Free Republic

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX)96%, a 2016 Republican presidential candidate, defended his decision to vote for Trade Promotion Authority (TPA) that would fast-track the Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP), Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (T-TIP) and Trade in Services Agreement (TiSA)—among other deals—during a Thursday interview with the Hugh Hewitt radio program. Hewitt started his line of questioning with coming out of a commercial. “Let’s take that opportunity, then, to go and talk about free trade—TPA, TPP, Export-Import Bank. Sen. Cruz, for clarity’s sake, can you quickly give us an overview on where you are on those three issues, as there’s quite...

Requesting help to avoid a "costly and time-consuming legal challenge," U.S. Sen. Rand Paul is asking members of the Republican Party of Kentucky's central committee to create a presidential caucus in 2016. In a letter dated Feb. 9, Paul told GOP leaders that an earlier presidential preference vote would give Kentuckians "more leverage to be relevant." "As you may have heard, you, as a member of the Kentucky Republican Central Committee, will be the one to decide if you want to help me get an equal chance at the nomination," Paul wrote. The letter went out to hundreds of other...

It's becoming clear to political observers that libertarians are emerging as a key swing vote, if not an official party. Republicans may have won a number of close races by appealing to these libertarians, so their views on policy cannot be ignored. Figuring out those libertarian views on immigration are therefore very important in the wake of President Barack Obama's primetime speech announcing his executive order on immigration.

Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky and Ted Cruz of Texas share a desire to run for president in 2016, but this week the Republicans differed on an issue of importance to the conservative base — gay marriage. During a recent visit to South Carolina's College of Charleston, Paul told CNN that "people change their minds all the time" on the issue of gay marriage. “The bottom line is, I’m old fashioned, and I’m a traditionalist. I believe in old-fashioned traditional marriage. But, I don’t really think the government needs to be too involved with this, and I think that the...

It seems all the Senate Republicans are willing to turn a blind eye to the scandal and corruption obviously at play in the Mississippi Senate race to protect their buddy Thad Cochran who, apparently, can no longer find his way to the clubby Senate lunches he’s been attending since Jimmy Carter was president. In what appears to be the ultimate modern demonstration of “drinking the Koolaid,” Republicans across the spectrum seem to have entered a pact in sticking together to defend, and even celebrate, campaign tactics predicated on gross voter fraud and manipulation of minority voters. In fact, we now...

This Rand Paul versus Rick Perry GOP thunderstorm popped up pretty fast, didn’t it? It was a dark cloud on the horizon on Friday, when Governor Perry of Texas published an op-ed in The Washington Post that attacked Senator Paul as a foreign policy isolationist. Paul is reluctant to devote more US troops and weapons to Iraq, and Perry used that position to portray the Kentucky lawmaker as the reverse of Ronald Reagan, as someone who wants to hunker down at home rather than lead the world. “Paul is drawing his own red line along the water’s edge, creating a...

Kentucky Senator Rand Paul made yet another appearance Monday with Tennessee’s Lamar Alexander, who is facing a Tea Party primary challenger. While considered one of the most moderate Republicans in the Senate, Alexander has been working in recent months to look more conservative. Before anyone could ask, Alexander denied that he was trying to get political help from the Tea Party darling. “We’re not here to endorse each other,” he said, without prompting. “Rand hasn’t asked me to endorse me for the President of the United States, and I haven’t asked him to endorse me for the senate. We’re here...

That is again leading to speculation that Sen. Paul will endorse Sen. Alexander’s re-election bid, something he came short of doing in a previous joint media appearance to demonstrate their solidarity with fishermen facing Corp of Engineer restrictions that would keep them from fishing near dams. Given the pair's voting records, which show wide policy fissures, if Sen. Paul does endorse Alexander, it will invite reasonable suspicion that he cares more about Lamar’s ability to help him in his expected 2016 presidential run than he does about the biggest issues facing the country. I have culled, from the Heritage Action...

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) says in a new interview that Republicans should embrace a more tolerant view of those who don't hold conservative positions on social issues."I think that the Republican Party, in order to get bigger, will have to agree to disagree on social issues," Paul told vocativ.com. "The Republican Party is not going to give up on having quite a few people who do believe in traditional marriage. But the Republican Party also has to find a place for young people and others who don’t want to be festooned by those issues."Paul's comments harken back somewhat to former...