Tancredo's decision is more noteworthy because he once headed Colorado's term-limit organization.
"All too often you have terrific candidates who come to Washington with the best of intentions, but they get too comfortable, and when the time comes, they don't want to go home," lamented Stacie Rumenap, a spokeswoman for U.S.Term Limits.
Whether Tancredo suffers any political damage remains to be seen. So far, the handful of Members who have broken their pledges, including McInnis, have not suffered any consequences at the polls, Rumenap conceded. And U.S.Term Limits is not in the business of recruiting challengers to incumbents who have broken the pledge.
Tancredo has promised to return campaign contributions to donors who are dismayed at his decision to ignore the term-limits pledge. But Armstrong - who did not respond to several messages left at his Denver law office - called the refund offer "hollow," according to The Rocky Mountain News.
Armstrong, meanwhile, has offered some kind words about Coffman.
"Mike Coffman is someone the Republican Party and the people of Colorado will rally around,"he told the News. "There is no doubt in my mind that he will be on the short list for whatever comes along - it could be governor, it could be Senator, it could be Congress."
Coffman, in fact, began running for Congress last year - in the new 7th district, which adjoins Tancredo's. But when the final district lines were drawn, Coffman found himself in Tancredo's 6th district, just a few blocks from the 7th, and chose not to move or run.
Coffman said that while he has not given much thought to the 2004 election yet, he believes that Tancredo will be vulnerable. The three Republicans most frequently mentioned as challengers are all military veterans, while Tancredo is not, and that could make a difference in a district that values military service, political insiders said.
Coffman, a 47-year-old Marine Corps vet who served in Operation Desert Storm, said Tancredo's military deferments during the Vietnam War would hurt him as America prepares to attack Iraq, and could be linked to his decision to ignore the term-limit pledge.
"Here's a guy ordering young men off to war and he himself didn't serve," he said. "I think in this conservative district, something like that could resonate."
Certainly, Tancredo's record would contrast with Coffman's, or Dyer's, who is an Air Force veteran, or Ward's, who is a lieutenant colonel in the Marine Corps Reserves and is on active duty in Florida.
Dyer called it "highly unlikely" that he would challenge Tancredo, but said somebody else might, and predicted that the term-limit issue would sting the incumbent.
"I think a number of people that support Tom are not going to support him if he breaks the term-limit pledge,"said Dyer, who was a surrogate for Tancredo at a candidate forum this fall. "We can't say that situational ethics is bad for party A but not for party B."
Ward, a former mayor of suburban Glendale, could not be reached for comment, but is expected to return to Colorado next year. In an interview with the News after completing his one term on the Arapahoe County Commission, Ward made his opinion of politicians who stay in office too long perfectly clear.
"Any politician who can't find the bathrooms in the first week doesn't deserve to be in public office," he said.
It is unclear whether the White House would try to get involved in a primary challenge to Tancredo.
But it is fair to say that Tancredo is not one of the president's favorite people. Earlier this year, the Congressman accused Bush of pandering to Hispanic voters and trying to prop up Mexican President Vicente Fox by offering amnesty to certain undocumented immigrants. That declaration brought an angry 40-minute phone call from Rove, and Bush pointedly failed to introduce Tancredo to the crowd during a political rally in Colorado in September.
With his hard-line views on immigration, Tancredo is no stranger to controversy. In 1999, he gained publicity for reaffirming his support for gun owners' rights just days after the massacre at Columbine High School, which is six blocks from his house.
The Southern Poverty Law Center released a report last summer linking Tancredo to extremist groups, which the Congressman dismissed as "McCarthyism."
And he was embarrassed earlier this year when it was revealed that undocumented workers had been hired to do some construction work on his Littleton home.
But pollster Ciruli said Tancredo's views on immigration are in line with his constituents'.
"Nobody who's going to argue the soft side of immigration is going to beat him in the Republican primary, or even in the general," he said.
After seeing two fairly viable opponents get wiped out by Tancredo in 1998 and 2000, Democrats appear to have abandoned the 6th district - leaving Republicans there to decide whether they want him to remain in office.
I have adopted the position, that each and every time, I will respond by pointing out they put forth no idea, common sense or facts - just RACISM!. I no longer say "I am not a RACIST" I realize that is a given, or they would not have used it in the first place.
This is a tactic that has been so detrimentally in our country in the past and will be in the future unless we counter it every time and not be afraid of it. That is why I 'scream' it each time I post.
Someone just wrote me that my 'epic' post raised the suspicion of RACISM!. You see, they didn't call me a RACIST - just 'suspected' I was.
All well and good to say what you'd do if and when, what about now?
yIDoqhQo' tlhInqan maH! buy' nqop!
-archy-/-
What laws of the land has he not upheld?
There's a section of the Constitution that says that our borders must be protected from invasion. A biggie, especially after September 11.
512 posted on 11/18/2002 11:56 PM PST by janetgreen
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 424 | View Replies | Report Abuse ]
To: janetgreen
Thanks for proving you're incapable of rational thought.
Going round and round with the Bozo Brigade soaks up valuable hours of life and ends up with looney statements like yours.
Your fears have been addressed. Start at the first post and read the thread. If you still feel the need to overstate, exaggerate and talk stupid...you're on your own.
Best of luck.
827 posted on 11/19/2002 12:35 PM PST by Deb
[ Post Reply | Private Reply | To 512 | View Replies | Report Abuse ]
FYI
From the
Constitution of the United States
Section 1. Full faith and credit shall be given in each state to the public acts, records, and judicial proceedings of every other state. And the Congress may by general laws prescribe the manner in which such acts, records, and proceedings shall be proved, and the effect thereof.
Section 2. The citizens of each state shall be entitled to all privileges and immunities of citizens in the several states.
A person charged in any state with treason, felony, or other crime, who shall flee from justice, and be found in another state, shall on demand of the executive authority of the state from which he fled, be delivered up, to be removed to the state having jurisdiction of the crime.
No person held to service or labor in one state, under the laws thereof, escaping into another, shall, in consequence of any law or regulation therein, be discharged from such service or labor, but shall be delivered up on claim of the party to whom such service or labor may be due.
Section 3. New states may be admitted by the Congress into this union; but no new states shall be formed or erected within the jurisdiction of any other state; nor any state be formed by the junction of two or more states, or parts of states, without the consent of the legislatures of the states concerned as well as of the Congress.
The Congress shall have power to dispose of and make all needful rules and regulations respecting the territory or other property belonging to the United States; and nothing in this Constitution shall be so construed as to prejudice any claims of the United States, or of any particular state.
Section 4. The United States shall guarantee to every state in this union a republican form of government, and shall protect each of them against invasion; and on application of the legislature, or of the executive (when the legislature cannot be convened) against domestic violence.
If the Bozo Brigade is the last defender of the Constitution of the United States, consider me a proud member.
Oh yes, you did! It is always screamed. It is one of those words that screams by it's very usage - you realize that.
Now you bet I screamed it and will continue to do so. It shows I am not afraid of those kind of tactics. You know and I know that it will only work on someone who is, in fact, a decent person. It wouldn't matter otherwise. So since you know and I know it isn't true - then I will make it very prominent to let you and others know - it is an insult that is not to be feared because it is so blatantly false and the accuser is well aware of that fact.
The sooner this country frees itself of the tactics of intimidation, the sooner we can actually discuss our problems and perhaps reach some solutions.
You cannot find it there any more than you can find any 'suspicion' of RACISM.
In this short exchange you stated...
I do live in Arizona where there is a large Spanish speaking population. I like it and I truly don't have the least fear that it will overtake English as the dominant
language.
This intimated to me that you don't have a problem with Spanish becoming a rival language to English in your area. The offshoot of this is that in your area teachers, healthcare workers, emergency services employees, public service employees and others can't get jobs unless they speak Spanish.
I'm not trying to put words into your mouth, but this is the impact of your inference. Did I misinterpret your thoughts? Does this reality trouble you?
Who's been blocking this? Huhhh?
The Bush administration hasn't done anything up until now to secure our borders and they're likely to do less in the future.
Nice catch, Drill.
Paul Shanklins parody song In a Yugo, popularized on Rush Limbaugh's show and found on Shanklin's Executive Privilidges album, comes to mind. So do a LOT of '50s and '60s *carcrash* songs, including Jan and Dean's Dead Man's Curve.
Now, President Bush is certainly not in favor of illegal immigration, so that leaves the statement meaning that because President Bush has not closed the borders on legal immigration, too, then one is also in favor of illegal immigration, meaning one has a problem with *any* immigration.
Oh, wait. I suppose you are going to say that President Bush DOES support illegal immigration. Obviously false.
The push-button-Bush-Bot responses on this thread have answered this question.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/deptofhomeland/sect1.html
Democrats have blocked this for a year now.
We have a crime wave of illegal immigration and Bush has done nothing about it but give speeches that legitimize it. Amnesties support and promote illegal immigration.
No Bush doesnt say he is in favor of "illegal immigration" instead he says he is in favor migrant workers while in the meantime our borders and citizens are being trampled over by criminals looking for a free-handout from the govt.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.