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Utah Sen. Mike Lee said he believes Ted Cruz would be the GOP presidential nominee if the convention is contested. "On successive ballots, I think victory is more likely to go to Ted Cruz," Lee, who is a backer of the Texas senator, said during a radio interview Wednesday. "We have to remember that most Republicans around the country have voted for someone other than Donald Trump." A convention would become contested if no candidate gets 1,237 delegates beforehand. On the first ballot, delegates are typically bound to the candidates their state picked in the primaries or caucuses. On subsequent...

Lindsey Ellefson writes at Mediaite: It was the ad that launched a thousand blog posts. Liz Mair of Make America Awesome appeared on CNN Tonight to talk to Don Lemon about the infamous ad featuring Melania Trump that spurred Donald Trump into attacking Heidi Cruz. Trump blamed Cruz for the initial attack on his wife in spite of the fact that it was done by the Make America Awesome superPAC. Mair responded to that by telling Lemon, “The truth is it’s me. It’s just me.” When asked if Cruz had any involvement in the ad, she said this...

According to the latest polling, Gary Herbert is hardly alone in Utah, but his endorsement may kneecap a fellow Republican governor in Utah. In a Facebook post earlier today, Governor Herbert urged his fellow Utahans to cast their vote for "a consistent conservative," and to cement the state's status as something more than just another "flyover state": Tomorrow night, Utah will award 40 delegates to the Republican National Convention. If one of the Republican candidates can receive more than 50 percent of the vote, that candidate will receive all of Utah's 40 delegates. Ted Cruz is a consistent conservative who...

Provo, Utah (CNN) -- Texas Sen. Ted Cruz on Saturday picked up the support of Utah's lieutenant governor three days before Republicans head to the state's caucuses. Spencer Cox, who had previously endorsed Sen. Marco Rubio's candidacy, endorsed Cruz at a rally here Saturday afternoon that was hosted by a pro-Cruz super PAC. "Ted has unwaveringly fought for conservative principles time after time, and as president, he will do the same. I am asking all of my fellow Utah Republicans to join me, Senator Mike Lee and Mitt Romney in voting for Ted Cruz on Tuesday," Cox said....

His newest foreign policy advisor, Frank Gaffney, is a key player in the effort to remove Grover Norquist from the organization's board. Ted Cruz named Frank Gaffney his foreign policy advisor on Thursday, a move that threatens to involve the Republican presidential contender in a contentious fight to get the party's most prominent anti-tax advocate kicked off the National Rifle Association's board. Gaffney once worked for President Ronald Reagan's Department of Defense and now runs the Center for Security Policy, a hyper-conservative think tank that promulgates theories about a Muslim Brotherhood conspiracy to infiltrate the U.S. government. The Southern Poverty...

New information is surfacing about Mitt Romney and his 2016 plans following the 2012 presidential candidate's nationally-covered speech on Thursday morning. The former Mass. Governor and Republican nominee for President spoke out against Donald Trump, calling the Republican front-runner a "phony" and "fraud." He urged Republicans to unite behind another candidate, yet declined to indicate which candidate he would be supporting. An in-depth look at Romney's campaign finance activity, however, shows that the former candidate may be gearing up to take another shot at the White House. In late January and early February of 2016, Romney's campaign finance entities, which...

WASHINGTON -- Donald Trump continues to lead in national polls among the many GOP contenders for president, but members of Utah's all-Republican congressional delegation said they believe voters will make a different choice. "It's a problem because he's both an asset and a tremendous liability," Sen. Orrin Hatch, R-Utah, said of the possibility the billionaire businessman and reality TV star could become the Republican nominee in 2016. Trump is attracting huge crowds, "telling people what they want to hear, and they're all mad at everybody here" in Washington, Hatch said. "But you still have to be responsible, no matter what...

SALT LAKE CITY — Donald Trump continues to be the front-runner in the GOP presidential nomination race, but he's languishing in fourth place in a new poll of Utah voters. The new UtahPolicy.com poll by Dan Jones & Associates comes as former Utah governor and 2012 presidential candidate Jon Huntsman Jr. is suggesting Trump has a shot at winning the White House. "People really are hungry for change. They were last time, but it hadn't reached the 212-degree boiling point. This time it has," Huntsman told USA Today's weekly "Capital Download" video series. Huntsman said that's why he thinks Trump,...

Maybe I’m overselling it a tiny bit in the headline. Watch the clip below, from 3:05 to 5:00, and tell me what he’s saying. When he’s asked who he’d vote for in a Trump/Hillary election, he emphasizes that he’s a Republican but he won’t give a straight answer about supporting Trump. He wants to see if Trump, as nominee, blossoms into a “problem-solver” during the general election campaign, in which case then, it seems, he’ll support him. But what if Trump doesn’t become that guy? Huntsman says no when asked about an independent run but then adds, “I’m not ready...

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker has become the 15th Republican presidential contender. Walker is reminding people about his fights and his subsequent triumphs, including his surviving a union-backed recall election. It is a record he argues that sets him apart from the crowded Republican field and he plans to exploit that in early-voting states. Gina Worthen, vice chairwoman of the Cache County Republican Party, says she sees Walker as a good candidate. "I think he's done some amazing things," Worthen says. "Being from a more blue state and being able to turn his state around and do some good things for...

Mitt Romney invited Obama political strategist David Axelrod to address a political gathering in Utah last week. The event was officially hosted by Romney and Solamere Capital, the investment firm whose executive committee he chairs, and was designed to introduce a host of GOP presidential contenders to wealthy donors. However, some notable names were apparently left off the guest list. They include announced candidates Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX), Ben Carson, Rick Santorum, and Mike Huckabee. Jeb Bush, who was invited, did not attend because he was in Europe. But three announced candidates—Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL), Carly Fiorina and Lindsay Graham—and...

And I do mean “noted.” With the possible exception of Steve Schmidt, no Republican advisor is better known to the right for sneering at the right than John Weaver. Re-read this old post, written when Weaver was helping to steer Huntsman 2012 to a third-place flameout in New Hampshire, for some of his greatest hits. He advised McCain in 2000, when Maverick was at his media-friendly right-baiting zenith, then caught on with Huntsman during the last cycle to try the ol’ what-our-party-really-needs-is-a-better-base approach again. He’s known for being a difficult boss, losing lots of races (with some notable successes, like...

GOP presidential candidate Sen. Ted Cruz said today that ABC News anchor and former Clinton White House staffer George Stephanopoulos has no business moderating any 2016 presidential debates. Cruz was asked in the Senate hallway this afternoon whether Stephanopoulos should host any debates following today’s revelation that he gave $75,000 to the Clinton Foundation without it disclosing it while officially covering the organization for ABC News. “Of course not,” Cruz responded, according to a transcript provided to The Federalist by one of his campaign communications staffers. “Debates should not be moderated by partisan Democrats who are actively supporting one of...

One of the newly announced South Carolina co-chairs for Sen. Ted Cruz's (R-TX) presidential campaign previously argued that the Utah judge who overturned the state's gay marriage ban should be impeached. That co-chair is state Sen. Lee Bright (R), who challenged Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) in the 2014 Republican primary. Bright, in 2014, griped about federal judges being "absolutely out of control on so many different fronts" and went on to suggest that U.S. District Judge Robert Shelby, the judge who struck down Utah's ban on same-sex marriage, should be impeached. In April, Cruz was hosted by a pair of...

SALT LAKE CITY — Now that Utah's favorite son Mitt Romney is no longer a candidate for president, "undecided" is the top choice of the state's Republicans in the party's 2016 nomination race. A new UtahPolicy.com poll found that just over one-fourth, 26 percent, of Utah Republicans haven't picked a preferred presidential candidate yet. Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush was the candidate with the most support so far, 22 percent. Texas Sen. Ted Cruz, a close ally of Utah Sen. Mike Lee, followed with 13 percent. Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, who like Cruz and Lee is aligned with the tea...

Based on historical patterns, the next president is likely to be a GenXer. This is not good news for the many baby boomers running, or thinking about running, in 2016. When voters decide it is time to move the presidency on to the next generation, they keep electing presidents in that next generation, or they go on to the one that follows. They do not go back. Bill Clinton and George W. Bush were from the baby boomer generation. Barack Obama is from the Gen X generation (those born 1961 to 1981). If the pattern holds, the next president will...

As Jeb Bush and Mitt Romney battle behind the scenes for big money donors, Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz is working to portray himself as the presidential candidate of the conservative base. Speaking to tea partiers in South Carolina over the weekend, Cruz cautioned that Republicans will lose the White House in 2016 if the nominee is insufficiently conservative. “If we nominate a candidate in that mold, the same people who stayed home in 2008 and 2012 will stay home in 2016 and the Democrats will win again,” Cruz told the crowd. His comments come as the Texas senator —...

Since forming a presidential exploratory committee earlier this month, Jeb Bush is being considered a serious Republican candidate for president. But as George Will astutely pointed out last week, Bush has two significant hurdles; his support for Common Core and immigration reform. Will correctly points out that his support for the latter is far more nuanced than people understand. Bush does not advocate for more immigration through family reunification, which is the agenda of radical immigration activists, but instead for meeting employment needs, and he supports a path to legal status instead of citizenship. However, his support for Common Core...

On Sunday on ABC’s “This Week,” Daily Beast contributor Kristen Soltis Anderson made an amazing statement. She said Republicans “understand that they need to start cultivating new and fresh talent.” Fascinating. Because the GOP has been cultivating new and fresh talent for years now and is — finally — poised to look to a whole new generation of Republican leaders, quite possibly starting with the 2017 occupant of the White House. The past few election cycles have been grim. The Republican Party went with Sen. John McCain because, well, it was his turn (just like in 1996 with Sen. Bob...

In a new poll of likely Republican primary voters nationwide by Zogby Analytics, 2012 GOP nominee Romney leads the pack with 14%, followed by former Florida Governor Jeb Bush (12%), Kentucky Senator Rand Paul (10%), New Jersey Governor Chris Christie (8%), former Arkansas Governor and now Fox News Host Mike Huckabee (7%), Florida Senator Marco Rubio (7%), Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker (5%), Rep. and former Vice Presidential nominee Paul Ryan (4%), Texas Governor Rick Perry (4%), Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal (3%), Texas Senator Ted Cruz (3%), South Carolina Governor Nikki Haley (2%), former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum (1%), and both...