Free Republic

The 60th quadrennial presidential election in the United States is in four weeks, less than a month away. As the campaign season is heating up, let’s take a look at the election of 1968, the last time the incumbent President decided not to run for re-election despite not being term-limited, just like President Joe Biden did this year. As the 2024 election is fast approaching, we need to make a big jump in American history, skipping from 1932 to 1968. Evidently, there are a lot of events we have to jump over, here’s a list of just the most significant...

Vice President Kamala Harris has it both ways on the campaign trail — simultaneously taking credit for some of the Biden-Harris administration’s record while casting former President Donald Trump as the incumbent. The contradiction wrongly frames Trump as the candidate responsible for soaring migrant crime, spiking inflation, and the deadly Afghan withdrawal — three situations that arose under the Biden-Harris administration. The contradiction stems from the media’s failure to widely ignore a “catch-22″ rooted within Harris’s candidacy: Harris cannot campaign on policies to fix crime, inflation, and border security without undermining the Biden-Harris administration’s claim of solving those key issues....

Fox News anchor Martha MacCallum, in an interview published Wednesday, said it will “absolutely be incumbent” on Republican presidential candidates during the first primary debate to address the criminal charges former President Trump faces. “It will absolutely be incumbent upon them to address [Trump’s criminal charges],” MacCall“Voters need to hear how they see it, and the option that they’re trying to provide. It’s very tricky territory for these candidates. They know that well,” she added. “It’s kind of a minefield.”um told “Vanity Fair.”

Incumbent Kansas Democrat Gov. Laura Kelly has secured a second term in an extremely close election against Republican challenger state Attorney General Derek Schmidt, NBC News projects. Both NBC News and CNN called the race on Wednesday morning after waiting for remaining vote counts to trickle in. By 10:30 a.m. ET, Kelly was ahead of Schmidt by roughly 15,000 votes, 49.2 percent to 47.6 percent. Independent candidate Dennis Pyle syphoned off 2 percent of the votes.

The surprising story out of Tuesday’s Republican House primary in Wyoming wasn’t that Rep. Liz Cheney lost. The pre-election polls all showed her losing handily to eventual winner Harriet Hageman. The big news from the Cowboy State was her margin of defeat. Cheney’s loss is one of the biggest on record for a House incumbent and is part of a pattern this primary season pointing to former President Donald Trump’s strength within the Republican Party. Cheney’s defeat appears to be the second worst for a House incumbent in the last 60 years, when you look at races featuring only one...

George Gascon, Jackie Lacey UPDATE, 11:19 AM: After a hard fought election and eight years in office, Los Angeles County District Attorney Jackie Lacey has just conceded to George Gascón. Noting the ” contentious fight” and fighting back tears, the first African-American woman elected to the powerful prosecution office recognized that the votes simply weren’t there for her. “In fighting to stay in office we faced a tsunami of money,” a clearly angry Lacey made a point of noting. The likes of Netflix’s co-CEO and others boosted Gascón with a war chest of $5 million greater than Lacey, who...

Last week was the pivotal week in the American election race. Not because of seven crazy days of Donald Trump's shenanigans – his continuing ugly row with Ted Cruz about their wives, the arrest of his campaign manage over an alleged assault, his refusal to back the eventual Republican nominee, and his extraordinary proposal that women who have illegal abortions should be punished (followed by a hasty, but unconvincing, u-turn). In fact you probably missed the crucial signals hidden amid all that Republican noise. Last week two pieces of data emerged which give us the clearest possible idea about where...

The term “paramountcy of the party” is often touted by totalitarian regimes in which the government and its bureaucrats are solely comprised of members of a single party. The ruling class is comprised entirely of party members, the elites are party members, the military is a wholly owned subsidiary of the party, in every facet of life the favored are members of the party; the party is the state. Whatever other options there are, they are there simply for show and few of the members ever dare to oppose their oppressive regimes. One needs to only look at the history...

This is an Audio of Frank Beckmann from WJR AM 760 out of Detroit interviewing Terry Bowman

Living in TEXAS, I have been hearing campaign ads being aired by Senator John Cornyn that really are irritating me. In these ads, one would not know that Senator Cornyn IS the Senate Minority Whip or that he's been in the Senate for almost a full 2 terms (11 years). Further, he paints a self portrait as being a Real Conservative just like me. In light of this, I am preparing to fill out an Employee Performance Evaluation form and then send it to him. Can anybody recommend a good and comprehensive form with which to do this? I'm also...

Rep. Jeff Landry (R-La.), a tea party-backed freshman, appears to have drawn the short straw in Louisiana’s new congressional map, as the delegation downsizes from seven members to six. Negotiations are continuing in Baton Rouge on the details and a final vote on a plan is not expected before the weekend. But key legislative leaders—with encouragement from GOP Gov. Bobby Jindal—have coalesced behind a map that would carve up Landry’s district, according to news reports and Republicans who are monitoring the redistricting deal-making. Most of Landry’s western parishes would become part of the coastal district held by Rep. Charles Boustany...

November 2nd could see some big, unpleasant surprises for incumbent Democrats in the House of Representatives. Strong GOP contenders, largely unnoticed by the national media and party bigwigs, are making bold plays for seats long regarded as belonging to the Democrats. ...If the Likely Democratic and Likely Republican seats are excluded, then 99 Democratic held seats are in play, and only six Republican held seats. Nate Silver of the fivethirtyeight.com blog currently rates 39 Democrat-held seats as leaning or likely to turn over, with only two GOP seats in that category. There are another twenty Democrat-held seats he rates as...

...Because we might as well face it: being in Congress is a good gig. The pay is pretty sweet, and gets better the longer you stay, what with automatic cost of living increases and all. Leadership positions pay better than rank-and-file, of course. But even as a lowly freshman Rep, you get a personal staffing allowance, expenses, and of course, franking priviliges! You also get travel benefits (both foreign and domestic) and, depending on your seniority, can frequently bring along family members on junkets, er, Congressional delegations. Plus there are recesses galore–even more than teachers get! In short, it’s nice...

Or perhaps not so stunning, since Jim Oberstar has lived for almost 50 years in Washington DC rather than Minnesota’s 8th CD. The working-class, union, and most importantly pro-life district in the northeastern part of the state has sent Oberstar to Congress for eighteen terms, and previous to that, Oberstar worked on Capitol Hill as a staffer since the Kennedy administration. A new internal poll for Republican challenger Chip Cravaack puts the former Navy pilot and instructor into a virtual dead heat for the seat — and shows the voters in MN-08 ready for a change.

By some counts, the GOP has a shot at 103 currently Democratic seats in the U.S. House of Representatives this year. You have probably marveled at Florida GOP House candidate Allen West’s speeches on YouTube. You’ve been amused to learn about the offbeat biography of Sean Duffy — MTV reality-show star, world-champion lumberjack, and a successful district attorney. You’ve chuckled at the thought of Jon Runyan plowing through New Jersey Democrat John Adler the way he used to plow through defensive lineman. And when North Carolina’s Bob Etheridge attacked that kid who asked him whether he supports the Obama agenda,...

Notice how the room erupts with anger and disbelief not at the congressman’s position, but over the fact that he claims to be ‘unaware’ of the case being dismissed. The face of the Democratic Party is increasingly that of an out-of-touch elitist who knows what is better for the people than they know themselves. And with Rep. Pete Stark’s dismissive attitude on the border issue, Rep. Ciro Rodriguez‘ angry eruption over skepticism over his remarks on ObamaCare, and now Rep. Brad Sherman’s supercilious smirk as he admits to his constituents that he is not aware of one of the top...

HUNTSVILLE, AL -- Mo Brooks has won the Republican nomination for 5th Congressional District without a runoff. Brooks said incumbent Parker Griffith called him and conceded just a few minutes ago. Brooks won 51 percent of the vote (35,712) to Griffith's 33 percent (23,494). Les Phillip won 16 percent (11,066).

EAST CAMDEN, Ark. – Days before Arkansas voters deliver a verdict on her political career, Democratic Sen. Blanche Lincoln spent Saturday telling them that she's built up the clout in Washington to best represent the state's interests. Talking up her credentials in Washington flies in the face of the anti-incumbent and anti-Washington sentiment that Lincoln faces. Halter, backed by labor unions that have soured on Lincoln, is portraying himself as an agent of change and Lincoln as the status quo. Lincoln is considered one of the most vulnerable incumbents in Washington this year. She angered conservatives by supporting the Democratic-led...

Representative has served S. Arizona for more than 20 years. A desire to teach, D.C. 'divisiveness' part of his decision U.S. Rep. Jim Kolbe, a Tucson Republican who rose through the ranks of Congress to become one of the country's most influential lawmakers, will not seek re-election in 2006. Kolbe stunned supporters, delighted rivals and touched off a frenzied wave of anticipation among possible successors Wednesday by announcing he will leave the House of Representatives next year after 22 years. "At some point you have to say it's time to hang up the spurs," the 63-year-old congressman said. "This is...

With all due respect to the political insight of Dick Morris (and he deserves much), he is quite wrong about his belief that Cong. Shelley Moore Capito--D-WV has a chance to defeat Sen. Robert Byrd--D-WV. It is unlikely that he will come down to defeat when otherwise Republican business owners won't cough up the money to make the Republican machine work. The WV GOP was severly choked in 2004 because these businesses were unwilling to buck Democrats who held and wielded a serious threat of reprisal. In the aftermath, the GOP there is in shambles. More of that later. Morris...