Free Republic

Republican strategist Karl Rove says the GOP should quit while it's not as far behind as it could be. Appearing Tuesday on Fox News Channel's "On the Record," Rove said Republicans fighting for concessions on Obamacare and entitlements are weakening their position the longer they hold out. "At some point you have to focus on, as Ronald Reagan said, getting as much of the pie as you possibly can get," Rove said. Republicans aren't even going to be able to get 80 percent of what they want now, he said, because they have been weakened over the last two months...

Karl Rove, normally a critic of Ted Cruz, complimented the freshman senator’s marathon speech and said he had positioned himself well for 2016. “I obviously don’t agree with the strategy . . . of trying to defund [Obamacare] as opposed to trying to delay . . . but that was an extraordinary performance,” Rove said -snip- Rove took a noticeably softer line on Cruz than he has in recent days. He previously called the defunding strategy “ad hoc” and said Cruz had created it without consulting with his Senate colleagues.

Karl Rove is always worth reading for a glimpse of how GOP elites are thinking, and his latest Op ed suggest real panic setting in over the chaos and division spreading among Congressional Republicans over how to handle this fall’s fiscal fights. Rove confirms an argument that will be familiar to readers of this blog: Public disapproval of Obamacare does not translate into public support for GOP efforts to sabotage the law. -snip- The poll is obviously one commissioned to advance an argument against defunding, but the very fact that Crossroads GPS — whose mission is to win elections —...

Video at link.

Faced with a politically risky push by some Republicans to defund ObamaCare, other party members are turning to an alternative strategy: delay it instead. Republicans are divided on how to confront the Affordable Care Act. Some, such as Sens. Ted Cruz of Texas and Mike Lee of Utah, are pushing to permanently defund it. But attaching such a measure to a resolution that funds the government after Oct. 1 runs the risk of a government shutdown if it doesn’t pass. If that happens, Republicans fear they would be blamed. Former White House chief of staff Karl Rove told Fox News...

The American Crossroads PAC and its affiliate, Crossroads GPS, co-founded by Republican strategist Karl Rove, jointly raised a little over $3.3 million in the first half of 2013, according to federal reports, a little off their 2012 election pace. -snip- Another political action committee founded by Mr. Rove, the Conservative Victory Project, raised little independent money so far this year. The Victory Project was established to help fund “electable” future Republican candidates in the wake of a number of losses last year of candidates who were popular with the right wing of the Republican Party but did not prevail in...

Former Bush strategist Karl Rove says he’s staying out of Wyoming’s Republican U.S. Senate primary between incumbent Mike Enzi and newly-announced challenger Liz Cheney, the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney. “Liz is a friend of mine,” Rove told radio host Hugh Hewitt on Thursday. “I also respect Sen. Enzi. This is going to be up to the people of Wyoming. They don’t need a Texan coming in there, and I grew up in the mountain west and you and I both know — particularly in the Rocky Mountain states and small states like Wyoming — they know everybody...

GRAND RAPIDS, MI — Video has surfaced of GOP strategist Karl Rove calling U.S. Rep. Justin Amash, R-Cascade Township, the "most liberal Republican." Speaking during the Aspen Ideas Festival in late June, Rove criticized Amash's reputed staunch libertarian stances on legislation as antithetical to tackling issues in Washington. The swipe came during a June 27 panel discussion about whether to include some libertarian tenets in Republican policy, which Rove cautiously advocated. "The most liberal Republican is Justin Amash of Michigan. Far more liberal than any other Republican," said Rove, who was senior adviser and deputy chief of staff to former...

The drive to overhaul U.S. immigration law may get a high-profile boost next week, just as House Republicans begin to consider their legislative options, when former President George W. Bush addresses the matter at an immigration event at his presidential library. Mr. Bush, whose own effort as president to pass an immigration bill failed, rarely addresses current policy debates, but he has made clear that he supports the renewed effort this year. On Wednesday, he will address 20 new citizens as they are sworn in at the George W. Bush Presidential Center. Three panel discussions will follow on the topic...

Charlie Spies knows how to raise money. The Republican lawyer helped rake in $153 million for Restore Our Future, the pro-Mitt Romney super PAC. But he’s had a harder slog with one of his latest projects, Republicans for Immigration Reform, a super PAC that aims to be a dominant force in the fight over revamping the country’s immigration laws. So far, the organization has made just a tiny ad buy in South Carolina and financed a poll with two other advocacy groups. “It has been a challenge to get donors on the Republican side to reengage,” Spies said.

The Republican Party’s senior operatives publicly are committing the cardinal sin of promising to spend tens of millions of dollars of its most generous donors’ money to lard up on data: knowledge. What, instead, is required — to restore its ability to make good, winning, decisions — is virtue: understanding. This critical distinction appears lost on the politicos. Memo to the GOP donor base: to win (in 2014 and 2016 and beyond) the GOP can and must get just two things just right. First, the GOP must (and can) reunite its libertarian and conservative factions around the Constitution. Second, the...

The GOP strategist says he tried to signal to the Romney campaign that it should change course, but they didn't follow his lead. A lot has been said about why Mitt Romney lost the presidential election, from his failure to turn out more white working-class voters to his failure to win more of the Latino voters who did turn out. Republican strategist Karl Rove offered the latest take Thursday in remarks detailing how he tried, from his perch at an outside group forbidden by law from coordinating with the campaign, to signal to Romney's team that they should make changes...

As immigration reform grinds its way through the U.S. Senate, the main focus has rightly been on the legislation's policy consequences. But there are important political implications, especially for the GOP, that are worth examining. Some observers, including Phyllis Schlafly, Pat Buchanan and the Center for Immigration Studies, argue that if Republicans want to win back the White House, they should focus on white voters (who comprised 72% of the electorate in 2012) rather than worrying about Latinos. After all, new Census Bureau estimates are that 100,042,000 whites voted in 2008 but only 98,041,000 did in 2012. Wouldn't it be...

Former Florida governor Jeb Bush is still nursing presidential aspirations, despite Republican unease about the “comprehensive immigration reform” he whole-heartedly supports, after losing an argument with himself and immediately backpedaling from a book he had only just published. Bush chose to deal with this unease by attacking the uneasy, referring to them as “chirpers” in a CBN interview following his appearance before the Faith and Freedom Coalition. ”I will be able to, I think, manage my way through all the ‘chirpers’ out there,” he said, apparently playing off Senator John McCain’s reference to his conservative colleagues Ted Cruz, Rand Paul,...

In an exclusive sit-down interview with The Brody File, Jeb Bush began to sketch out his case for President of the United States if he decides to run next year. “It will be based on my record. And that record was one of solving problems from completely from a conservative perspective. I cut taxes every year, I shrunk the size of government,” Jeb Bush tells The Brody File. And as for his critics who say he’s too mainstream establishment he offers this: “I will be able to, I think, manage my way through all the chirpers out there.” We sat...

Karl Rove's recollection of the 1986 Immigration Reform and Control Act ("Immigration Reform and the Hispanic Vote," op-ed, June 6) is, shall we say, highly selective. That law, he writes, "essentially told those here illegally that if they had arrived in the U.S. prior to 1982 and wanted to become citizens, simply raise your right hand." He asserts that the Gang of Eight bill is different because it "has plenty of penalties and hurdles for those here illegally who seek citizenship." Well, I was there in '86. I read that bill carefully. (We did that back then.) And I can...

Phyllis Schlafly, founder and president of the pro-family grassroots organization Eagle Forum blasted New Hampshire Senator Kelly Ayotte, who campaigned on promises to oppose amnesty, for now supporting the fatally flawed Gang of Eight amnesty bill. "As a Senate candidate, Kelly Ayotte had it right when she said that we don't necessarily need to add new immigration laws, we need to start by enforcing the laws already on the books," said Schlafly. "Ayotte even ran ads against her Democrat opponent for supporting amnesty." "Ayotte betrayed every conservative who supported her when she announced her support for this shameful bill," Schlafly...

Crossroads GPS, an advocacy group backed by Karl Rove, former senior adviser to George W. Bush, is launching a $100,000 ad campaign urging conservatives to support an overhaul of the nation's immigration laws. The full-page print ad is signed by 53 business leaders and Republicans, including former Republican National Committee Chairman Edward Gillespie, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Rove. It's the first ad the group has run on immigration this year.

Former George W. Bush senior advisor Karl Rove and former Barack Obama senior advisor David Plouffe got into quite a heated debate on ABC’s This Week Sunday. When Plouffe claimed the ongoing Internal Revenue Service scandal wasn’t political, Rove pushed back twice saying “Baloney.” Rove to Former Obama Advisor Plouffe Claiming IRS Scandal Wasn’t Political: ‘Baloney’ DAVID PLOUFFE, FORMER SENIOR ADVISOR TO BARACK OBAMA: But there's been no suggestion. The independent, the prosecutor looked at this - excuse me, the inspector general - said there was no politics involved in this. No one has indicated at all that the White...

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush is “the smartest guy, the biggest thinker” in the Republican Party as it looks toward winning the White House in 2016, GOP strategist Karl Rove tells Newsmax TV. “Six months ago, I would have said, ‘No, he's not going to run,’” Rove tells Newsmax in an exclusive interview. “But maybe he is. I certainly hope he keeps a very strong voice.”

Karl Rove called conservative Weekly Standard editor Bill Kristol “inexplicable” on Monday for criticizing Rove’s super PAC Hillary Clinton Benghazi attack ad, adding that more people have seen the ad than subscribe to The Weekly Standard.

Former Bush adviser and GOP strategist Karl Rove says Republicans have a good chance of taking the Senate from Democrats in 2014 if they avoid nominating the types of candidates who stumbled badly in once competitive 2012 races. “Republican success will depend on having quality Senate candidates,” Rove wrote in The Wall Street Journal on Thursday. “Todd Akin and Richard Mourdock self-destructed last fall, and other candidates squandered important opportunities.”

The Republican National Committee has chosen a Karl Rove-linked voter data project called Liberty Works to help it compete with Democrats in the digital arena. Liberty Works will team up with Data Trust, whose chairman of the board is former RNC Chairman Mike Duncan, committee spokeswoman Kirsten Kukowski confirmed to POLITICO. “Basically, RNC is going to provide the data, and then Liberty Works will build the platform, and Data Trust will manage it all,” Kukowski said. “This is kind of in the beginning stages. There are legal issues that we’re going to iron out.”

Frank Luntz may smugly believe that Rush Limbaugh, Mark Levin and other right wing talk radio hosts are "responsible for the stark polarization within the nation's political discourse" and therefore "problematic" for the Republican Party. I submit the problem is that Luntz, and a misguided over-reliance on focus groups, has neutered and thus destroyed any semblance of courage in the GOP's message. Luntz is conflating, as many wonks and number crunchers do, cause and effect with regard to the bigger realities and polarization. The country is polarized because, well, we are polarized. Rush and "the great one" didn't make it...

President Barack Obama’s influence is disappearing to the point that he is just a “minor actor on Capitol Hill” and even Democrats believe he is doing little but get in the way, Karl Rove has charged. “No president is ever irrelevant, but less than 10 weeks into his second term Mr. Obama’s power is waning,” Rove writes in Thursday’s Wall Street Journal. “Even members of his own party view him as an obstacle to getting things done.” …

The GOP is working with Silicon Valley investors to digitally target voters and donors in a broader effort by the Republican National Committee to revive the party. The venture, whose mission is still being refined, will create an interactive platform available to any GOP campaign to access the party's vast amount of data on voters. This platform will likely work in conjunction with the RNC's efforts to improve its own database of voter information. The venture is being backed by Karl Rove and fomer Bain & Co. executive and private equity investor Richard Boyce. Sun Microsystems co-founder Scott McNealy will...

GOP strategist Karl Rove says he can imagine a Republican candidate in the next presidential campaign supporting gay marriage. The statement from the former adviser to President George W. Bush appears to acknowledge that opposition to gay marriage has waned in some conservative circles. …

STEPHANOPOULOS: That was Bill Clinton after Dukakis's loss in '88. BRAZILE: That was Bill Clinton after Walter Mondale lost, after Jimmy Carter lost. We had a dynamic governor who was reform minded, who took those reform issues and brought them into the national forefront. He really helped recharge the Democratic Party. But, you know, the Republican Party is out to lunch. I watched CPAC Charl -- I mean Karl. (LAUGHTER) BRAZILE: Charles was a former friend. ROVE: I thought I was a current friend. BRAZILE: But you're always a friend, but you owe me some chili. ROVE: But you owe...

Karl Rove sought to turn the tables Sunday on Sarah Palin, jabbing her for stepping down early as Alaska governor, a day after she blistered the GOP consultant in a speech at CPAC. Palin launched a broadside against the GOP establishment on Saturday at the gathering of conservatives, but directed her sharpest aim at Rove, reports Huffington Post. “If these experts who keep losing elections and keep getting rehired and getting millions — if they feel that strong about who gets to run in this party, then they should buck-up or stay in the truck,� Palin told CPAC Saturday, according...

Karl Rove wasted no time in hitting back at Sarah Palin after she criticized him for getting involved in Republican primaries last year. "If she can play in primaries, other people can play in primaries," he said on "Fox News Sunday."

Republican strategist Karl Rove responded to the harsh comments former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin had for him at CPAC on Fox News Sunday this morning. Before taking a shot at Palin for not completing her term as governor, he said that Palin was actually in agreement with him on former Senate candidate Todd Akin and that he actually works pro bono for American Crossroads. [....] Rove continued that Palin endorsed in primaries and got involved in other races around so he didn’t understand what the problem was with other people doing the same thing. He defended his work for American...

Former Governor Jeb Bush (R-FL) spoke at the annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC).

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush gave the keynote speech Friday night at the Conservative Political Action Conference 2013 Reagan Dinner and received what was described as a “respectful” standing ovation when introduced, as reported by Twitchy.com. As he laid out what appeared to be the foundation for a future presidential campaign platform, there was a general lack of enthusiasm that brought some to describe it as tepid.

Former Alaska governor Sarah Palin (R) delivered a blistering attack on President Obama on Saturday, using a string of one-liners to rile up a raucous crowd at the Conservative Political Action Conference in suburban Washington. Palin hit Obama on everything from gun control to transparency and likened his administration to a TV reality show. At one point, she even alluded to a years-old controversy over a House member shouting, “You lie” at Obama during a major address before Congress. “Barack Obama promised the most transparent administration ever. Barack Obama: You lie!” she said. Palin’s jabs were met with a series...

There are 23 names on the Conservative Political Action Conference's much watched 2016 GOP presidential nomination straw poll. And there's one glaring omission: Jeb Bush. It appears the former two-term Florida governor is the reason his name isn't on the ballot. "He requested not to be put on the poll this year," an official with the American Conservative Union, the group that puts on CPAC, told CNN.

As the GOP struggles to broaden its appeal, the head of the American Conservative Union declared Thursday that the Republican Party is not a home for everyone, as prominent voices in Republican politics gather with thousands of conservatives and tea party activists outside Washington. The Conservative Political Action Conference offers Republican leaders—past and potential presidential contenders among them—a high-profile stage to court their party's most passionate voters. The three-day gathering also shines a spotlight on deep divisions within the Republican Party as it tries to recover from a painful 2012 election season. “I’m a firm believer that if the Republican...

Jeb Bush Going For 'Full Ginsburg' To Promote Immigration Policy On TV Named for the Lewinsky lawyer who first pulled off the feat, former governor to appear on all five major Sunday talk shows 9 March 2013 In insider Washington slang it is a publicity coup that has been dubbed the "full Ginsburg" – when a single interviewee snags a slot on all five of American television's major Sunday morning talk shows on the same day. It was named after Monica Lewinsky lawyer William Ginsburg – who was the first to pull it off in 1998 – but now former...

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R) said Tuesday that he would endorse a pathway to citizenship that does not incentivize illegal immigration. It's a stance that differs from the immigration reform plan that he laid out in his new book. Bush, a well-known pro-immigration reform Republican, raised eyebrows on Monday when he said on the "Today" show and in his book that he opposes a pathway to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, arguing that it would violate the rule of law and encourage future illegal immigration. In his new book, "Immigration Wars," Bush offers up a plan that would provide a...

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush won’t confirm he’s a candidate for the next presidential race, but he sounded like a White House hopeful Monday, declaring his party in need of leadership. “I have a voice, I want to share my beliefs about how the conservative movement and the Republican party can regain its footing, because we’ve lost our way,” he told TODAY’s Matt Lauer. Bush said he wouldn’t rule out a run in 2016, “but I won’t declare today either.”

During an appearance on NBC’s “The Today Show,” Bush said it’s not the time to talk about increasing taxes after what he called the biggest tax hike in American history two months ago following the fiscal cliff deal. But he also wouldn’t rule out the idea that revenues could be part of a package — something Republicans in Congress have said is off the table.

GOP strategist Karl Rove said Saturday that rebuilding the Republican brand in California will be a tough task that will require them to diversify and create a strategy to spread their message to a wider audience. Referring to the state party’s deep losses in recent years, Rove said it needs to focus on larger themes of restoring jobs and reducing government spending. He also said the party must recruit candidates who reflect the diversity of the country, and in particular, California. By next year, Hispanics will overtake whites as the state’s largest demographic group. …

SACRAMENTO, Calif. (AP) — GOP strategist Karl Rove said Saturday that rebuilding the Republican brand in California will be a tough task that will require them to diversify and create a strategy to spread their message to a wider audience. http://blogs.sacbee.com/capitolalertlatest/2013/03/karl-rove.html

The Buckley Rule has been much invoked in recent weeks, in this space and elsewhere, and on almost every occasion it has been both misquoted and misapplied. As one who was present at the formulation, I feel obliged to record the “originalist” intention. It was the winter of 1964 and the unresolved question at NR editorial meetings, week to week, was this: Whom should the magazine support for the Republican presidential nomination? To outsiders, the question would have seemed all but settled. Issue by issue, NR gave every appearance of being all in for Barry Goldwater. Heck, there were those...

Karl Rove continues to explain why his political action committee is not anti-Tea Party and will help elect the most electable conservative candidate. (Check out the video)

Karl Rove has been working overtime trying to reassure the conservative wing of the GOP that some of his best friends are tea partyers. On Bill O’Reilly’s Fox News show last week, Rove played up his credentials with the right by asserting that he headed Ronald Reagan’s 1980 presidential campaign in Texas. As it turns out, not so much. In fact, as we reported in some detail in the book Bush’s Brain, Rove worked for George H.W. Bush against Reagan in the state’s 1980 primary. And others directly involved in the Reagan effort in the Lone Star State say Rove...

Blistering new book coming out about Rove and the establishment - been in teh works since day after election. Some pull quotes about Rove, Romney, the establishment, how liberals are undermining entrepreneures on purpose, etc. The image of a typical OWS encampment allows us a peak at the future, which is a powerful object lesson by itself. The fear of even having this discussion with the voters is why we are not happy with the establishment. They would rather change the subject to something trite like “jobs and Ohio” without realizing that a communist movement central to the Democrat universe...

February 8, 2013 Nuclear war over Rove's claims to work for Reagan; Gipper biographer says no Paul Bedard The war of words between conservatives and former Bush advisor Karl Rove has gone nuclear, this time over Rove's claim that he worked for Ronald Reagan's 1980 campaign and on a Reagan advisory board. The bottom line: While Rove told The O'Reilly Factor Thursday that he worked for the Gipper, Reagan's acclaimed biographer Craig Shirley says there's no evidence to back Rove up. Worse: In an email Shirley is sending to conservative leaders, he reveals that Rove backed former President Ford in...

Mark Levin blasted Karl Rove tonight for claiming he’s supported conservative candidates when in fact it’s only after they won the primaries. Levin points out that it’s the Tea Party, the American people that are working hard to elect solid conservatives in these tough primaries and Rove isn’t a part of that. Just like in the case of Ted Cruz, Levin says Cruz got nominated because of the American people, not Rove...

fter smearing movement conservative icon Brent Bozell as a "hater" who has a "sordid history of hating Karl Rove," Jonathan Collegio of American Crossroads mocked a group of prominent conservatives who wrote a letter to Crossroads GPS President Steven Law demanding Collegio be fired. “I’ve been trying to get my friends to sign it, because it’ll make for a funnier story once I get it framed,” Collegio said, in response to the letter to the Washington Examiner. “It would be flattering, if it weren’t so absurd.” In an interview with Breitbart News editor Larry O'Connor on WMAL's "Mornings on the...

-snip- Minnesota media mogul Stan Hubbard, who has written big checks to Crossroads and other conservative groups, said the GOP has had too many candidates who are “nut cases” and pledged to donate and raise money for Conservative Victory Project. “Some areas obviously are more conservative in their constituencies than others,” Hubbard said. “But I don’t think anybody anywhere with any sense is going to want to elect a candidate who says, ‘If your daughter gets raped, it’s God’s will’,” he said, referring to Richard Mourdock, who defeated incumbent Sen. Dick Lugar of Indiana in the 2012 GOP primary only...