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The Talk Shows Sunday, October 26th, 2008 Guests to be interviewed today on major television talk shows: FOX NEWS SUNDAY (Fox Network): Gov. Tim Kaine, D-Va.; former Gov. Tom Ridge, R-Pa.MEET THE PRESS (NBC): Republican presidential candidate Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.FACE THE NATION (CBS): Robert Rubin, former Treasury secretary and adviser to Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill.; Doug Holtz-Eakin, adviser to Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.; Govs. Ed Rendell, D-Pa., and Tim Pawlenty, R-Minn.THIS WEEK (ABC): Jack Welch, former chief executive of General Electric Co.; Sen. Lindsey Graham, R-S.C.; Rep. Rahm Emanuel, D-Ill.LATE EDITION (CNN) : Sens. Evan Bayh, D-Ind., and Jon...

"You know, Governor Palin has more executive experience than Senator Obama, Senator Biden, and Senator Schumer combined because those guys have never run anything." -- Rep. Heather Wilson U.S. Rep. Heather Wilson (R-NM) MSNBC August 29, 2008 MSNBC's Peter Alexander: "There were several women spoken about as possible vice presidential candidates, Kay Bailey Hutchinson from Texas, Meg Whitman from eBay, Carly Fiorina, why Governor Palin?" Rep. Heather Wilson: "She's a chief executive of a state. She's a governor, former mayor of a city in Alaska. She's been a businesswoman. She helped her husband run the family fishing business. She's a...

The screencap captures it nicely: Heather Wilson, smiling. Robert Wexler, mouth agape. On this afternoon's Hardball, the feisty, brilliant [bio: high honors Air Force Academy grad, Rhodes Scholar] GOP representative from New Mexico took on the duo of the combative congressman from Florida and host Chris Matthews, and walked away a winner. The subject was Obama's Berlin speech, and by extension his presidential qualifications. You'll find excerpts below, but they don't do begin to do justice to Wilson's brio and the coolness under verbal fire she displayed. That's why I'd strongly encourage readers to view the video. Wilson kicked off...

A surrogate for John McCain made a leftward feint on a campaign conference call today, suggesting that the presumptive Republican nominee might pull troops out of Iraq sooner than Barack Obama. "He’d like troops to come home earlier than 16 months if the conditions allow it," Rep. Heather Wilson, (R-New Mexico), said of McCain.

Steve Pearce won the Republican nomination in the race for U.S. Senate over rival Heather Wilson and will now turn to the challenge of keeping Sen. Pete Domenici's seat in Republican hands. The southern New Mexico representative won Tuesday's primary with roughly 51 percent of the vote, compared to Wilson's 49 percent with 99 percent of precincts reporting statewide, according to unofficial results. Pearce, who ran as a right-wing conservative, will face Democrat Tom Udall, who ran unopposed in the Democratic primary, on Nov. 4. Wilson endorsed Pearce this morning, saying that Republicans have "no time for disappointment or for...

A photo finish appears to be in the works as a Survey USA poll shows Heather Wilson closing in on Steve Pearce in the last weekend of the primary campaign. Pearce is still clinging to a slim lead, but it's well within the poll's margin of error. The poll, conducted Friday through Sunday, shows Pearce ahead by one percentage point, 48 to 47. Wilson closed in on the three point lead Pearce had in the poll two weeks ago. The poll may reflect Pete Domenici's eleventh hour endorsement of Wilson as his choice to replace him in the U.S. Senate....

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey in New Mexico shows that Democratic Congressman Tom Udall continues to enjoy wide leads over potential Republican opponents in the race for the state’s open U.S. Senate seat. Udall now leads Republicans Steve Pearce 53% to 37% and Heather Wilson 57% to 36%. Against both opponents, those figures reflect a very slight improvement compared to a month ago. In February, Udall was ahead by more modest margins.

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey in New Mexico shows that Democratic Congressman Tom Udall has widened his lead over potential Republican opponents in the race for the state’s open U.S. Senate seat. Udall now leads Republicans Steve Pearce 54% to 40% and Heather Wilson 56% to 36%.

Rep. Steve Pearce beat Rep. Heather Wilson to gain the top spot on the ballot for the U.S. Senate race in the June 3 primary at the state Republican preprimary convention Saturday. Pearce won with more than 54 percent of the vote, while Wilson had more than 45 percent of the vote from convention delegates, who are GOP party activists from around New Mexico.

A new SurveyUSA poll in New Mexico finds Congressman Tom Udall (D), who just declared his candidacy for the seat of retiring GOP Senator Pete Domenici, to be the clear frontrunner. For the Democratic nomination, Udall leads Albuquerque Mayor Martin Chávez by a 62%-32% margin, and also does better than Chávez in the general election match-ups. Udall leads the two Republicans, Representatives Heather Wilson and Steve Pearce, by margins of about 15% in both cases. If Chávez is the Democratic nominee, he trails Pearce by ten points and Wilson by one point. On the Republican side, Wilson is the frontrunner...

Heath Haussamen reports today that Rep. Tom Udall has decided to jump in the New Mexico Senate race and has started to call Democratic officials in the state to inform them of his decision. If confirmed, this would be a major coup for both the DSCC that relentlessly pressured Udall to run even after he ruled it out at the beginning of October, and for the netroots that organized a very successful Draft Udall movement. Previous reports had already indicated that Udall was moving to hire staff and putting the pieces of a run together -- so this latest report...

Heather Wilson, 48% Martin Chavez, 44% Undecided, 8%

Sen. Pete Domenici's announcement of his retirement at the end of his current term already is causing ripples throughout New Mexico politics. With an open Senate seat in New Mexico for the first time since 1972 -- and at least one Republican House of Representatives member considering a Senate run -- a rush of politicians began weighing possible opportunities. Rep. Tom Udall of Santa Fe, a Democrat who represents Northern New Mexico, hasn't made a public announcement concerning his plans. If Udall, who was recently assigned to the House Appropriations Committee, did decide to run for the Senate, at least...

Rep. Heather Wilson (R-N.M) will run for the New Mexico Senate seat that is expected to open up officially later Thursday when Sen. Pete Domenici (R) declares that he will not seek reelection in 2008, according to a source familiar with Wilson’s decision. Domenici has taken Wilson under his wing in recent years, and as he has gotten older, Wilson’s name has topped the list of potential heirs. A strong campaigner, she has survived several multimillion-dollar challenges in a swing district ...

Aug. 6, 2007 issue - Six years after 9/11 , U.S. intel officials are complaining about the emergence of a major "gap" in their ability to secretly eavesdrop on suspected terrorist plotters. In a series of increasingly anxious pleas to Congress, intel "czar" Mike McConnell has argued that the nation's spook community is "missing a significant portion of what we should be getting" from electronic eavesdropping on possible terror plots. Rep. Heather Wilson, a GOP member of the House intelligence community, told NEWSWEEK she has learned of "specific cases where U.S. lives have been put at risk" as a result....

4 in N.M. charged with corruption ALBUQUERQUE, N.M. - A former state senator and three other people were charged with corruption Thursday in a highly politicized case that a former federal prosecutor told Congress he believes led to his firing.A federal grand jury accused former New Mexico Senate President Pro Tem Manny Aragon and the others of conspiring to skim $4.2 million in public funds meant for construction of a county courthouse.David Iglesias, one of eight U.S. attorneys fired late last year, told Congress this month that he rejected what he believed to be pressure from U.S. Sen. Pete Domenici...

New Mexico Democrats, frustrated by their inability to defeat Rep. Heather Wilson (R-N.M.), now are openly talking about redrawing the state’s Congressional district boundaries prior to the 2008 elections.

Heather Wilson on the Iraq Study group report as quoted in the Albuquerque Tribune: "Their recommendations range from the blindingly obvious, to the naive and simplistic, to the interesting but underdeveloped. I was expecting a steak dinner, and we got hors d'oeuvres."

Republican Rep. Heather Wilson retained her seat Friday, narrowly winning a fifth term in Congress by defeating Democrat Patricia Madrid and overcoming election-season sentiment that battered GOP incumbents nationwide. Wilson won New Mexico's 1st Congressional District after Bernalillo County Clerk Mary Herrera released the county's final unofficial count Friday night. The final unofficial tally was 105,916 votes for Wilson, and 105,037 for Madrid. That gave Wilson a winning margin of 879 votes — with roughly 211,000 ballots cast in the race. ''The people of New Mexico have asked me to continue to represent them in the Congress,'' Wilson said Friday...

New Mexico's switch to paper ballots stumbled to a rocky start Tuesday as Bernalillo County's elections administrator acknowledged there may have been a violation of federal law. Only two hours after polls opened Tuesday, two precincts ran out of paper ballots and some voters were turned away. "We would assume there is an infraction that occurred," said Jaime Diaz, Bernalillo County's election administrator. "There were no ballots to be issued." The state Republican Party ...backed off threatened legal action over the ballot shortages. Rep. Heather Wilson, R-N.M. ... called for federal observers to monitor the election. The GOP late Tuesday...

GOP confident of Wilson victory; county extends deadline to 9 p.m. With incumbent Rep. Heather Wilson holding on to a roughly 900-vote lead, and GOP observers claiming there are about 500 ballots left to count, according to this morning's Albuquerque Journal story, you'd think it would be over. The official unofficial number of votes left to be counted as of this morning is 1,985, but GOP tallies say the actual count is no more than 500, and county elections administrator Jaime Diaz told the Journal that an estimated 200 of those had been disqualified. But it's never over till it's...

Democrat Patricia Madrid cut into Rep. Heather Wilson's margin in the 1st Congressional District vote-count Wednesday night, but she also lost opportunity as hundreds of other ballots were disqualified. A new tally of more than 900 Bernalillo County "in-lieu-of" ballots broke more than two-to-one in Madrid's favor, cutting Wilson's lead to 1,164 votes, according to an unofficial count. But according to estimates by County Clerk Mary Herrera, at least 845 other ballots had been disqualified, meaning that no more than 1,985 ballots remained to be counted in Bernalillo County. Madrid, the state's attorney general, would have to win about 79...

Republicans cried foul Monday after Attorney General Patricia Madrid's office provided legal advice on how to count Bernalillo County ballots in her close 1st Congressional District race against Rep. Heather Wilson. The legal advice could allow more provisional ballots to be counted in the ongoing tallying of votes— a possible advantage for Madrid, who trailed Wilson by 1,487 votes. "The attorney general should never even have been asked to rule on this, because it's a clear conflict of interest," said Enrique Carlos Knell, spokesman for the four-term Republican congresswoman. Assistant Attorney General Chris Coppin said he— not the Democratic attorney...

More than 3,700 votes remain to be counted in the race to represent central New Mexico in the U.S. House of Representatives. Officials say it?ll be Tuesday before they release the next wave of votes for the First Congressional District, where incumbent Heather Wilson, a Republican, leads Democrat Patricia Madrid by 1,481 votes. Election workers are counting provisional and ?in lieu of? ballots. Provisional ballots were cast by voters whose eligibility needs to be determined before their votes are counted. ?In lieu of? ballots were cast by voters who requested absentee ballots but swore they never received them. Some of...

ALBUQUERQUE -- The vote-counting process is far from done in Bernalillo County despite the last of the ballots rejected by scanning machines being counted by hand and added to totals. With the inclusion of 642 rejected ballots, Rep. Heather Wilson’s lead over Democrat Patricia Madrid shrank by 126 votes. That still leaves Wilson 1,481 votes ahead out of more than 108,000 cast, enough for her to declare victory as Democrats say her claim is premature. Election totals remain unofficial until certified by the county and state canvassing boards. Today Bernalillo County Clerk Mary Herrera said she may need to ask...

The 11 House races that are still undecided. ? Connecticut?s 2nd District: three-term Republican Rep. Rob Simmons ? Florida?s 13th District: ? Georgia?s 12th District: ? North Carolina?s 8th District: ? New Mexico?s 1st District: Rep. Heather A. Wilson, who is seeking a fifth full term in the House, may earn the prize for most resilient Republican incumbent... ? Ohio?s 2nd District: Republican Rep. Jean Schmidt?s hard-edged conservatism remains problematic even though this southern Ohio district leans strongly Republican most of the time. ? Ohio?s 15th District: Seven-term Republican Rep. Deborah Pryce?s influential position as the House Republican Conference chairwoman...a...

ALBUQUERQUE -- Heather Wilson raised a toast of orange juice with her husband and children, confident that re-election was secure after a 36-hour delay. The incumbent Republican declared victory late Thursday in her bid for a fifth term in the U.S. House. Wilson holds a razor-thin lead over Democrat Patricia Madrid in one of New Mexico's most caustic campaigns ever. ''My children expected to be celebrating with orange juice on Wednesday morning. It's taken a while, but I'm glad they're here with me to celebrate. Josh and Cait, we won,'' she told her 13-year-old son and 10-year-old daughter. Democrats refused...

Video of Republcan Heather Wilson declaring victory in New Mexico District 1 at 10 p.m. MST, November 9, and Rats responding by claiming "Republicans don't like Democracy and don't want every vote counted." Heather leads by 1,607 votes with 4,400 provisional votes left to count. Provisional ballots, most commonly filed by dumb Dems who forget where they registered or even if they are registered, are often disqualified with 40 to 50% thrown out not being uncommon.

In Bernalillo County, it seems the dreary part of democracy always ends up in a drab warehouse, with weary election workers hand-tallying ballots among fast-food cups, political observers and attorneys. This year is no different. About 100 election workers continued to tally 4,580 ballots by hand Wednesday at the warehouse, near Interstate 25 and Montaño NW. And after that is finished, they still have another 3,800 provisional and "in-lieu-of" absentee ballots to examine. They will start counting those today, and County Clerk Mary Herrerra estimated it would take two days. They are counted as part of the canvassing process, which...

Here are the latest, unofficial returns from New Mexico TP PR Madrid Wilson Bernalillo 414 413 91,488 90,731 Sandoval 15 15 3,971 3,810 Santa Fe 3 3 604 1,297 Torrance 18 18 2,100 3,266 Valencia 15 15 2,990 3,352 Totals 465 464 101,153 102,456

She was the Democrats' best hope against U.S. Rep. Heather Wilson, their No. 1 star in an election season scarred by scandal and war. And Attorney General Patricia Madrid still might be. But we probably won't know for sure until the end of the week. Or next week. After the congressional candidates spent a long evening playing cat-and-mouse in their vote tallies, they went into the morning hours with Wilson holding a 1,303-vote lead. But their fate is bound up in two sets of uncounted ballots totaling more than 5,000 votes. One group consists of more than 2,000 ballots rejected...

Republican Rep. Heather Wilson and Democratic challenger Patricia Madrid brought out some political and local star power Sunday during their separate high-energy, high-decibel political rallies. Wilson's northeast Albuquerque event highlighted her support among some Hispanics and members of the opposing political party, featuring former Rep. Manuel Lujan Jr. and New Mexico musical legend Al Hurricane, who happens to be a Democrat. "She's super bright," said Lujan, who from 1969-1989 held the 1st District seat now held by Wilson. "I served there for 20 years, so I watch her very closely— and I think she does the right thing." At a...

House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi on Thursday at an Albuquerque rally called Republican Rep. Heather Wilson a "handmaiden of the oil companies" who has been raking in campaign money from Big Oil as gas prices soar. Wilson spokesman Enrique Carlos Knell did not directly counter a Madrid/Pelosi assertion that Wilson has taken nearly $400,000 in campaign money from oil and gas interests since she took office in 1998. But Knell said Wilson's gasoline price-gouging bill, which passed the House earlier this year, shows Wilson is not beholden to oil and gas firms. And Knell had other sharp words for Madrid...

President George W. Bush praised Rep. Heather Wilson as an independent-minded woman during a Wilson campaign fundraiser in Albuquerque on Friday. While about 300 Wilson supporters gave the president an enthusiastic welcome inside the Albuquerque Hyatt Regency, about 200 protesters outside called for Bush's impeachment and Wilson's ouster in the fall election. "Heather is an independent soul and that's what you want," Bush said in a speech that lasted more than 20 minutes. "She's strong on her beliefs, she's strong on her convictions." He described Wilson, R-N.M., as compassionate, smart and dedicated to her district. Bush touched on his recent...

Today President Bush traveled to Seattle, Washington for a fundraising luncheon to benefit U.S. Rep. Dave Reichert, R-Wash.,in his bid for reelection. Later the President traveled to New Mexico for another fundraiser for U.S. Rep. Heather Wilson in her reelection bid. Despite of all the biased polling that has been focused on smearing the President, President Bush has raised more money for Republican candidates than anytime in the past, and has done so in fewer appearances.

Passing a federal law to help prevent kids and animals from drinking deadly antifreeze could prove tougher than Rep. Heather Wilson (R-NM) expected. Wilson is trying to convince her House colleagues to approve a federal version of New Mexico's Scooby's Law, but she met with stiff resistance over environmental and liability concerns in a House subcommittee this week. Scooby's Law, named after a golden retriever who died in Bernalillo after drinking antifreeze in 2003, would force antifreeze manufacturers to add a bittering agent that discourages animals and young children from drinking the liquid. The federal bill Wilson has co-sponsored is...

President to offer heavyweight help to Heather Wilson. President George W. Bush will be in Albuquerque on June 16 to lend a little presidential heft to Rep. Heather Wilson's closely contested re-election race with state Attorney General Patricia Madrid, according to longtime political observer Joe Monahan. Republican donors are being invited to a $1,000-a-person fund-raising reception for Wilson at the Hyatt Regency with a chance to be photographed with the president at $5,000 a pop, according to an invitation Monahan links to on his Web site. Monahan suggests that a visit by Bush on behalf of Wilson this early in...

Writing in Roll Call, Stuart Rothenberg gives us his top ten list of most endangered House incumbents. All but one are Republicans. Rep. Bob Ney (R-OH) Rep. Tom DeLay (R-TX) Rep. John Hostettler (R-IN) Rep. Jim Gerlach (R-PA) Rep. Rob Simmons (R-CT) Rep. Heather Wilson (R-NM) Rep. Christopher Shays (R-CT) Rep. Mike Sodrel (R-IN) Rep. Clay Shaw (R-FL) Rep. Melissa Bean (D-IL) He says it was a tough list to compile. "Many of the incumbents on this list have proven their political mettle before, and in normal circumstances, they wouldn’t be in all that much trouble. Others find themselves in...

Monday, February 13, 2006 You know your city is too small when... (The back of Heather Wilson's head, on the left, with the top of the computer screen I'm hiding behind visible as I take the photo as quietly as I can...) ...you go to Starbucks to write and the evil Congressman (yes, man) Heather Wilson walks in, dressed in a manly blazer and manlier pants. Just call her W's mini-me. I don't know what the hell she's doing here. She is sitting here in front of me as I write. I just happened to have my digital camera and...

Today on Fox News Channel, GOP Rep. Heather Wilson raised the previous wiretap on Martin Luther King during her discussion and answering questions about the President's Terrorist Surveillance Program. She seemed to use this as a reason that we needed more oversight of the president's program. She said something to the effect "...you know, a friend of mine sent me an email about Martin Luther King being wire tapped....".

WASHINGTON - After weeks of insisting it would not reveal details of its domestic eavesdropping, the White House reversed course Wednesday and provided a House committee with highly classified information about the program. The White House has been under heavy pressure from lawmakers who wanted more information about the National Security Agency's monitoring. Democrats and many Republicans rejected the administration's implicit suggestion that they could not be trusted with national security secrets. The shift came after Rep. Heather Wilson (news, bio, voting record), R-N.M., chairwoman of a House Intelligence Committee subcommittee, broke with the Bush administration and called for a...

The Republican chairwoman of the House subcommittee charged with overseeing the National Security Agency announced her own misgivings with the Bush administration’s controversial terrorist surveillance program Tuesday and called for a full congressional inquiry into the matter. The congresswoman, Rep. Heather Wilson, R-N.M., is chair of the House Intelligence Subcommittee on Technical and Tactical Intelligence. With the announcement, she became the first Republican on an Intelligence Committee, from either the House or Senate, to call for a full investigation. Wilson told the New York Times that she had "serious concerns,” arising, at least partially, from the fact that the administration...

A House Republican whose subcommittee oversees the National Security Agency broke ranks with the White House on Tuesday and called for a full Congressional inquiry into the Bush administration's domestic eavesdropping program. The lawmaker, Representative Heather A. Wilson of New Mexico, chairwoman of the House Intelligence Subcommittee on Technical and Tactical Intelligence, said in an interview that she had "serious concerns" about the surveillance program. By withholding information about its operations from many lawmakers, she said, the administration has deepened her apprehension about whom the agency is monitoring and why. Ms. Wilson, who was a National Security Council aide in...

2006 Congressional Election Cycle Has Begun  50 Republican Incumbents Undeserving of Support by Pro-life Voters   The Republican National Coalition for Life PAC is currently receiving phone calls from Republican candidates for Congress in the 2006 Republican primaries. Our usual practice is to mail our Candidate Questionnaire to Republican candidates in each district as soon as the filing deadlines are reached. When we receive the results of the questionnaire, they are recorded on our website at www.RNCLife.org so that voters can see for themselves it those seeking to represent them in Washington are truly pro-life. We hope that this service...

WASHINGTON - Rep. Heather Wilson is scheduled to arrive at Fort Bliss, Texas, today on her first, and quite possibly last, junket as a member of the House Armed Services Committee. The Albuquerque Republican said House Energy and Commerce Chairman Joe Barton, a Texas Republican, has refused to sign a waiver of House rules to let her stay on a second major committee. That comes after the Republican Steering Committee on Thursday rejected Barton's request to oust Wilson from his committee.

Incumbents lead the challengers in all three New Mexico congressional races, and Republican Rep. Heather Wilson has widened her once-narrow lead over Democratic challenger Richard Romero, according to a Journal poll. Wilson, vying for her fourth term representing New Mexico's 1st Congressional District, had the support of 51 percent of the voters compared to 43 percent for Romero, a state Senate leader and retired Albuquerque schools administrator. Six percent of 1st District voters were undecided, according the Journal poll, conducted last Tuesday through Friday. In a previous Journal poll published Oct. 5, Wilson held just a one point lead over...

In the coming weeks, we will profile some of the hotly contested House races across America. Many of these races will play an important role in deciding who the next President of the United States will be, so localized has the targeting become in the national race. Today, we cover New Mexico’s First Congressional seat held by Republican Heather Wilson. She faces Democrat Richard Romero in a rematch from 2002. New Mexico’s First Congressional District includes the city of Albuquerque and some of its suburbs. According to Michael Barone in his Almanac of American Politics 2004, “the future and the...

Convention Contact: Leonardo Alcivar (212) 356-2004 NEW YORK - Republican National Committee Chairman Ed Gillespie and Bill Harris, CEO of the 2004 Republican National Convention, today announced a second group of program speakers to address the nation from Madison Square Garden at the 2004 Republican National Convention. The 9 names include four U.S. Senators, three Members of the U.S. House of Representatives, including the Speaker of the House, a lieutenant governor, and Miss America 2003. “It is an honor to announce the addition of these outstanding Americans to the 2004 Republican National Convention program. For the past three and a...

Bonilla’s ‘Dream’ fails to meet goal By Dan Morgan The Washington Post WASHINGTON -- When Rep. Henry Bonilla, R-Texas, took charge of an independent political fund called American Dream PAC in 1999, he made clear that its mission was ”to give significant, direct financial assistance to first-rate minority GOP candidates.” Since then, only $48,750, or 8.9 percent, of the $547,000 the southwest Texas congressman has raised for his political action committee has gone to minority office-seekers while more than $100,000 has been routed to Republican Party organizations or causes, including a GOP redistricting effort in Texas, a legal defense fund...

Albuquerque, NM – Congresswoman Heather Wilson at a hearing today compared Viacom, owner of CBS and MTV, to Enron for demonstrating bad corporate behavior by airing the Super Bowl halftime show that included indecent broadcasts. Rep. Wilson, a cosponsor of the Broadcast Decency Enforcement Act of 2004 (H.R. 3717), made the following statement at today’s hearing of the House Telecommunications and Internet Subcommittee: “I was visiting my mother when the Super Bowl was on and called home just before halftime. We are very restrictive about television watching at our house, but we have a sports fanatic fourth grader who asked...