Free Republic

RACINE — Rabbi Dena Feingold believes President Donald Trump's rhetoric encourages hate speech and she believes House Speaker Paul Ryan has the power to do something about it. The spiritual leader of Beth Hillel Temple in Kenosha, Feingold said as much on Monday night on national television during Ryan's "town hall" meeting, when she asked the Republican congressman whether he would support a resolution to censure the president based on his "many sides" remarks regarding the events in Charlottesville, Virginia, two weeks ago. Ryan said he would not support censure of Trump, calling Feingold's idea "counterproductive." "If we descend this...

MADISON (WKOW) -- Just months after losing his bid to return to the U.S. Senate, Middleton Democrat Russ Feingold is starting a new political organization with a stated goal of abolishing the U.S. Electoral College. Feingold announced the creation of LegitAction Wednesday in a press release, calling it "an organization committed to restoring our country’s democratic legitimacy." Under that premise, LegitAction will "focus on four central pillars of our democracy." - Protecting the Right to Vote - Reforming our campaign finance system- Empowering the national popular vote by abolishing the Electoral College- Protecting the independence and credibility of the Supreme...

Russ Feingold's bad week just got a little worse. A a jaw-dropping expose in the Boston Globe , reports that employees of a prominent Democratic law firm in Boston, had been operating a straw donor scheme to benefit various U.S. Senate campaigns since 2010. The law firm, Strouss and Bradley, would have employees give the maximum legal donations to Democratic Senate campaigns and then reimburse them their money as "bonuses."

A few weeks ago, Wisconsin looked like a walkover for Democrats, in both the presidential and Senate races. Russ Feingold came out of retirement for a rematch against Ron Johnson, whose campaign-energy level had appeared to be flagging over the last year or so, and Donald Trump laid an egg in the state early. Democrats counted on flipping the state as one of their keys to a new Senate majority, and up to now have not appeared concerned with their progress. Now, however, a super-PAC is making a $2 million, last-minute jump to boost Feingold, raising questions about what Democrats...

Russ Feingold and John McCain largely made their names in the Senate fighting the power of special interest money. But now as McCain fights for re-election in Arizona and Feingold tries to return to the Senate in Wisconsin, the authors of the McCain-Feingold campaign finance law are benefiting from the same sources of funding they once scorned. …

Democrat Hillary Clinton continued to hold a lead over Republican Donald Trump in Wisconsin's presidential battle, while Democrat Russ Feingold increased his lead over Republican U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson in their pivotal contest, according to Wednesday's Marquette University Law School Poll. Among likely voters, those who say they're going to the polls, Clinton had 44% and Trump had 42%. Twelve percent haven't made a decision

A progressive Jewish political action committee with ties to the son of Democratic Party mega-donor George Soros is intervening in Senate races for the first time, endorsing Rep. Tammy Duckworth of Illinois and former Sen. Russ Feingold of Wisconsin. The endorsements from Bend the Arc Jewish Action PAC will involve fundraising support from the group, which makes direct payments to candidates running for office. It will also marshal what are known as “conduit” payments, linking its network of donors to the group's favored candidates. “As American Jews, we’re disturbed by the dark turn American political discourse has taken in recent...

MADISON, Wis. - Former U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold spent part of his first interview of the election year defending President Obama's nuclear deal with Iran - a deal most Americans are leery about, to say the least. The Democrat, who is running against U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson to reclaim the seat he lost in the 2010 Republican revolution, said it's only right to talk about the "great things the president has done." "He has accomplished some foreign policy goals we have had for a very long time," Feingold told Sherwin Hughes, host of "The Forum," Friday on Milwaukee's 860 AM,...

MADISON, Wisconsin — As the nation celebrates its veterans and pays tribute to their sacrifices, it’s important to remember the promise made to America’s protectors has too often been broken. The headlines over the past few years in particular have screamed of neglect, ill-treatment and other abuses of too many veterans. That broken faith was no more apparent than in Wisconsin, at the Tomah Veterans Affairs Medical Center. While federal lawmakers have conducted a series of investigations into widespread over-prescription of opiates that led to the death of a 35-year-old Marine veteran at the facility and have pledged changes to...

MADISON, Wis. — Thirsty for some Packers and politics? The Wisconsin GOP and some national friends say they’ve got a slushie of truth for you. On Saturday beginning at 1 p.m., the Republican Party of Wisconsin and the National Republican Senatorial Committee will hand out free slushies at the Green Bay Packers home, Lambeau Field, to “highlight Russ Feingold’s (don’t call him Senator Russ) slush fund scandal.” The liberal Feingold is challenging U.S. Sen. Ron Johnson for the conservative’s Senate seat in a rematch of the 2010 race. Earlier this week, the NRSC launched a billboard and the WISGOP released...

Russ Feingold, the only US senator who voted against the 2001 Patriot Act, has announced he will launch a campaign to regain his seat in 2016. Feingold, a Wisconsin Democrat, lost a re-election bid in 2010 to Ron Johnson, a Tea Party Republican. Feingold had served three terms. In a video released on Thursday and first obtained by the Huffington Post, Feingold says that “billionaires and big corporations are calling the shots” and “we need to get started fixing all this”. “Let’s fight together for change,” Feingold says. “That means helping to bring back to the US Senate strong independence,...

MADISON, Wis. — Former U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold is doing more than dropping hints that he may seek another run at the seat from which he unceremoniously dumped during the conservative revolution of 2010. Multiple media accounts assert the Wisconsin Democrat has been “reaching out” to supporters — possibly potential donors — in recent weeks to feel out a 2016 Senate bid against first-term Republican Sen. Ron Johnson. But is the man whose name is synonymous with campaign finance reform and expansive political speech policing violating the long-standing federal Hatch Act, which limits executive branch employees like Feingold from politicking...

At the Shadow Party’s "Take Back America" conference in Washington on June 3, 2004, following a glowing introduction from Hillary Clinton, George Soros stepped to the podium to explain to the audience that when it came to electoral politics in the USA, he was a newcomer. Only his outrage over Bush’s invasion of Iraq had stirred him to get involved in the partisan struggle. "[I]t is the first time that I feel that I need to stand up and do something, and become really engaged in the electoral process in this country," Soros said.[1] This was far from the truth,...

Kate Cochran chooses to make her Facebook profile viewable to the public. And she has revealed herself to be a far-left progressive. Among the items she “likes” on Facebook-none of them are conservative in nature-are Organization for Action-Mississippi (Obama grassroots) , Barack Obama, Al Franken, Campaign for Southern Equality (homosexual movement), and Not having George Bush as President (by Leftake.com). She has written two “notes” regarding her father’s Senate race. Here are some highlights from the first one titled “June 3, 2014 Primary Election”: “On July 18, 2006, Cochran voted, along with 19 Republican Senators, for the Stem Cell Research...

Wisconsin is a critical state in Obama's strategy to win reelection. [Obama] won it handily against McCain in 2008, but recent polling there is consistent with other swing states; the race between Obama and Romney is very tight. It is hard to see a path to another term that doesn't include Wisconsin in Obama's column. Fearful that a Walker victory in next month's recall would be a crippling blow to the state's Democrat party, the Obama campaign is shifting its entire campaign infrastructure in the state to help oust Walker on June 5th. [Video at link] This is just the...

Feingold rips Pelosi for willingness to consider entitlement cutsBy Russell Berman - 05/03/12 04:24 PM ET A liberal stalwart is making a surprise attack on Nancy Pelosi, accusing the House minority leader of signaling “a disturbing potential willingness” to slash entitlement programs that Democrats consider sacred. Former Sen. Russ Feingold (D-Wis.) on Thursday sent out an email through his Progressives United advocacy group criticizing Pelosi for saying she would support the Simpson-Bowles deficit plan, which called for using cuts to Medicare, Medicaid and Social Security to close the nation’s budget gap. “Recently, Democratic Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi has signaled a...

Former Wisconsin Sen. Russ Feingold, who was ousted in last year's midterm elections, announced Friday that he won't run for retiring Sen. Herb Kohl's seat in 2012. He also said that he wouldn't be a gubernatorial candidate should Democrats in the state attempt to recall Republican Scott Walker. In a note to supporters on the website of the political committee he founded, Progressives United, Feingold said, “I am also well aware that I have a very strong standing in the polls should I choose to run again for the U.S. Senate or in a recall election for governor. After twenty-eight...

Republicans "went right for the jugular" when they chose this state as the place to demonize public employees, destroy the right to vote and abuse the budget process that will continue this week, former U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold told supporters Sunday evening near the Capitol Square. "Why are we in a place called Walkerville today?" he asked the energized crowd at the corner of State and West Mifflin streets, amid the tent village that sprang up earlier this month to protest the state budget bill and will remain through June 20 while lawmakers debate the bill. "Because we will not...

Madison -- Former U.S. Sen. Russ Feingold led a crowd of hundreds of marchers, taxi cabs and an antique fire engine around the Capitol Square in a demonstration Monday. In the heat, the pro-union demonstrators -- perhaps as many as 1,000 in all -- marched in opposition to Gov. Scott Walker's budget policies that would end most collective bargaining for public workers and cut aid to schools and local governments.Meanwhile a few tents were left up near the square in a "Walkerville" protest area meant to invoke the Depression-era protests against then President Herbert Hoover.

Will Russ Feingold try to get back into the Senate, now that his longtime colleague Herb Kohl has decided to retire? Or will he inadvertently bigfoot other Democrats and damage prospects for a Democratic hold on the seat? Feingold said that he’s considering all of these questions in the first indication that he has an interest in defending the open Wisconsin seat: “I am looking at it, but I feel I should take some time to think this through,” said Feingold, the former senator who was defeated last fall for re-election after three terms. “For me the question right now...