Free Republic

A very nice liberal broadcaster asked me earlier this week whether I am worried about the future of the Republican party. Funny question. There are 25 states in which the state legislatures and governorships are controlled by Republicans, and two states with executive/legislative divides in which there are Republican legislative majorities large enough to override a veto from the Democratic governor. Sixty-eight of the country’s 98 partisan state legislative chambers are Republican-run. There are only four states with Democratic governors and legislatures; it is true that these include one of our most populous states (California), but the majority of Americans...

A group of tea party activists is convinced that Republican presidential front-runner Donald Trump has struck a secret deal with rival Sen. Ted Cruz to guarantee the Texan the vice presidential spot on the ticket, and conservatives are raving that it would be the best pairing since Harry Burnett Reese combined peanut butter and Hershey’s chocolate.The Cruz campaign vehemently denied that there was an agreement to form the conservatives’ “dream ticket,” while the Trump campaign remained mum.“There is no such secret deal,” said Cruz campaign national spokesman Rick Tyler.Still, speculation about an arranged marriage of Mr. Trump’s self-styled conservative crusade...

FRANKFORT — Republican Gov.-elect Matt Bevin plans to make marriage licensing one of his first priorities after his inauguration Dec. 8, pledging Friday to take executive action to strip county clerks’ names from the documents. Bevin spoke to the media in the Capitol Rotunda in his first post-election news conference, where he reiterated his plan to shutter Kentucky’s health insurance exchange, kynect, as well as his stance against releasing his tax returns. The state’s next governor spent much of his day at the Capitol meeting with his transition team and legislative leaders, saying he expects to announce his chief of...

Kentucky Gov.-elect Matt Bevin said in an appearance on The Glenn Beck Radio Program Friday that he will push back against the Environmental Protection Agency’s efforts to regulate the coal industry, telling the EPA to “pound sand.” Bevin’s comments came after Glenn Beck asked, “Now that you’re in, President Obama has said that he’s going to destroy the coal industry. Kentucky is a coal state. What are you going to be doing specifically to push back on that?” In August, President Barack Obama unveiled his coal policy in partnership with the EPA, granting the agency authority over what is traditionally...

The tax-reform proposal unveiled by Ted Cruz last week is as transformative, intellectually dominating and economically and politically revolutionary for 2016 as Kemp Roth was in 1980. Indeed, even more so. Cruzs plan would scrap the current income tax code and replace it with a simple, single, flat rate of 10%, to be paid by everybody on everything , wages, profits, capital gains, dividends, rent, interest and all forms of individual income. No one would be able to claim that billionaires pay lower tax rates than their secretaries or that the system is rigged to favor the rich over the...

Harvard Professor and former Democratic presidential candidate Larry Lessig says the Democratic party is scared of having outsiders run for president, because party leaders have seen how powerful Republican outsiders Donald Trump and Ben Carson have become.

Well, Tuesday in Kentucky history was made. First of all, the Bluegrass State elected only its second Republican governor in 40 years, Matt Bevin. And may I add that Governor-Elect Bevin spent four years active duty service in the U.S. Army as an Artillery officer — Go Redlegs! But there was an even BIGGER story coming out of Kentucky Tuesday night. As reported by National Review Online: Matt Bevin’s 53 percent to 44 percent victory tonight marks only the second time in 48 years that Republicans have won the Kentucky governor’s race. But Republicans also made history in another way....

On Tuesday, at the voting booth, America took a hard turn in the Republican direction. In race after race and state after state, the big winners at the ballot box were Republican candidates and Republican principles. I know why. It’s because the Democrat brand sucks. It’s because Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton and any number of their hangers on have turned their party into something hostile to the beliefs and lives of an increasing number of Americans. Let me give you some examples. The Democrat Party is the party of people who hate the cops. If you think cops are...

Matt Bevin’s 53 percent to 44 percent victory tonight marks only the second time in 48 years that Republicans have won the Kentucky governor’s race. But Republicans also made history in another way. Bevin’s lieutenant governor running-mate, Jenean Hampton, is now the first African American elected to statewide office ever in the state’s history. Both Bevin and Hampton are Tea Party activists who have never held elective office. Hampton’s path certainly represents triumph over adversity. Born in Detroit, the 57-year-old Hampton and her three sisters were raised by a single mom who lacked a high school education and couldn’t afford...

It's hard to overstate how important those GOP gains — and the consolidation of them we've seen in the last few years — are to the relative fates of the two parties. While the story at the national level suggests a Republican Party that is growing increasingly white, old and out of step with the country on social issues, the narrative at the local level is very different. Republicans are prospering at the state level in ways that suggest that the party's messaging is far from broken. There are other, more pragmatic effects of the GOP dominance in governor's races...

The latest news on Mississippi's general election. All times are local. 12:23 a.m. Republicans have boosted their majority to 71 in the state House. But three races were too close to call early Wednesday. The surge turns back Democratic hopes of trimming the GOP edge, which now stands at 67-55 in the chamber. Redistricting created terrain for Republicans to pick up seats, boosting hopes that they would get to a 74-seat supermajority. With the supermajority, they would eliminate Democrats' ability to block taxing and spending decisions. Republican challenger Vince Mangold on Tuesday defeated House Minority Leader Bobby Moak from Bogue...

If you'd asked most political people a week ago who'd be celebrating his victory in the Kentucky gubernatorial race Wednesday morning, they'd have probably guessed it would be the Democrat, Jack Conway. Kentucky has a long tradition of electing Democrats to the highest position in the state; since 1971, only one Republican had won the position (Ernie Fletcher in 2003). But also, the polls! Surveys conducted in late October showed Conway with a decent lead over Republican Matt Bevin -- suggesting that the race would be close, but Conway was likely to win. Conway didn't win. Conway got beaten, badly...

Democrats outspent and outpolled Republican novice Matt Bevin, and expected their candidate, Attorney General Jack Conway, to keep the Kentucky governorship in Democrat hands, where it had been for all but one term of the last half century. Instead, Tea Partier Bevin, who had previously challenged Mitch McConnell for the GOP nomination for Senator and lost big, pulled off a near landslide victory with an 85,000 vote margin. Sheryl Gay Stolberg and Alan Blinder of the New York Times: In beating his Democratic opponent, Attorney General Jack Conway, by almost nine percentage points, Mr. Bevin, 48, shocked people in his...

The Hill explains how the Tea Party has taken over the GOP. Since the GOP took the wheel of the 114thCongress in January, all they seem to have accomplished is driving the institution into the ground—guided by ineffective, chaotic leadership that’s part and parcel with the Republican Party’s new extremism.

Donald Trump is surging in GOP presidential polls ahead of next week’s first Republican debate among the party’s presidential candidates, but the controversial businessman finished third in a sampling of conservative activists, according to a survey released Saturday by the St. Louis Tea Party Coalition. In email polling of 122 coalition members conducted July 26 through July 29, Texas Senator Ted Cruz came in first at 29 percent, followed by Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker at 27 percent, with Trump at 19 percent. The rest of the crowded GOP field finished in single digits. You can see the entire poll here....

Rep. Mark Meadows (R-N.C.) has filed a motion to try to force Speaker John Boehner from his leadership post. The move, called a motion to vacate the chair, represents a new level of opposition to GOP leadership from the conservative wing of the House Republican Conference. The motion can be postponed for several days before consideration. The resolution was filed late Tuesday afternoon, just one day before the House was slated to depart for its summer recess.

In a move that is difficult to describe as an accomplishment, there were so many haters in Arizona that Donald Trump had to move his anti-immigrant hatefest from the Biltmore Resort and Spa to the Phoenix Convention Center. By this morning, 9,000 haters had tickets in their hands. His campaign chairman, Corey Lewandowski, bragged, “We received 4,000 RSVPS in 2¹/₂ hours.” By this morning, Trump was claiming 15,000: Donald J. Trump ✔ ‎@realDonaldTrump Today I will be rallying with with 15,000 patriots in Arizona for border security! Let's Make America Great Again! https://www.donaldjtrump.com/ 11:48 AM - 11 Jul 2015 The...

Pro-Israeli Republican presidential candidate Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX) spoke to Arutz Sheva at the third annual Champions of Jewish Values event, held in New York, in which he spoke about what his planned presidency would look like. Cruz was highly critical of the administration of US President Barack Obama, remarking, "this administration has expressed an unprecedented antagonism to the nation of Israel - that's unacceptable. I'm grateful that the American people stand with the nation of Israel." Concerning the Iranian nuclear threat, Cruz said, "we need a president who...says we wil not negotiate a nuclear deal with Iran that allows Iran to keep centrifuges, to keep...

House Budget Committee Chairman Tom Price (R-Ga.) said Thursday that he does not support an idea backed by Senate Republican leadership to temporarily extend ObamaCare subsidies if the Supreme Court cripples the law. "I don't think that I would be able to be supportive of continuing the subsidies beyond what the Court would allow," Price told The Hill. A plan from Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) to continue the subsidies until 2017 has been co-sponsored by Senate Republican leaders. Price is one of the most prominent Republicans to come out against the idea. The idea behind the temporary continuation is that...