Free Republic

A few weeks ago, former Senator Benn Sasse quit his job as President at University of Florida. The claimed reason given by Sasse was to care for his wife who has epilepsy, but the timing of things now looks very sketchy. I’m going to outline the details in real time because this is going to become more critical as Ron DeSantis positions his future ambitions for the White House, again in 2028.CTH noted a few years ago that Ron DeSantis was positioning for 2024 presidency. One of the supportive datapoints was a $20 million donation by the Republican Governor’s Association...

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) is pushing his state’s university system to look into former University of Florida (UF) President Ben Sasse’s expenses in the wake of reporting from a student newspaper on the subject. “We take the stewardship of state funds very seriously and have already been in discussions with leadership at the university and with the Board of Governors to look into the matter,” Bryan Griffin, a communications director for DeSantis, said in an emailed statement sent Thursday to The Hill. The Florida Board of Governors “oversees the operation and management of the Florida public university system’s twelve...

Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen (R) appointed his predecessor, former Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts (R), to fill the state’s U.S. Senate seat, vacated by former Sen. Ben Sasse (R-NE) in January. Term limits rendered Ricketts unable to run for reelection. Being appointed to the position was widely expected after he said he intended to seek an application for consideration for the appointment following Pillen’s announcement that he would “seek qualified applicants” to fill the upcoming vacancy. Sasse, a two-term senator, left his U.S. Senate seat to become the president of the University of Florida. He officially resigned from the Senate on...

It didn't take long after Sasse's announcement for names to start rolling in to be his replacement. The first to announce their application was a retired Air Force Lt. Colonel who first hit Nebraska's political scene when he challenged Mike Flood in this year's CD1 primary. "My oath did not expire so I'm driving forward to continue my service to my country and my community. For the constitution and the folks of Nebraska, to serve them," said Retired Lt. Colonel John Glen Weaver. While his experience in politics is limited Weaver believes his extensive career in the military, which included...

Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., an outspoken critic of former President Donald Trump, officially resigned from the Senate on Sunday as he prepares to step back into academia as president of the University of Florida. Sasse, who led Midland University, a small private collage in his home state, prior to running for Senate, submitted his resignation last month saying that he would leave office Jan. 8 — two years into his second term. Sasse's departure opens up the seat to an appointment from Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen, a Republican. The state's previous governor, Republican Pete Ricketts, has said he would seek...

Senator Ben Sasse (R-NE) enjoyed several firsts in his short political career, making him a conservative outcast. For instance, he supported the “Never Trump” movement months before any other Republican. Likewise, he was the first GOP senator to speak out against efforts to contest the 2020 Electoral College ballots and to support impeaching former President Donald Trump after the January 6 Capitol Hill riots. However, in a recent twist, he’s headed out of Washington DC — perhaps for good. On November 9, the Florida Board of Governors, which oversees the state’s university system, approved Sasse’s appointment as president-elect of the...

So the red wave ended up not happening, being something more of a pink puddle instead. Has America just become too gerrymandered and partisan for there to be “yuge” wave elections like there used to be? Perhaps. Maybe we need to also not run horrible candidates.Regardless, there are fortunately a few salty letfist tears to sip on after yesterday.Those would be the tears of one of the biggest Democrat donors, Sam Bankman-Fried. He ran a crypto company called FTX that was first valued in 2021 at $18 billion, then exploded upward to a whopping $40 billion, at which point Bankman-Fried...

Republicans who think they’ll be protected by appeasing liberals have another thing coming..

GAINESVILLE — Students and faculty at the University of Florida gave U.S. Sen Ben Sasse a raucous welcome to campus Monday, greeting the Nebraska Republican with biting questions and a loud protest as he sought to introduce himself as the school’s likely next president. Introduced last week as the only finalist for the job, the 50-year-old Sasse faced opposition to his stances against same-sex marriage, his past efforts to do away with tenure and a decision by UF leaders to keep much of the selection process secret. During the second of three public forums, about 200 student protesters crowded into...

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) is pushing for Nebraska Gov. Pete Ricketts to fill the vacant seat left by Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.), who recently announced his retirement. Sasse confirmed on Oct. 6 that he will retire early from the Senate and will likely take a position as president of the University of Florida. Now, Graham wants Ricketts to take Sasse’s place in the Senate—a position to which Ricketts could theoretically appoint himself. Under Nebraska law, the governor appoints a new senator if a vacancy arises in the middle of a term. However, Ricketts has been clear that he does not...

That Sasse is now preparing to willingly remove himself from the playing field is yet another striking testament to the whole-scale takeover of the Republican Party under Trump. Of the 17 Republicans – 10 in the House, seven in the Senate – who voted to either impeach or convict Trump last year, no more than six will be returning to Congress in 2023. And several of those remaining Republicans face stiff competition this fall, meaning that number could sink even lower by the time the next Congress rolls around.

With Nebraska Republican Sen. Ben Sasse's retirement, 11 of the 17 Republicans who voted to impeach or convict former President Donald Trump in 2021 have now opted not to seek re-election or have lost their primary races this year. Sasse announced Thursday he is stepping down to lead the University of Florida. The Nebraska Republican came to the Senate after a stint as the president of Midland University, and his public statements about his decision to join Florida do not mention Trump at all. He went as far as to tell National Review “the impeachment vote has exactly zero to...

Sen. Ben Sasse’s (R-Neb.) expected retirement from the Senate is the latest sign that is it harder to be a Republican critic of former President Trump in Congress than a loyal ally. Sasse is one of seven Senate Republicans who voted to convict former President Trump last year during his impeachment trial over the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. He’s the third to retire. The Nebraskan senator not that long ago was also seen as a rising star in his party and a possible presidential candidate. But that possibility seemed more and more faint as Sasse’s opposition to...

Ben Sasse is brilliant, a consensus builder and will be a great leader of a great University. Ben and family, welcome to Florida! https://t.co/FMlssqdT9q— Jeb Bush (@JebBush) October 6, 2022

Sasse won reelection in 2020, and his term was not set to expire until 2026. But Sasse has been at odds with Trump and his own party for years. After the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, Sasse was one of seven Republican senators who voted to convict Trump for his role in inciting the deadly riot. Senate Republican leadership has been alerted of the news, a leadership aide told NBC News. According to Fox News, Sasse is headed to the University of Florida for a lucrative gig.

Ben Sasse is likely to accept a job at the University of Florida and resign his Senate seat in the near future, according to two people familiar with the Nebraska Republican’s plans. The Nebraska governor would then appoint a replacement for Sasse under state law. The second-term Sasse made a name for himself as a consistent Trump critic in Congress as well as a reliable conservative vote.

Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) claimed in a speech on Thursday that “the right wants a strongman daddy figure” in describing his political party while asserting that Democrats want “a powerful, nameless but supposedly benevolent bureaucracy.” “In the 2016 presidential campaign, you had two candidates with wildly different solution sets, but their fundamental diagnosis was really the same. The system’s rigged, you’re getting screwed, you’re a victim, the country is going down the tubes, you’re victims,” Sasse said while giving remarks at “A Time for Choosing Speaker Series” event by the Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute. “The left wants a...

Sen. Ben Sasse, R-Neb., lit into the “weirdos” that he said are tearing the United States apart, in a fiery speech at the Reagan Foundation that connected the hyperbolic political debates of the last few years with the global threats facing the nation. The Nebraska Republican ripped into “performance artists” on the far left and far right who have dominated politics for close to a decade, saying they’re more focused on getting likes and retweets for themselves on social media than on preserving the United States’ standing as a global superpower amid new threats from adversaries like China.

Former President Trump expressed regret over endorsing Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.) in the 2020 Nebraska Senate race, saying he “should have never given him the endorsement.” “He’s bad news, Ben Sasse. He begged for my endorsement, the day after he started hitting me and we hit much harder than he knows how to hit. He’s bad news,” Trump said during a telerally held for Nebraska gubernatorial candidate Charles Herbster (R).

Senate Judiciary Committee member Ben Sasse (R-NE) announced Friday night he will vote “no” on Ketanji Brown Jackson’s Supreme Court nomination, threatening the committee’s approval of the judge. If a majority of Judiciary Committee members do not vote to approve Jackson’s nomination, the vote may result in an 11-11 tie between Republicans and Democrats, forwarding her nomination to the Senate floor with additional procedural steps, meaning the nomination does not have the committee’s recommendation, which under other circumstances is often fatal. A full Senate vote could then mean moderate Democrats may oppose Jackson’s nomination because of her record of soft...