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Post by the Scribe on Mar 1, 2021 19:37:33 GMT
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Post by the Scribe on Mar 23, 2021 6:27:26 GMT
GET RID OF THE FILIBUSTER. Some of us are very TIRED of this TYRANNY BY THE MINORITY. They have been trying to UNDO EVERYTHING that the Dems and Obama did anyway and they will continue to do it with or without so why not take our country back from these CONS? Because that is what they are. CONS.Trump says removing filibuster would be "catastrophic for the Republican Party"www.yahoo.com/news/trump-says-removing-filibuster-catastrophic-144154727.html Fadel Allassan Mon, March 22, 2021, 7:41 AM
Former President Trump warned the GOP that removing the filibuster would be "catastrophic for the Republican Party" during an interview on the podcast “The Truth with Lisa Boothe." podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/episode-1-do-you-miss-me-yet-tell-all-president-donald/id1557742167?i=1000513917996
Flashback: Trump told Republican lawmakers in 2018 that keeping the filibuster would be "the end of the party," insisting that Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) would eliminate it as soon as Democrats took the majority, Politico reported at the time. www.politico.com/story/2018/06/26/donald-trump-kill-the-filibuster-677151
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Why it matters: Schumer has faced mounting pressure from progressives to remove the filibuster for priority issues like climate change and voting rights.
Eliminating the 60-vote filibuster and moving to a simple majority requirement in the Senate would significantly limit the power of the minority party, which has often used the procedure to delay or block legislative action it opposes.
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What he's saying: "Look, he's hanging by a thread right now with respect to the filibuster," Trump said about Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's (R-Ky.) attempts to stave off any changes to the filibuster.
"f they get the fili — he's hanging on Joe Manchin, who always goes with the Democrats. Joe talks, but he ends up going with the Democrats."
"Now there’s another great senator from the state of Arizona," Trump continued, referring to moderate Sen. Kyrsten Sinema (D-Ariz.). "He's hanging by a thread and if they get rid of the filibuster, if they knock it out, it will be catastrophic for the Republican Party."
Trump went on to attack McConnell as weak, arguing that the party needs "better leadership" in order to "rein in" anti-Trump senators like Mitt Romney (R-Utah) and Ben Sasse (R-Neb.).
"And now, they knock out the filibuster, it’s going to be a real problem. ... they’re gong to have a free for all," he added.
"And I told Mitch McConnell from almost the first day, I said, look, the first thing they’re going to do is knock out the filibuster. So if they’re going to knock it out, maybe we should and get everything that we want."
The state of play: McConnell last week warned Democrats that removing the filibuster would "break the Senate" and turn the chamber into a "100-car pileup" where chaos reigns. www.axios.com/filibuster-senate-abolish-manchin-sinema-mcconnell-0eb3aed7-02e2-4443-8d77-fa3335e3bd61.html?utm_medium=partner&utm_source=verizon&utm_content=edit&utm_campaign=subs-partner-vmg
He also promised retribution if the GOP took back control of the Senate, saying, "We wouldn't just erase every liberal change that hurt the country —we'd strengthen America with all kinds of conservative policies with zero, zero input from the other side."
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Post by the Scribe on Apr 4, 2021 7:56:35 GMT
And why could any moron on the right be elected in 2010? The damn racists were outraged a black man became president in 2008 and conservative media's gaslighting their base.John Boehner says in forthcoming memoir that in 2010 a Republican could be a 'total moron' and still be elected in the midtermswww.yahoo.com/news/john-boehner-says-forthcoming-memoir-150257256.html Grace Panetta Fri, April 2, 2021, 8:02 AM
John Boehner. REUTERS/Kevin Lamarque
John Boehner said that a Republican "could be a total moron" and still get elected in 2010.
2010 was a big year for the GOP and Boehner said, "we did pick up a fair number in that category."
The former Republican House Speaker didn't hold back in an excerpt of his memoir published Friday.
Former GOP House Speaker John Boehner said that a Republican "could be a total moron" and still be elected to Congress in the 2010 midterms in an excerpt of his forthcoming memoir that was published in Politico Magazine on Friday. www.politico.com/news/magazine/2021/04/02/john-boehner-book-memoir-excerpt-478506?nname=playbook&nid=0000014f-1646-d88f-a1cf-5f46b7bd0000&nrid=0000016b-2cd6-d307-a5ff-eddff0860000&nlid=630318;nlid=630318
"In the 2010 midterm election, voters from all over the place gave President Obama what he himself called 'a shellacking.' And oh boy, was it ever. You could be a total moron and get elected just by having an R next to your name-and that year, by the way, we did pick up a fair number in that category," Boehner wrote in his book, "On The House: A Washington Memoir," which is set to be released on April 13. us.macmillan.com/books/9781250277183
Video: Republican party speeches through the years
Republicans' big sweep was a dream scenario for the party, but Boehner, first elected to Congress in 1991, found that he had his work cut out for him with a caucus of over 80 new GOP House lawmakers who weren't all part of the so-called establishment Republicans, but belonged to a new Tea Party insurgency. www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2014/11/05/which-election-was-worse-for-democrats-2010-or-2014/
Read more: Washington moves of the week: A top Trump White House staffer lands a TV gig and a former Kamala Harris aide heads to a lobbying firm www.businessinsider.com/heres-who-got-hired-in-washington-this-week-kayleigh-mcenany-2021-4?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral
In the excerpt, Boehner didn't hold back when assessing his new colleagues, saying that when he tried to offer the freshmen lawmakers guidance about being in Congress, his advice "went straight through the ears of most of them, especially the ones who didn't have brains that got in the way."
Boehner also assigned some blame to conservative media outlets, especially Fox News, in incentivizing flashiness and outrage over substance, which he said made it harder for him to govern his caucus effectively.
By 2013, Boehner wrote, "the chaos caucus in the House had built up their own power base thanks to fawning right-wing media and outrage-driven fundraising cash."
He said that former Minnesota Rep. Michele Bachmann, for example, had "made a name for herself as a lunatic" after first being elected in 2006. And yet she demanded a seat on the prestigious and highly sought-after House Ways and Means Committee.
In the days of yore, Boehner said, the House speaker would simply brush off such an audacious request. But Bachmann had the increasingly powerful conservative media apparatus at her disposal and could use it to cause even more trouble for him.
Eventually, Boehner compromised and gave her a seat on the House Committee on Intelligence, a still-distinguished committee assignment that would allow her to build up some foreign policy credentials to fit her presidential aspirations.
But his troubles with Tea Party-style elected officials with national ambitions didn't end there - and weren't limited to his side of the Capitol.
"There is nothing more dangerous than a reckless asshole who thinks he is smarter than everyone else. Ladies and gentlemen, meet Senator Ted Cruz," he wrote. "He enlisted the crazy caucus of the GOP in what was a truly dumbass idea. Not that anybody asked me." www.businessinsider.com/john-boehner-calls-ted-cruz-a-reckless-asshole-book-excerpt-2021-4?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral
Read the original article on Business InsiderPeople Former Republican House Speaker John Boehner Sounds Off on GOP ‘Crazytown’ In New Tell-All www.yahoo.com/entertainment/former-republican-house-speaker-john-202332802.html Fri, April 2, 2021, 1:23 PMFormer GOP House Speaker John Boehner in new book excerpt calls Ted Cruz a 'reckless a--hole who thinks he is smarter than everyone else'www.yahoo.com/news/former-gop-house-speaker-john-142951673.html Eliza Relman Fri, April 2, 2021, 7:29 AM
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Post by the Scribe on Apr 6, 2021 22:44:45 GMT
In many ways, the GOP is already a minority party. The GOP hasn't won the popular vote in a presidential election since 2004. Democrats have won the popular vote in seven of the last eight elections, including the past four (2008, 2012, 2016, and 2020). Under former President Donald Trump, the GOP lost the White House, House, and Senate in just four years.Business Insider The GOP's flailing response to the Georgia voting law backlash shows how lost the party iswww.yahoo.com/news/gops-flailing-response-georgia-voting-182547241.html John Haltiwanger Tue, April 6, 2021, 11:25 AM
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell offers a stimulus compromise at a press conference with Republican Senator from Wyoming John Barrasso (L) and Republican Senator from South Dakota John Thune (R) at the Capitol. Photo by Nicholas Kamm/POOL/AFP via Getty Images
The GOP response to backlash over Georgia's new voting restrictions shows how lost it is.
The typically pro-corporate party is threatening tax hikes on major companies criticizing the law.
And as Republicans rant about "cancel culture," they're calling for boycotts of pro baseball.
See more stories on Insider's business page.
The Republican party was always going to struggle to define itself post-Trump, but the scope of that challenge has become increasingly evident via the party's bumbling reaction to growing fallout over Georgia's controversial new voting law.
The voting law, which includes a provision banning volunteers from delivering food or drinks to voters in line, has sparked a wave of criticism - including from major companies based in Georgia like Coca-Cola and Delta. The MLB has also protested the law by moving the All-Star Game out of Georgia. Republicans maintain that the law is designed to prevent voter fraud, an extremely rare and virtually non-existent problem in the US. www.businessinsider.com/ga-voting-law-bans-volunteers-from-delivering-food-water-to-voters-2021-3?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral www.businessinsider.com/trump-fox-interview-bartiromo-debunked-fraud-allegations-election-2020-11?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral
In a strange twist of events, the typically pro-corporate, hyper-patriotic GOP is now calling for boycotts of Coke, perhaps the country's most iconic brand, and America's favorite pastime. www.businessinsider.com/donald-trump-expands-list-companies-boycott-georgia-law-opposition-2021-4?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral
"If @mlb is boycotting states that pass Republican election integrity laws, maybe Republicans should boycott Major League Baseball?" GOP Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky tweeted on Monday.
For decades, Republicans have made opposition to raising taxes a central tenet of their political philosophy, while decrying almost anyone who called for taxes and regulations on corporations as socialists. But Republicans are currently threatening tax hikes on companies that criticize Georgia's new law. www.businessinsider.com/gop-plans-tax-hikes-boycotts-for-companies-that-oppose-voter-laws-2021-4?utmSource=twitter&utmContent=referral&utmTerm=topbar&referrer=twitter?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral
"Corporations will invite serious consequences if they become a vehicle for far-left mobs to hijack our country from outside the constitutional order," Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell said in a statement on Monday.
"Why are we still listening to these woke corporate hypocrites on taxes, regulations & antitrust?" Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida tweeted on Friday.
Indeed, the same party that has consistently backed the notion corporations should be granted the same free speech rights as people is now leading the charge to punish companies that expressed views contrary to their agenda. www.washingtonpost.com/politics/mitt-romney-says-corporations-are-people/2011/08/11/gIQABwZ38I_story.html
"Just mind blowing hypocrisy from the crowd that fought for years to make corporations 'citizens' so they could make First Amendment protected unlimited political contributions," Democratic Sen. Chris Murphy of Connecticut tweeted on Monday. "Republicans LOOOOVE corporate free speech so long as the corporations agree with Republicans."
And while a number of top Republicans and Fox News - the GOP's de facto state news channel - continue to rant about the perils of "cancel culture," the party is effectively engaging in the same behavior it's been condemning by pushing for boycotts of major US companies and institutions they currently disagree with. www.vice.com/en/article/xgzepz/out-of-control-republican-cancel-culture-has-now-come-for-coca-cola
In short, the Republican party has lost its sense of self and has no discernible, cogent ideology. It's in survival mode, as evidenced by the flailing response to the backlash over Georgia's new voting restrictions. But while the GOP effort to defend the divisive law is clumsy, the legislation itself is part of a far more coordinated, nationwide effort from the party when it comes to elections.
Republicans are afraid of becoming a permanent minority party Brian Kemp bill signing Gov. Brian Kemp signs SB 202 into law at the Georgia state Capitol in Atlanta on March 25, 2021. Governor Brian Kemp's Twitter feed/Handout via REUTERS
The Georgia law, signed by Republican Gov. Brian Kemp, came as GOP lawmakers in state legislatures across the country push for a slew of voting restrictions in the wake of the 2020 election. At least 361 bills with restrictive voting provisions had been introduced by legislators in 47 states as of March 24, per an analysis from the Brennan Center for Justice. www.brennancenter.org/our-work/research-reports/voting-laws-roundup-march-2021
After a the deadly insurrection at the Capitol on January 6, political scientists and democracy experts warned that Republicans would increasingly embrace anti-democratic tactics over fear they'll become a permanent minority party. www.businessinsider.com/trump-acquittal-proves-authoritarianism-remains-potent-force-in-us-2021-2?utm_source=yahoo.com&utm_medium=referral
"What we're seeing is basically a fear of a multiracial democracy," Carol Anderson, a professor of African American studies at Emory University, told Peacock's Mehdi Hasan in February.
In many ways, the GOP is already a minority party. The GOP hasn't won the popular vote in a presidential election since 2004. Democrats have won the popular vote in seven of the last eight elections, including the past four (2008, 2012, 2016, and 2020). Under former President Donald Trump, the GOP lost the White House, House, and Senate in just four years.
And as America becomes increasingly diverse, the GOP remains an overwhelmingly white, male party. The current Congress is the most racially and ethnically diverse in US history, according to Pew Research, but the vast majority of racial and ethnic minority members are Democrats (83%), while just 17% are Republicans. There are also more Democratic women in Congress (106) than Republicans (38). www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/01/28/racial-ethnic-diversity-increases-yet-again-with-the-117th-congress/ www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2021/01/15/a-record-number-of-women-are-serving-in-the-117th-congress/
The Capitol attack was largely catalyzed by Trump's "big lie" that the election had been stolen from him, which was enabled and amplified by many Republicans in Congress. This lie, combined with the GOP fear of perpetual minority status, is continuing to fuel voter suppression efforts nationwide.
Stacey Abrams, the former Georgia gubernatorial candidate who's been credited with driving historic Black voter to help Democrats flip the Southern state, in late March told the Guardian that Republicans are "responding to the big lie, to the disproven, discredited, the blood-spilled lie of voter fraud." www.theguardian.com/us-news/2021/mar/24/democracy-under-attack-america-us-voting-rights-republicans
"They are responding by conforming to a lie and cloaking it in this mask that this is somehow ethical, that this is somehow about protecting, when it is about restricting and suppressing," Abrams added.
Read the original article on Business Insider www.businessinsider.com/gop-response-georgia-voting-law-backlash-shows-party-lost-2021-4
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Post by the Scribe on Apr 13, 2021 10:55:53 GMT
Good luck with this one. Read through my "the Economics" or Talking Points threads and you will see nothing Trump did helped the economy or middle class. 10,000 baby boomers retired EVERY DAY TRUMP WAS IN OFFICE opening 300,000 jobs per month which is a number Trump rarely reached. That is where the job numbers came from. That reason plus new jobs and industries that catered to retiring boomers. I contacted the Bureau of Labor Statistics myself and those job openings are counted in their monthly totals as jobs created. Why the so called LIBERAL MEDIA didn't point that out is BEYOND me. And we sure weren't going to hear that from CONservative mainstream media. And the way Trump and the Cons BOTCHED the pandemic with their typical cuts to programs and deregulation only made things worse. Read my Trump's Covid Response thread regarding that fiasco.
Top Republicans Work To Rebrand GOP As Party Of Working Class www.npr.org/2021/04/13/986549868/top-republicans-work-to-rebrand-gop-as-party-of-working-class April 13, 20215:00 AM ET Heard on Morning Edition SUSAN DAVIS
5-Minute Listen ondemand.npr.org/anon.npr-mp3/npr/me/2021/04/20210413_me_top_republicans_work_to_rebrand_gop_as_party_of_working_class.mp3?orgId=1&topicId=1014&d=323&p=3&story=986549868&dl=1&siteplayer=true&size=5182320&dl=1
Rep. Jim Banks, R-Ind., seen before a television interview, is pushing his party to focus on working class voters as a way to win back the House of Representatives in the 2022 midterms and the White House in 2024. Bill Clark/CQ-Roll Call, Inc via Getty Imag
A growing number of working-class voters were drawn to Donald Trump's Republican Party, and now top Republicans are searching for ways to keep those voters in the fold without Trump on the ballot.
"All of the statistics and polling coming out of the 2020 election show that Donald Trump did better with those voters across the board than any Republican has in my lifetime since Ronald Reagan," Rep. Jim Banks, R-Ind., told NPR. "And if Republicans want to be successful as a party, win the majority in 2022, win back the White House in 2024, I think we have to learn lessons that Donald Trump taught us and how to appeal to these voters."
Since 2010, the most significant growth in the Republican coalition has been white voters without a college degree — an imperfect but widely used metric to quantify the working-class voting bloc — along with some marginal growth among similarly educated Black and Hispanic voters. Banks believes the only winning path forward for the GOP is to permanently reimagine itself as the party of the working-class America.
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Banks is the chairman of the Republican Study Committee, a conservative faction in the House long rooted in small government, low taxes and social conservatism and he recently sent a six-page memo to House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., making his case. For Banks this means tougher immigration laws and cracking down on China, Big Tech and, perhaps most provocatively for the GOP, corporate America. apps.npr.org/documents/document.html?id=20613471-working-class-memo-up&beta=true
"For too long, the Republican Party fed into the narrative and the perception that the Republican Party was the party of big business or the party of Wall Street," Banks said.
Read the full memo below:
apps.npr.org/documents/document.html?beta=true&id=20613471-working-class-memo-up
Republicans are increasingly comfortable attacking corporations these days, a political stance made easier after Wall Street donors gave more to Joe Biden in 2020, major companies halted donations to Republicans who objected to Electoral College results on Jan. 6, and as companies take more liberal positions on controversial issues, like Georgia's new voting law.
Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., last week issued a rare public lashing toward companies that oppose the law. "My warning, if you will, to corporate America is to stay out of politics. It's not what you're designed for," he said. McConnell — a top recipient of corporate political donations — walked back his comments, but not a statement his office released warning corporations of "serious consequences" for "behaving like a woke parallel government."
Top Senate Republicans — some considering 2024 presidential runs — have been echoing the call to remake the party even before the 2020 election. "We've got a big battle in front of us, Republicans do, to try and make this party truly the party of working class America," Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., said last November.
He's among a number of Senate Republicans who have taken recent positions that run counter to longstanding party orthodoxy, like linking up with Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders in support of stimulus checks last year and supporting a mandatory $15 minimum wage for companies with annual revenues over $1 billion.
Others include Florida's Marco Rubio, who recently sided with pro-union forces in an organizing dispute at Amazon and speaks frequently of "common good capitalism," and Utah's Mitt Romney, who has introduced legislation to expand the welfare state to provide more generous benefits to combat child poverty.
"I think the claim that says the Republican Party is the party of the working class is at best, insincere, and more likely, political misdirection and rebranding exercises," said John Russo, a visiting scholar at the Kalmanovitz Initiative for Labor and the Working Poor at Georgetown University and a co-editor of the publication Working Class Perspectives.
The working-class vote is complicated and too often confused with whiteness when about 40% of the working-class vote is people of color, Russo said. Their support also didn't cut overwhelmingly toward Republicans in 2020. Biden still won a majority of voters who earn less than $50,000 year, while Trump won a majority of voters who earn over $100,000 a year.
Russo says about one-third of working-class voters are considered persuadable in elections, and it's never reliable whether cultural or economic forces will drive their vote. "The working class, like all of us, carry multiple identities, race, class, gender, religious, geographic, and people may vote different parts of their identity as situations and moments change in their lives."
Democrats are not ceding this vote without a fight, led by a new president with a blue-collar upbringing who wants to enact the most radical economic investment in working people since the New Deal, with a message to sell it targeted almost squarely at the working-class vote. "I'm not trying to punish anybody, but damnit, maybe it's because I come from a middle-class neighborhood, I'm sick and tired of ordinary people being fleeced," Biden said in a recent speech promoting his $2 trillion infrastructure and economic stimulus plan.
Republicans think Democrats are overreaching with their economic largesse. Rep. Banks compared Biden's plans to a feel-good sugar high that will lead to a crash. "And I predict it will crash long before the 2022 midterm election, as we see a lot of government spending inflate the economy, but then when it bottoms out and American workers, blue-collar working-class Americans feel the effect of it, they're gonna blame Joe Biden and Democrats for it," he said.
The battle for the working class is even more urgent for the two parties because it's a growing bloc of voters. Since the 2008 financial crisis, Russo said, more middle-class people have slid economically backward and are experiencing what he calls "the fragility of working-class life."
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Post by the Scribe on May 7, 2021 10:50:04 GMT
There are at least TWO RepubliCON Parties. The old NEOCON controlled party and the Trumpian aka T party. Both lack any semblance of empathy or compassion. Both are haters of government. Both are false patriots. Both are liars and deceivers. Both seek world domination but in different ways. Both are controlled by the 1% wealthy elite and globalists. Both are the enemies of America yet both seek to control her. And both are inherently corrupt and will bring us down if they ever get total power. Because our political and electoral system is set up to handicap the Red small minority states (in this case CONservative states) we will always have a battle for control. It is also why the CONS have mastered election theft. Without it they would never rule as they have.GOP seeks unity, even if that means embracing election liewww.yahoo.com/news/gop-seeks-unity-even-means-053837074.html Thu, May 6, 2021, 10:38 PM
FILE - In this Feb. 13, 2019 file photo, House Republican Conference chair Rep. Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., with House Minority Whip Steve Scalise, R-La., at right, talks to reporters during a news conference at the Capitol in Washington. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)
In this Nov. 20, 2019 file photo, Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., listens during a House Intelligence Committee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington. (AP Photo/Andrew Harnik)
WASHINGTON (AP) — There's a new buzzword among Republicans in Washington: unity.
The House GOP, led by Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, is moving toward stripping Rep. Liz Cheney of her leadership post for her frequent criticism of former President Donald Trump. The unusual step, they say, is necessary to unify a party whose base still reveres the former president four months after he incited a deadly riot at the U.S. Capitol.
“We all need to be working as one if we’re able to win the majority," McCarthy said this week.
With Republicans close to reclaiming control of the House next year, the treatment of Cheney suggests GOP leaders will do almost anything to rally the party's base, even if that means sweeping the events of Jan. 6 under the rug and embracing — or refusing to confront — Trump's ongoing lie that he won the 2020 election, a campaign that he actually lost by a wide margin.
Those backing Cheney's ouster argue she has become a distraction by continuing to criticize Trump, who remains the dominating force in the party. They want to move forward, they say, and focus on policy ideas and providing a clear contrast with Democrats. But critics see the fight as a larger distraction.
“My unsolicited advice would be: Talk about the future and what you offer to Americans,” said Alyssa Farah, the former Trump White House communications director. “I do worry that this is sort of showing that we're going to continue more the politics of personality as opposed to the politics of policy and deliverables to the American public."
While a message about being “sufficiently pro-Trump” may work in certain districts, she noted Republicans' focus on election interference depressed GOP turnout in Georgia, where the party lost two runoff elections in January that gave Democrats control of the Senate. And she warned that aligning the party with lies about voter fraud could turn off suburban voters and older voters in key swing districts. apnews.com/article/Georgia-election-results-4b82ba7ee3cc74d33e68daadaee2cbf3
“Those are the ones where you have to win over moderates and independents, and that message does not resonate with them, fundamentally,” she said.
The GOP's leadership turmoil could pose some risks for Democrats as well. While many Democrats are only too happy to let Republicans fight among themselves, the drama could distract from President Joe Biden's effort to promote his massive infrastructure package, a push he took on the road Thursday with a visit to Louisiana. apnews.com/article/louisiana-business-government-and-politics-462e89744cc73d2d953e1c332e36ddb9
Still, Republicans are making a clear political calculation. Trump remains deeply popular among GOP voters, and many continue to believe the lies he continues to spread about what happened in November. A CNN poll in late April found that 70% of Republicans believe that Biden did not legitimately win the election, even though dozens of local Republican election officials, state audits and even Trump’s former attorney general have said there was no evidence of widespread fraud.
Republican Rep. Elise Stefanik, who has Trump’s backing to serve as Cheney’s replacement, said Thursday that she was “sending a clear message that we are one team. And that means working with the (former) President and working with all of our excellent Republican members of Congress,” even as she parroted election conspiracies on former Trump strategist Steve Bannon’s podcast. apnews.com/article/capitol-siege-government-and-politics-39442b6fc9e6eafb24ba1c55e8ec9797
Cheney, meanwhile, has framed her fight as one over the soul of a party long associated with her family name.
“The Republican Party is at a turning point, and Republicans must decide whether we are going to choose truth and fidelity to the Constitution,” she wrote in a Washington Post op-ed Wednesday. “The question before us now is whether we will join Trump’s crusade to delegitimize and undo the legal outcome of the 2020 election, with all the consequences that might have.” www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/05/05/liz-cheney-republican-party-turning-point/
Cheney has been under fire since she joined nine other Republican House members in impeaching Trump for his role in sparking the Jan. 6 attack on the Capitol. Trump's supporters stormed the building, trying to halt the certification of the vote. apnews.com/article/congress-impeachment-vote-donald-trump-044f0d3a8a33c459f52be8039ca7b286 apnews.com/article/trump-impeachment-vote-capitol-siege-0a6f2a348a6e43f27d5e1dc486027860
McCarthy, who had originally defended Cheney against efforts to strip her title as House Republican Conference chair, has insisted his decision has nothing to do with Cheney's vote but is rather about her refusal to stop criticizing Trump in the weeks since.
“I have heard from members concerned about her ability to carry out her job as conference chair, to carry out the message,” said McCarthy on Fox News.
But Arkansas Republican Gov. Asa Hutchinson told CNN that the move was nonetheless “going to be perceived by the American body politic as an ouster because of one vote.”
“I don’t think this is healthy for our party — that perception. We’ve got to get back to talking about ideas and how to unify ourselves,” he said.
Those seeking her ouster see it differently.
Indiana Rep. Jim Banks, the chair of the conservative Republican Study Committee who has long argued the party should focus on policy to win in 2022, sees Cheney as distracting from that goal.
“The reason that we are having an internal discussion about a change in leadership is because of the distraction from the single mission and goal that the vast majority has in winning back the majority," he said. “She’s focused on her animosity toward President Trump. She’s focused on Jan. 6 — the rest of us are focused on the midterms."
Banks pushed back on the idea that Cheney and others with different views were being purged from the party. In her leadership role, he said, Cheney is tasked with speaking on behalf of the conference. “But you're out of sync as the chief spokesperson of our party, that’s why a change is needed. ... The infighting and the distractions are not going to subside unless we make a change.”
Still, Neil Newhouse, a longtime Republican pollster, said he doubted the current drama would have any impact on an election that’s still 18 months away.
“While the GOP leadership controversy may be headlines on the national news and much talked about inside the Beltway, it is simply no more than a bump in the road for GOP efforts to win the majority in the ’22 midterm elections,” he said, adding: “This issue will be long forgotten by this time next year.”
Joe Gruters, the chair of the Florida Republican Party, agreed.
“What happens in the leadership race I think is almost irrelevant to the rank-and-file members on the ground," he said. "I think people are concerned about what happens to them and their pocketbooks and less about who's carrying what flag and who has a title within the structure of the party overall.”
Still, he made clear that Trump's views matter.
“Once the former president speaks on something like that, I would say most rank-and-file members agree with whatever he is saying. And the fact that he said it ... I think it’s over."
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Post by the Scribe on May 8, 2021 7:19:59 GMT
State RepubliCON Party after state RepubliCON Party is showing their true criminal anti American colors. Let's hope more people become WOKE to their insanity to where they are never voted another term with political standing, anywhere. Donald J. Trump is and has always been a racist lying scumbag. He is a sociopath and a great manipulator of the ignorant easily manipulated. And frankly I do NOT believe 70 plus million Americans voted for him. His wins should have been audited.Yahoo Sports Ohio GOP wants former Ohio State WR Rep. Anthony Gonzalez to resign from the U.S. House www.yahoo.com/sports/ohio-gop-now-wants-former-ohio-state-wr-rep-anthony-gonzalez-to-resign-from-the-us-house-171517133.html Nick Bromberg Fri, May 7, 2021, 10:15 AM
The state of Ohio's Republican Party wants Rep. Anthony Gonzalez to resign from his seat in the House of Representatives.
The former Ohio State and Indianapolis Colts wide receiver has represented Ohio’s 16th district in Congress since 2019 as a Republican. And on Friday, the governing board of the state GOP voted to approve a resolution calling for Gonzalez’s resignation. www.yahoo.com/nfl/teams/indianapolis/
The call for resignation came after Gonzalez and nine others were officially censured. Gonzalez was among 10 Republican members of the House who voted to impeach former President Donald Trump after Trump supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. www.yahoo.com/sports/former-ohio-state-colts-wr-anthony-gonzalez-among-republicans-to-vote-to-impeach-president-trump-223024910.html
Five people died in the riot. Trump was acquitted on the impeachment charges in the U.S. Senate after his term ended.
Two Republican candidates running for an open Senate seat in 2022 immediately said they supported the vote to censure Gonzalez and others. One even said that Gonzalez should be "eradicated" from the party. The Senate seat is open after Sen. Rob Portman (R) announced that he would not seek re-election.
FILE - In this Tuesday, Feb. 11, 2020, file photo, Rep. Anthony Gonzalez, R-Ohio, speaks during a Senate Commerce subcommittee hearing on Capitol Hill in Washington, on intercollegiate athlete compensation. Federal legislation setting guidelines for college athletes to pursue money-making opportunities could be proposed within a month, and Gonzalez, who is planning to introduce it, said Thursday, June 4, 2020, there will be no blanket antitrust exemption for the NCAA. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File) Anthony Gonzalez is in his third year in the United States House of Representatives. (AP Photo/Susan Walsh, File) Resolution claims Gonzalez ‘knowingly and willfully violated’ oath of office The resolution to call for Gonzalez’s resignation was introduced by a member of the state party who said that Gonzalez had a “hidden vendetta” against the former president.
From the Columbus Dispatch: www.dispatch.com/story/news/politics/elections/2021/05/07/ohio-gop-vote-censuring-rep-gonzalez-over-trump-impeachment-vote/4953443001/?utm_source=dispatch-News%20Alert&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=news_alerts&utm_term=news_alert
The party initially planned to vote on censure, but Shannon Burns, president of the Strongsville GOP, offered a resolution to take the rebuke a step further. He called for the resignation of Gonzalez for betraying his constituents and holding a “hidden vendetta” against Trump.
"Gonzalez resorted to emotional conclusions that misplaced blame on President Trump, the President of Law and Order and America First," the resolution read. "We believe that Congressman Gonzalez knowingly and willfully violated his oath of office."
According to the Cincinnati Enquirer, the vote to call for Gonzalez's resignation was not unanimous.
The rebuke of Gonzalez and others comes as members of the GOP across the country continue to display their support for the former president as publicly as they can. Rep. Liz Cheney of Wyoming is widely expected to be removed from her House leadership position in the GOP because she has been outspoken against the lie that the 2020 presidential election was fraudulent. www.yahoo.com/news/how-elise-stefanik-liz-cheneys-likely-gop-leadership-replacement-went-from-moderate-to-maga-090023167.html
Gonzalez comfortably won re-election in 2020
Friday's machinations make it likely that Gonzalez will have a Trump-loyal challenger in the Republican primary ahead of the 2022 election. Gonzalez, whose district is outside Cleveland and Akron, comfortably won re-election in 2020 with over 60 percent of the vote. That was an over six-point increase from his vote share in 2018.
Gonzalez had 87 catches for 1,286 yards and 13 TDs in three seasons at Ohio State. He played in the NFL for five seasons and had 99 catches for 1,307 yards and seven TDs. He’s also the sponsor of a bipartisan bill reintroduced in the House in April that would allow college athletes across the country to make endorsement and sponsorship income.
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Post by the Scribe on May 8, 2021 19:16:51 GMT
Why Is Donald Trump’s Grip So Strong On The GOP? | TODAY 79,785 views•May 8, 2021
TODAY 2.95M subscribers National Review editor-in-chief and NBC News political analyst Rich Lowry joins Weekend TODAY to discuss former President Donald Trump’s tight grip on the Republican Party and the current state of the GOP. Some Republicans “are with Trump out of conviction … and then you have the rest of the party that’s afraid because they know that Trump has the energy, the grassroots support, and he’s willing to aim at them and try to destroy them and may succeed,” Lowry says.
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Post by the Scribe on May 10, 2021 10:14:16 GMT
The Republican Rebrand, Exposed | Robert Reich 56,376 views•May 5, 2021
Robert Reich 306K subscribers
Former Secretary of Labor Robert Reich debunks the Republican Party's phony attempt to rebrand itself as the "party of the working class."
Watch More: Trump's Worst Attacks on Workers ►►https://youtu.be/2vfl6XTapYc
Republicans can spout off all the catchy slogans about blue jeans and beer they want, but actions speak louder than words: if you oppose stimulus checks, a $15 minimum wage, unions, and overtime pay, you’re not the party of the working class.
So don't fall for the Republican Party's attempted rebrand. It's a cruel hoax. The GOP doesn't give a fig about working people. It is, and always will be, the party of big business and billionaires.
#workers #JoshHawley #Republican
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Post by the Scribe on May 12, 2021 21:25:31 GMT
No matter what side of this GOP Civil War you are on the fact is they are bought, paid for and ruled by the 1%. They do their bidding in the name of CONSERVATISM which is now a self-perpetuating INDUSTRY. Sowing chaos (via wedge issues and lies) while helping the wealthy pick the pockets of Americans seems to be their modus operandi.More than 100 Republican former officials, others to seek reforms, threaten new partyNBC News More than 100 Republican former officials to seek reforms, threaten new partywww.yahoo.com/news/more-100-republican-former-officials-031100619.html Hallie Jackson and Dartunorro Clark Tue, May 11, 2021, 8:11 PM More than 100 influential Republicans plan to release a call for reforms within the GOP alongside a threat to form a new party if change isn't forthcoming, a person familiar with the effort said.
The statement, set to be released Thursday, involves a "Call for American Renewal," a credo that declares that it is imperative to "either reimagine a party dedicated to our founding ideals or else hasten the creation of such an alternative." The push will include 13 yet-to-be-revealed principles that the signatories want the GOP to embrace.
This is not the first group to form as the pro-Trump and traditional conservative factions of the Republican Party remain at loggerheads. The new effort comes as a vote looms to oust Liz Cheney of Wyoming from the No. 3 House Republican leadership post for her refusal to stay silent about former President Donald Trump's repeated election lies and his role in the Jan. 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol. www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/house-republicans-vote-liz-cheney-s-future-leadership-rebuking-trump-n1266992
The move was first reported by Reuters, which cited some of the people involved: former New Jersey Gov. Christine Todd Whitman, the former administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency; former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge, the first secretary of homeland security; former Transportation Secretary Mary Peters; and former GOP Reps. Charlie Dent of Pennsylvania, Barbara Comstock of Virginia, Reid Ribble of Wisconsin and Mickey Edwards of Oklahoma. Evan McMullin, a former CIA agent who ran for president as an independent in 2016, is also involved.
A push to channel anti-Trump sentiment with the "Never Trump" movement in the spring of 2016 was largely unsuccessful at the time, and none of the people backing this latest effort are serving as elected Republicans. However, it comes as Trump's pull within his party appears to have lessened. A recent NBC News poll found that 44 percent of Republicans said they support Trump more than the GOP, compared to 50 percent who said they support the GOP more than the former president. www.nbcnews.com/politics/meet-the-press/after-100-days-out-office-trump-s-support-softens-nbc-n1265457
One of the organizers is Miles Taylor, a former Trump official who, as "Anonymous," wrote an op-ed in The New York Times blasting the Trump administration in 2018. www.nbcnews.com/politics/2020-election/anonymous-no-more-former-dhs-official-miles-taylor-reveals-he-n1245157 www.nytimes.com/2018/09/05/opinion/trump-white-house-anonymous-resistance.html
"We're going give the GOP one last chance to get its act together and moderate, but we're not going to hold our breath," Taylor told NBC News. "We're ready to get out there and fight against the radical elements in the party to try to excise those elements from within the GOP and our national politics and to try to invest in the deeper pro-democracy bench."
Taylor suggested that the nascent movement will work to back candidates who support its principles, whether they are moderates or independents.
"Enough is enough, and the GOP has had enough time to decide whether it's going to separate itself from a man who is a chronic loser," he said, referring to Trump, predicting a "raging civil war" if the rest of the party doesn't get on board.
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Post by the Scribe on May 20, 2021 18:10:08 GMT
Once More For the People in the Back: You Cannot Negotiate or Compromise With the Republican Partywww.yahoo.com/lifestyle/once-more-people-back-cannot-155500313.html Jack Holmes Thu, May 20, 2021, 8:55 AM MST
Photo credit: Drew Angerer - Getty Images
Somehow, after everything, there remain creatures in Washington, D.C. obsessed with bipartisan compromise. One of our two major political parties has lined up in opposition to renewing what's left of the Voting Rights Act, which swept through Congress on a strong bipartisan basis in the Bush years, when it actually still had some teeth. The same party's Arizona affiliate is engaged in a circus "audit" of that state's election results because they didn't like who won. They've also responded to the 2020 election, which many Republicans continue to Just Ask Questions about, by passing hundreds of restrictive voter laws in state legislatures across the country. Through this and gerrymandering and court-packing and the undemocratic features of the Senate and the Electoral College, the party has devoted itself, root and branch, to clinging to power without crafting an agenda that actually appeals to a majority of citizens. www.nbcnews.com/id/wbna14059113 www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a36466550/arizona-election-audit-maricopa-county-board-letter/ www.esquire.com/news-politics/a36407037/liz-cheney-booted-house-republican-leadership/
But even beyond any of that, they just submarined their own shared Bipartisan Bill to establish a commission to look into an attack on their own place of work earlier this year. If a mob broke into your company's offices and ransacked the place, chanting that they wanted to hang the vice president of the firm, would the VP's putative friends—and brother!—shut down an inquiry into what happened? This is not normal behavior, and it's not the behavior of an organization whose members can be reasoned with. (As David Freedlander pointed out, House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy used to back a Commission as a desperate escape from impeaching Donald Trump for his crimes against the republic. Now he's against this, too. It's almost like he's not actually interested in any kind of accountability.) There will be no Bipartisan Compromise so long as the Republican Party clings to the increasingly kaleidoscopic fever dreams blasting out of the right-wing infotainment vortex. As my colleague, Charles P. Pierce, wrote, the Democrats will need to go it alone on a January 6 commission. In truth, they'll have to go it alone on everything. www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a36487656/january-6-commission-republicans-john-katko/ www.forbes.com/sites/andrewsolender/2021/05/19/rep-greg-pence-opposes-commission-to-probe-jan-6-riot-that-targeted-his-brother/
www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a36487656/january-6-commission-republicans-john-katko/
Photo credit: Drew Angerer - Getty Images
This ought to have been obvious before. In the Senate, Mitch McConnell has proven to be the most cynical operator that Washington, D.C. has seen in some time, and that's saying something. McCarthy, in the House, is as craven as he is dense. And the party has a track record, going back to the Obama years, of demanding bipartisan consultation, extracting concessions and watering down bills, then voting against them anyway. This is what happened with the January 6 commission: Republicans got pretty much everything they wanted, and they still shut it down. They will do the same with the American Jobs Plan. As Catherine Rampell brilliantly laid out in the Washington Post, the initial lowball counterproposal they offered was actually vastly inflated. Their aim is to hack away at the bill, then vote against it. And you can probably forget about even that level of commitment to the American Families Plan. Josh Hawley might have some family-benefits proposals, and so might Mitt Romney on the party's other wing, but when it gets to crunch time, you can expect at least the former (and very possibly the latter) to vote against the plan and fist-pump at the faithful. www.esquire.com/news-politics/a36421276/mitch-mcconnell-s1-partisan-takeover-for-the-people-act/ www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/a36462628/kevin-mccarthy-january-6-commission/ www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2017/08/01/set-health-record-straight-republicans-helped-craft-obamacare-ross-baker-column/523952001/ www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/04/26/republicans-make-biden-an-infrastructure-offer-he-has-refuse/ thehill.com/homenews/senate/551683-hawley-defends-jan-6-fist-pump
This is an American political ecosystem where shame has ceased to function as a social force and, in fact, shamelessness has become a political superpower. To survive and thrive in the entirely degraded post-Trump Republican Party—the culmination of 40-plus years of self-replicating insanity—you cannot have any compunction about lying your ass off and acting in continual, ceaseless bad faith. There are people in this party who voted against the American Rescue Plan and then went bragging to their constituents about all the relief they'd brought home. Flip-flopping is passé. You now have to be able to juggle multiple contradictory positions at once. John Katko made the mistake Wednesday of thinking any principle—even that an attack on their own workplace should be investigated by Congress—was durable enough to survive the gauntlet of self-serving nonsense. Democrats should do their own commission, and then they should do their own bills. This will require Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema coming back to reality, and seeing all of the above for it is before signing off on filibuster reform. You cannot negotiate with the void. www.esquire.com/news-politics/a15940835/trump-shame-shamelessness/ abcnews.go.com/Business/wireStory/republicans-promote-pandemic-relief-voted-77527236
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Post by the Scribe on Jun 8, 2021 9:26:09 GMT
Obama criticizes Republicans for embracing 2020 falsehoods
Former President Barack Obama says Republicans have been "cowed into accepting" a series of positions that "would be unrecognizable and unacceptable even five years ago or a decade ago," telling CNN's Anderson Cooper he is worried about the state of democracy in the US. #CNN #News
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Post by the Scribe on Jun 8, 2021 11:47:19 GMT
The Republican Party is a Cult Says Fmr. GOP Congressman Mickey Edwards | Amanpour and Company 84,813 views•Jun 2, 2021
Amanpour and Company 203K subscribers Lifelong Republican and former congressman Mickey Edwards walked away from the GOP earlier this year, saying it had become less a party than a "cult." He speaks with Walter Isaacson about the persistent myth that the election was stolen -- and the question of whether the Republicans are fit these days to run a candidate for the highest office in America.
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Post by the Scribe on Jun 9, 2021 10:48:07 GMT
These people are crooked and floating with cash from their wealthy, elite overlords. That is why these CONS give tax breaks to the wealthy whenever they are in control because of the PAYBACK they get in campaign donations which are basically bribes to continue the gravy train. It is a financial power circle jerk. State GOPs Can’t Explain Millions In ‘Trump Victory’ Cash www.yahoo.com/news/state-gops-t-explain-millions-083921197.html Roger Sollenberger Wed, June 9, 2021, 1:39 AM
John Moore/Getty Months after the Federal Election Commission notified several GOP state parties of major gaps in their 2020 fundraising and spending reports, the committees are correcting their numbers—but they still can’t explain why the discrepancies occurred.
The issue has raised new questions about possible abuse of a longstanding campaign finance loophole that allows wealthy megadonors to cut massive checks. Last year a number of Republican state parties failed to disclose transfers in the hundreds of thousands, sometimes millions, of dollars, which violates reporting requirements.
“There are layers of problems here, but the basic question is whether the state parties complied with federal disclosure requirements,” Paul Ryan, vice president of policy and litigation at election reform advocacy group Common Cause, told The Daily Beast.
It appears systemic. The FEC has so far sent notices to 10 of those 46 state parties that failed to report high-dollar same-day transfers from joint fundraising committees and to the RNC. So far, all but one have responded.
But their explanations have been incomplete or nonexistent. For example, the Rhode Island Republican Party seemed only to acknowledge the error occurred but did not address how or why. “The $251,771.78 for the Post General report was missed on the original 30 Day Post General report that was filed so an amended report was filed to include that.” The party later filed another amendment disclosing more than $455,500 in transfers from Trump Victory, but did not offer an explanation in that letter either. docquery.fec.gov/pdf/542/202105059446290542/202105059446290542.pdf docquery.fec.gov/cgi-bin/forms/C00078196/1515198/sa/ALL
The problem stems from joint fundraising agreements—teams of political committees that join together to increase their party’s fundraising power and reach. The arrangements are legal, but it appears the GOP has used them to secretly pass millions of dollars from Trump Victory to the RNC through apparently oblivious state committees.
And the corrected filings also show that some committees hadn’t told the FEC they joined Trump Victory, even though Trump Victory had included them. Their explanations have been unclear.
Hawaii didn’t announce its role in Trump Victory until this February. Four days later, the committee revealed nearly $1.7 million in transfers, claiming it missed the transactions “due to a misunderstanding regarding the reporting requirements.” docquery.fec.gov/pdf/120/202102249428820120/202102249428820120.pdf
Last month, the Arkansas GOP disclosed a whopping $3.5 million in transfers with Trump Victory, a group it has never officially joined, according to FEC records. “The transfers were inadvertently not disclosed on the original reports due to clerical errors,” the state party explained.
The Oklahoma GOP passed hundreds of thousands of dollars from Trump Victory on to the RNC last year, but has still never officially joined the agreement. Last month, the treasurer wrote—twice—that he has been suffering from “serious health problems.” docquery.fec.gov/pdf/427/202105139446688427/202105139446688427.pdf docquery.fec.gov/pdf/428/202105139446688428/202105139446688428.pdf
However, while the state parties may have been unaware of the arrangement, the RNC wasn’t. The RNC reports include the transfers.
The FEC wanted to know how that was possible. In response to a question about the Colorado GOP’s unreported transfers, the RNC shifted all blame to the state, writing, “We have confirmed that we received funds from [the] Colorado Republican Committee. No further action is required.” docquery.fec.gov/pdf/255/202106019448178255/202106019448178255.pdf
This doesn’t mean the FEC was baffled. In fact, the same month it asked the RNC to explain itself, the Wyoming GOP paid the FEC a major fine for the same types of omissions in 2016.
But now there’s a new dimension: A small D.C.-area bank may also be in the crosshairs.
In January 2020, Trump Victory told the feds it would use Chain Bridge Bank, a popular institution among Republican committees. The RNC also held an account there, but some state committees didn’t. Others recently told the FEC they had one, but initially failed to report it.
Two parties—Arkansas and Oklahoma—still haven’t reported an account with Chain Bridge. The Hawaii GOP only added the bank in February.
If the committees had established the accounts on their own, it’s unclear how they could have forgotten doing so. None of them have explained this to the FEC, and none responded to The Daily Beast’s inquiries. Chain Bridge would not comment publicly on its clients.
Joint fundraising arrangements are complicated, but carry major financial benefits. Here’s how it works.
Joint fundraising committees open a back door, allowing national parties to raise more money from megadonors than the law otherwise permits. Because Trump Victory has 48 members, one person can cut a single check equal to the combined contribution limits of all four dozen committees. Trump Victory then distributes that money to the other committees.
For example, two donors gave Trump Victory $817,800 in 2020: Pharma exec Richard Roberts, and Nicole Luckey, wife of billionaire tech pioneer Palmer Luckey, in September and October, respectively. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Roberts_(pharmaceutical_executive)
The arrangement has a second benefit. While a donor can only give $10,000 to a state party, state committees can transfer unlimited sums to the national party—the RNC. This means the RNC can effectively claw back all Trump Victory contributions from the states, including from donors who already gave the RNC the maximum amount.
The strategy traces back to 2016, when then-candidate Hillary Clinton became the first to take advantage of the 2014 Supreme Court decision that opened the joint fundraising floodgates. That helped the Democratic National Committee build a machine that pulled in $80 million for the DNC—about three times more than Trump’s own machine that year. www.fec.gov/files/legal/murs/7339/7339_1.pdf
The system has been widely criticized by election reform advocates for skewing the playing field in favor of an elite group of megadonors. publicintegrity.org/politics/comeback-for-legalized-money-laundering-in-party-politics/ www.issueone.org/issue-one-raises-concerns-democratic-partys-new-mega-joint-fundraising-committee/ www.inquirer.com/philly/news/politics/elections/campaign-finance-joint-fundraising-committees-pa-nj-midterm-elections-bob-menendez-brian-fitzpatrick-chrissy-houlahan-bob-casey-20181001.html www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/08/04/soft-money-is-backand-both-parties-are-cashing-in-215456/
“These joint fundraising practices amount to little more than legalized money laundering, and allow wealthy donors to sidestep contribution limits and write six-figure checks for the benefit of presidential candidates and the national parties,” Brendan Fischer, director of federal reform at the Campaign Legal Center, a non-partisan watchdog group, told The Daily Beast.
“It’s bad policy, but it’s legally permissible,” said Ryan, who co-authored a 2013 Supreme Court amicus brief arguing that joint fundraising would unfairly empower wealthy donors. www.scotusblog.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/12-536_appellee_amcu_clc-etal.authcheckdam.pdf
FEC Finally Exposes an Attempt to Trick Hillary Clinton Supporters Out of Their Votes in 2016 www.thedailybeast.com/attempt-to-trick-hillary-clinton-supporters-out-of-their-votes-in-2016-is-finally-exposed-by-fec?via=rss&source=articles_fancylink
Again, this is all usually legal. But last year many of those transfers appear to have gone unnoticed by a number of experienced state committee treasurers.
The FEC has previously issued fines for similar infringements. Given the amount of money involved, the penalties could be steep. www.wyofile.com/federal-elections-commission-fines-wyo-gop-52000/
“A ‘knowing and willful’ violation of federal campaign finance law is punishable by a fine of up to 200 percent of any contribution or expenditure involved in such violation,” Ryan said.
There’s another twist: the bank accounts. Those omissions raise new questions about whether the party treasurers—who must sign off on those accounts—knew their committees had opened an account at Chain Bridge. That could expose them legally, Ryan said. www.axios.com/republicans-state-gop-trump-campaign-cd16bae3-ebf9-4ed5-94de-98a85d23e06c.html
“Campaign finance law would be undermined if a state committee was using an account and not disclosing it, which treasurers must do under penalty of perjury.” Ryan said. “It would be even more severe if the RNC was setting up an account and not telling the state party about it.”
The FEC thinks the problems may be related.
In 2019, the agency slapped the Wyoming GOP with a major fine for its unreported 2016 transfers. The report cited allegations of suspicious banking activity, pointing to concerns that funds were transferred directly from Trump Victory to the RNC, “rendering all FEC reports concerning those transfers fraudulent.” www.wyomingnews.com/rocketminer/news/state/fec-fines-wyoming-gop-52-000/article_d08998b9-4118-5dbc-aa59-fa4e7b8a2446.html
The General Counsel recommended a sweeping investigation. The Republican-appointed commissioners, however, voted it down. www.fec.gov/files/legal/murs/7339/19044465466.pdf
The reason for the apparent shortcuts is hard to discern.
“I can’t think of many reasons why they would set this up,” said Ryan. “They may find it easier, or could be trying to save bank fees. But it could also be a way to increase the RNC’s haul. Suppose you had a state party that wouldn’t participate, but the RNC wanted to involve another state so it could pull in more money. This would allow them to do so.”
The Wyoming case may offer a hint that supports his hunch.
On Monday, WyoFile reported that the Wyoming GOP’s treasurer has accused the state party chair and RNC of striking a deal behind his back in 2016, calling it an “obvious ‘end run’ to by-pass individual state laws.” urldefense.proofpoint.com/v2/url?u=https-3A__www.wyofile.com_inside-2Dthe-2Dcampaign-2Dfinance-2Dend-2Drun-2Dthat-2Dearned-2Dgop-2Dan-2Dfec-2Dfine_&d=DwMFAg&c=r30hyXAdWe8oret4PlAIyA&r=ZFxsZzeMC3p8I2nAaAiC_BErVtKjUDjjA7zmfggjrjwCX81PUWokcAc1Vr74mIXG&m=wAGotZXg7yEb88Xf7X8V90I-w8CPbpq61zc_dsnpg4k&s=8KAHqVh6oslfC47rnqYpEOURZg_dFyROv46gs8tcIig&e=
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Post by the Scribe on Jun 12, 2021 12:33:39 GMT
Laboratories of Democratic Backslidingwww.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/segments/laboratories-democratic-backsliding-on-the-media LISTEN www.podtrac.com/pts/redirect.mp3/audio.wnyc.org/otm/otm061121_cms1113538_pod.mp3 Download Embed June 11, 2021
Bernice King, daughter of slain civil rights leader Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., speaks during a voting rights rally at Liberty Plaza near the Georgia State Capitol on June 8, 2021, in Atlanta, GA. ( Brynn Anderson / AP Photo )
According to new research from Jake Grumbach, Assistant Professor of Political Science at the University of Washington, GOP lawmakers have been reducing the “democratic performance” of states they control for the better part of two decades. Using a statistical model that assesses shifts in democracy from 2000-2018, Grumbach found that when Republicans have gained control of state legislatures, those states have moved steadily — at times abruptly — away from democracy. Grumbach talks to Brooke about what these findings mean for where journalists and others should be focusing their attention — and where he sees cause for hope amid it all.
This is a segment from our June 11th, 2021 program, Little Fires Everywhere.
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