Free Republic

Former Bush campaign manager Karl Rove said Friday on Fox News Channel’s “America Reports” that he believed Vice President Kamala Harris will soon lead former President Donald Trump in the polls because of momentum. Rove said the former president could take the lead again by focusing on an issue. Host John Roberts said, “So let’s talk about where the race is because, in some battleground states, the polls seem to have been narrowing.”

Republican strategist Karl Rove urged Democrats to “go hard” at former President Trump’s rhetoric surrounding the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol, calling the former president’s pledge to free imprisoned rioters a “critical mistake.” “If they were smart, they’d take the January 6 and go hard at it. And they would say, ‘He wants to pardon these people who attacked our Capitol,'” Rove said told MSNBC’s Ari Melber. “One of the critical mistakes made in this campaign is that Donald Trump has now said ‘I’m going to pardon those people because they’re hostages,'” Rove said in the interview, which...

Former George W. Bush aide Karl Rove warned in a new op-ed that former President Trump’s federal indictment over his mishandling of classified documents will come at a steep cost to himself and the country. “No matter the outcome, America will pay a high price for the former president’s reckless petulance. So will he,” Rove wrote in a Wall Street Journal op-ed. Rove, who served as a senior adviser and deputy chief of staff to Bush, wrote that the country has been “plunged into an unprecedented crisis” after Trump was indicted on 37 felony counts last week. The former president...

Former Bush 43 adviser Karl Rove said Monday on FNC’s “The Story” that former President Donald Trump needs to “move on” from claiming he won the 2020 presidential election. Sunday at CPAC in Maryland, Trump said, “We are never going back to the party of Paul Ryan, Karl Rove, and Jeb Bush.” Anchor Martha MacCallum said, “President Trump went after you at one point, went after other Republicans and said, you know, that’s not the direction we’re going anymore. We’re moving hard on America first, and this is the last battle. Everyone knows it. The country could be lost forever.”...

Former Bush 43 adviser Karl Rove said Monday on FNC’s “The Story” that former President Donald Trump needs to “move on” from claiming he won the 2020 presidential election. Sunday at CPAC in Maryland, Trump said, “We are never going back to the party of Paul Ryan, Karl Rove, and Jeb Bush.” Anchor Martha MacCallum said, “President Trump went after you at one point, went after other Republicans and said, you know, that’s not the direction we’re going anymore. We’re moving hard on America first, and this is the last battle. Everyone knows it. The country could be lost forever.”

Karl Rove, who served as a senior adviser to former President George W. Bush, said on Friday that former President Trump did not have the authority to take presidential documents with him to his Mar-a-Lago residence when he ended his term. “Why he was holding on to these materials when he had no legal authority to do so under the Presidential Records Act is beyond me,” Rove, a Fox News contributor, said during an appearance on the network. Rove’s appearance came shortly after a federal magistrate judge approved the release of a redacted affidavit used to convince him to approve...

Former President Donald Trump told Fox News to dump Republican strategist Karl Rove in a statement from his political action committee Thursday. Rove wrote in The Wall Street Journal on Wednesday when he noted a so-called "muted enthusiasm" for Trump following a straw poll at the Conservative Political Action Conference showed 68% said the former president should run again in 2024. "Never had much of a feeling for Karl, in that I disagreed with so many of the things he says. He's a pompous fool with bad advice and always has an agenda," Trump wrote in a statement from his...

Republican strategist Karl Rove said on this week’s broadcast “Fox News Sunday” that President Donald Trump should be aware Americans do not like “sore losers.” Anchor Chris Wallace asked, “The Electoral College votes tomorrow, and then on January 6, the Congress actually counts the votes and formally declares a winner. Do you expect President Trump to continue to contest the election past tomorrow, maybe even past January 6, and do you think he’s either helping or hurting both himself and the country?” < snip > He added, “As to your second question, it depends on — the answer to that...

Karl Rove, the longtime GOP operative and former adviser to George W. Bush, is heading up Senate Republicans’ fundraising efforts for the Georgia runoff elections. Rove has been tapped as the finance chairman for the Georgia Battleground Fund, a joint fundraising effort by the National Republican Senatorial Committee (NRSC) and the campaigns of GOP Georgia Sens. David Perdue and Kelly Loeffler, a person familiar with the effort confirmed to The Hill. Republicans and Democrats are expected to pump hundreds of millions of dollars into the two runoffs in Georgia over the next eight weeks as they battle for control of...

Karl Rove, the architect of former President George W. Bush's gubernatorial and presidential campaigns, acknowledged Wednesday that the 2020 presidential election will not be overturned regardless of the flurry of lawsuits from President Donald Trump challenging the results.

Monday Fox News contributor Karl Rove said President Donald Trump needs to do better than the “raw and dangerous” rhetoric he has used while commenting on racial issues. Discussing politicians comments on the recent mass shootings, Rove said, “Everybody in our political system needs to do better. The president needs to do better. His rhetoric at times has been raw and dangerous, I think in terms of being easily misunderstood. The Charlottesville statement, for example.”

On this weekend’s broadcast of “Fox News Sunday,” network contributor and Republican strategist Karl Rove discussed President Donald Trump criticism of NFL players for taking a knee during the national anthem at games. According to Rove, Trump would be “walking away” from this controversy a “loser.” ... “He could have come away from this the winner,” he continued. “But he is walking away from this a loser in the minds of the American people for exactly the reasons you pointed out. He was against the federal government interfering and telling the Washington Redskins what their name should be. Now he...

Karl Rove says that instead of nominating Donald Trump, Ted Cruz or John Kasich “a fresh face might be the thing that could give us a chance to turn this election and win in November against Hillary.” In an interview with Hugh Hewitt on Thursday, Rove weighed in on the 2016 election and called on Trump to start “acting in a presidential manner” in order to turn his high unfavorable ratings around. Hewitt asked Rove, “If Donald Trump is the nominee, how do you recover from a 30 percent favorable/63 percent unfavorable, as you note in your column today?” Rove...

Karl Rove, a critic of Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump, said late Wednesday that voters could stay home in November if the businessman becomes his party's nominee but doesn’t change his strategy for the general election fight. The GOP operative spoke with Democratic counterpart David Plouffe, who worked on President Obama’s campaigns, at an event held by technology company SAP at the Newseum. For much of the panel, the questions were framed around a hypothetical situation in which front-runners Trump and Democrat Hillary Clinton had become the nominees. During a discussion about the role of data in campaigns, Rove said...

-snip- Mr. Trump suggests those numbers will improve when he begins attacking Mrs. Clinton in the general election: “I haven’t even started on her yet.” Then again, neither have Democrats started on him. They will pummel him over his bankruptcies, this summer’s Trump University fraud trial, his crude and misogynistic statements, his nativism while hiring foreign workers, his imperious manner. These things may not matter to Mr. Trump’s die-hard Republican primary supporters; they will matter to swing voters in a general election. The GOP contest will arrive at its most critical moment next week. If Gov. Kasich wins Ohio, Sen....

“It was the wrong message from the wrong messenger on the wrong day.” Republican strategist Karl Rove panned Mitt Romney’s anti-Trump speech in an interview that aired on Michigan local radio’s Big Show on Tuesday. Romney called Trump a “phony” and a “fraud” in a speech last week. Trump hit back, calling Romney a “failed candidate” who should have won in 2012. “It was the wrong message from the wrong messenger on the wrong day,” said Rove. “This was the day of the debate, so it’s going to get overwhelmed largely by last night. I thought the speech was good...

Just last week, a years-long tradition came to a screeching halt. “You want me to put it on Fox News,” I asked my wife. “No,” she replied. “I’m done with Fox News.” My job is to monitor the mainstream media, which is something that eats up about 14 hours of a day that begins at 6 a.m. when the cable morning shows begin. Lying next to me, my good sport of a wife suffers through about an hour of “Morning Joe,” whatever they call that left-wing garbage fire on CNN, and the rest. Out of habit, before I head to...

Front-running GOP presidential candidate Donald Trump doesn't yet have a "lock" on the nomination, but time is running out for another candidate to defeat him, according to political strategist Karl Rove. In a commentary for The Wall Street Journal, the former senior adviser and deputy chief of staff during the George W. Bush administration argues the GOP nomination -- "as long as three or more candidates are splitting delegates" in proportional contests -- may stay "uncertain" until March 15. But he could also seal the deal then "if a fragmented opposition gives him an absolute majority of delegates on that...

Donald Trump ripped Karl Rove at a campaign rally in Tulsa, Oklahoma this afternoon that featured former Gov. Sarah Palin. TRUMP: Karl Rove, this guy he predicted -- he thinks Romney won the election. Remember? Romney won. He won. I'm telling you. They had to take him off the air in a basket.

The Republican Party will lose the White House, the Senate and many of its House seats if Donald Trump becomes the party's presidential nominee, according to Karl Rove. “If Mr. Trump is its standard-bearer, the GOP will lose the White House and the Senate, and its majority in the House will fall dramatically,” the Republican wrote in an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal Rove, who was a top adviser to former President George W. Bush, said nominating Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) for president could also be dangerous. “If the nominee is Ted Cruz the situation is still dicey,” he...