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Texas Gov. Rick Perry called in to Mark Levin's radio show and the two had a wide-ranging conversation. Levin ended by saying, while he is not endorsing anyone yet for the GOP Nomination, Perry is "up there with candidates acceptable to me."

MANCHESTER, N.H. (AP) — Republican presidential candidate Rick Perry says he opposes a fence along the U.S. border with Mexico. Speaking to hundreds of New Hampshire voters at a private reception Saturday afternoon, the Texas governor says a fence would be ineffective and take too long to build. The comments, which produced one angry shout, expose a rift with some conservative voters over Perry's immigration record. Tea party activists in Texas have been particularly upset by his steady opposition to the fence. He also signed a law giving illegal immigrants in-state tuition for Texas universities.

Rick Perry's campaign just responded to the attack ad that a pro-Michele Bachmann super PAC unveiled last night, which it is airing in South Carolina, and which hits him on his spending record as Texas governor: “Gov. Perry is a proven fiscal conservative, having cut taxes, signed six balanced budgets, and led Texas to become America’s top job-creating state,” said Ray Sullivan, RickPerry.org’s communications director. “Congresswoman Bachmann’s front-group ad is patently and provably false. Unlike Washington, the Texas budget is balanced, does not run deficits and limits spending, even as Texas added jobs and population in big numbers.”

SANTA FE, New Mexico (Reuters) - A New Mexico judge on Wednesday blocked a move by the state's Republican governor to make it harder for illegal immigrants to keep driver's licenses in the state. Governor Susana Martinez's administration last month ordered the state to reverify the physical residency of foreign nationals who hold New Mexico driver's licenses in order to get or keep their licenses.But District Court Judge Sarah Singleton in Santa Fe issued a temporary restraining order blocking the program, arguing in a brief ruling that "irreparable injury" would occur from "constitutional deprivations to the applicants

At first glance, Labor Day weekend looks like it could be a lot of fun for Rick Perry and his fans. The odds of a Sarah Palin candidacy continue to shrink to irrelevance as she wrestles with incompetent local Tea Party organizers in Iowa over a long-planned appearance just outside Des Moines. Mitt Romney’s temporary triumph in securing top billing at a Tea Party Express event in New Hampshire, meanwhile, is being spoiled by protests from Dick Armey’s FreedomWorks organization. And Mitt is also looking a bit humiliated by his last-minute decision to change plans and appear at a candidate...

Mitt Romney is going into the lion’s den today. Romney is neither a veteran nor a Texan, but he is heading to San Antonio, Texas to address the Veterans of Foreign Wars convention one day after Gov. Rick Perry, who is both a veteran and a Texan, fired up the crowd with a patriotic paean to American exceptionalism. But with poll after poll showing Romney slipping into Perry’s wake, the former Massachusetts governor is keen to show that he’s not backing down. The latest CNN survey has Perry nearly doubling Romney among all candidates running or considering a run and...

This morning Politico ran a story titled "Is Rick Perry dumb" by columnist Jonathan Martin. In the second paragraph, after ridiculing his accent in the opening paragraph, the writer asks: "Is he dumb -- or just "misunderestimated?" Martin goes on to question Perry's "intellect." Rush Limbaugh responds on his Monday program: "This is a recycle, same thing they tried against Ronaldus Maximus back in 1979/1980. 'Is Ronald Reagan dumb?' "It's amazing. Nothing new. Media cycles, media templates being repeated, being recycled."

I just read the text of Rick Perry's remarks to the Border Summit on Aug, 21st 2001. How in the hell is this stuff slipping through the cracks without a single mention in the conservative press? If this had been Obama, Sean Hannity would have been talking about it 24/7 during the last presidential campaign. There are many passages in the speech that are of great concern to me, but this one really caught my attention. ...Legislation authored by border legislators Pat Haggerty and Eddie Lucio establishes an important study that will look at the feasibility of bi-national health insurance....

We are adults and most on FR are very intelligent persons. I think we can decide if a candidate is right for us. How about stop repeating the same Gardasil, Texas corridor, immigration stories over and over and over. Most have seen them by now if they have been paying attention. Most have judged the stories and condemn Perry to hell for them or they think that a president just might have different priorities than a state governor. Screaming at us in all caps isn't going to change any minds. FR isn't the entire universe of voters. We are a...

AUSTIN, Texas (AP) - Texas Gov. Rick Perry has asked the U.S. Department of Homeland Security for nearly $350 million to cover the costs incurred detaining illegal immigrants in state prisons and county jails. In a letter to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano, Perry criticized the federal government hasn't been doing enough to secure the border with Mexico, thereby allowing illegal immigrants to enter the U.S. and use taxpayer-funded resources, including prisons and jails. It's a claim the Republican governor has made many times before. The letter was dated Aug. 10, three days before Perry formally announced he is running...

Opinion L.A. 2012 Campaign: Rick Perry And A Uniquely Anti-Gay GOP Field? August 24, 2011 You might think as much following the revelation by reporter Mark Benjamin that Republican front-runner and Texas Gov. Rick Perry once compared, in writing, homosexuality to alcoholism. Benjamin writes at Time magazine's Swampland blog: Since leaping into the GOP presidential race, Texas Gov. Rick Perry hasn't been asked if he thinks gays are born or made. But in a little-noticed passage in his first book, "On My Honor," a encomium on the Boy Scouts published in 2008, Perry also drew a parallel between homosexuality and...

TX governor panders to 'The Race' Chad Groening - OneNewsNow - 7/21/2010 5:20:00 AMThe head of a grassroots borders enforcement organization says it's completely inappropriate for Texas Governor Rick Perry to speak to a radical Hispanic organization that supports granting amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants. The Republican governor recently addressed a crowd of 1,800 members of the National Council of La Raza, which calls itself the largest Hispanic civil rights organization in the United States. Critics, however, point out that La Raza means "The Race," and claim the organization is nothing more than a Hispanic supremacist organization. One of...

As he enters the Republican presidential race, Texas Gov. Rick Perry is striking some red-meat notes on the subject of immigration. Border security, he says, is a federal responsibility -- and immigration reform will have to wait until the border is secured. Invoking his beloved 10th Amendment, he proposes that in the meantime states should have some latitude to set their own course on the subject. As for Texas, he suggests, unauthorized immigration will not be treated lightly; earlier this year he called for a state law to abolish sanctuary cities, although the bill never made it to his desk....

A new poll by Public Policy Polling puts Texas Gov. Rick Perry in the front of the GOP presidential field in Iowa and shows just how much Perry’s entrance into the race scrambled the contest for the Republican nomination. The poll, released Tuesday (.pdf), shows that 21% of the poll respondents would support Perry in the Iowa caucuses next February, outpacing the two other Republican frontrunners Michele Bachmann and Mitt Romney. Romney’s campaign has been focusing on New Hampshire, a state that is considered a must win for his campaign. If the contest were simplified to a three-way race between...

A couple of caveats are in order before we start looking at this poll. First, it comes from PPP, a Democratic pollster which has had its fair share of difficulties in sampling Republicans. It’s also early in the race, as Rick Perry just starts getting vetted and Sarah Palin hasn’t yet begun to campaign, if in fact she decides to campaign at all. Still, this is a rather dramatic result: The race is pretty close four ways in Iowa but Rick Perry is the new favorite among Republican voters in the state. Among announced candidates he’s at 22% to 19%...

....Tough-guy politicians may not actually make the best leaders, but they've been shown to be popular with voters and able to win major elections. Currently, no other leading candidate (not Mitt Romey, Ron Paul or Michele Bachmann) in the Republican field comes across as more macho than Perry. Evidence of Perry's machismo is surging on the internets. The Twitter feed @RickPerryFacts is a constant stream ofChuck Norris-esque statements about Perry. They're funny, but I also can't help but think they don't speak to a yearning of some part of the human psyche: A basic desire for a strong, tough-guy leader....

(RALEIGH) -- Texas Gov. Rick Perry has been in the Presidential race for barely more than a week, but Tom Jensen with Public Policy Polling said a recent round of polling in North Carolina and Colorado already ranks Perry close to deserving front runner status. "We're already finding Perry tied for the lead in both North Carolina and Colorado and these polls were conducted before he even officially entered the race," said Jensen. In North Carolina Perry is in a three way tie with Mitt Romney and Sarah Palin. Each getting 17-percent. Perry also led a poll conducted in Virginia...

clip--- As governor of the state that shares the largest border with Mexico, Perry defended his record on immigration, including his support for allowing illegal immigrants to get in-state tuition rates at Texas universities but opposing such a law on a national level. "I'm a big believer in the 10th amendment," Perry said. "Whether they allow for tuition increases or decreases or whatever it might be in that state, it needs to be the states making that decisions." Perry wouldn't wade into a national immigration reform debate, deferring to his position that those decisions should be made on the state...

Texas Governor Rick Perry, the latest GOP candidate to enter the 2012 presidential race, looks to challenge former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney’s status as the frontrunner for the Republican presidential nomination. Perry entered the race on August 13th after announcing his candidacy at an event in South Carolina. Perry’s announcement, which stole the spotlight from the Ames Straw Poll, put to rest several months of speculation about the Texas Governor’s decision to run for the GOP nomination. During his presidential announcement, Perry said “we cannot afford four more years of this rudderless leadership.” Perry also added that “page one of...

Rick Perry: A Candidate For Whom 'UnPresidential' Is A Virtue Texas governor's stance on economy and global warming may play well with the US right, but it turns off independents Chris McGreal 19 August 2011 Rick Perry, seen here campaigning in New Hampshire, has drawn criticism over his boasts about new jobs in Texas. There are not many contenders to be president of the United States who consider it an asset to be called unpresidential. But then Rick Perry is not looking for the support of those seeking a president like any other. At least not for now. The Texas...