Political Wire

Members should sign in for the full experience.

Extra Bonus Quote of the Day

June 17, 2016 at 1:06 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard 27 Comments

“If anybody can get his senators to all agree to go over a cliff and kill themselves, that’s pretty good. Boy, I will tell you that guy has a lot more sway with his caucus than I ever had. If I ever suggested something as absurd and bizarre as that to my caucus, they would revote and kick the hell out of me out of the caucus. I mean, really.”

— Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV), quoted by the New York Times, on Senator Majority Leader Mitch McConnell’s (R-KY) effort to prevent even a hearing for Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland.

Republicans Should Worry About Losing the House

June 17, 2016 at 1:02 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard 61 Comments

Ramesh Ponnuru: “Republicans need to start worrying about losing their majority in the House of Representatives.”

“Republicans accept the conventional wisdom that Hillary Clinton is favored to win the presidency, and they know that her election would probably end their majority in the Senate. But in a year that has upended political expectations, they have clung to one comforting assumption: Their hold on the House is secure.”

“But Clinton’s lead in the polls is widening to the point that Republicans need to set aside their complacency. Split-ticket voting has declined over the last generation. If Clinton wins big — because Republican voters stay home, or swing voters choose her party, or both — House Republicans will struggle to win re-election.”

Dozens of Delegates Launch New Effort to Dump Trump

June 17, 2016 at 12:59 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard 65 Comments

“Dozens of Republican convention delegates are hatching a new plan to block Donald Trump at this summer’s party meetings, in what has become the most organized effort so far to stop the businessman from becoming the GOP nominee,” the Washington Post reports.

“The delegates are angered by Trump’s recent comments on gun control, his racial attacks on a federal judge and his sinking poll numbers. They are convinced that Trump is an insufficiently conservative candidate and believe they will find enough like-minded Republicans within the next month to change party rules and allow delegates to vote for whomever they want, regardless of who won their state caucus or primary.”

Bonus Quote of the Day

June 17, 2016 at 11:36 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 43 Comments

“Ugh or yuck is my response. I think Barry would be appalled that his home was being used for that purpose. Barry would be appalled by Mr. Trump’s behavior — the unintelligent and unfiltered and crude communications style. And he’s shallow — so, so shallow.”

— Susan Goldwater Levine, the widow of the late Sen. Barry Goldwater (R-AZ), when asked by the Washington Post about Donald Trump.

Jolly Drops Senate Bid In Florida

June 17, 2016 at 11:33 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 18 Comments

Rep. David Jolly (R-FL) is dropping out of the U.S. Senate race and running for re-election instead, the Tampa Bay Times reports.

Jolly said on CNN that Sen, Marco Rubio is “saying he is getting in,” but later walked back that statement.

Trump Declared No Income In 1984

June 17, 2016 at 10:27 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 50 Comments

Daily Beast: “In 1984, Donald Trump constantly bragged to the press about how much cash he was raking in. That same year… he told the IRS he had made nothing at all.”

“Trump deducted $626,264 as expenses on his 1984 federal income tax return, and $619,227 on his New York City return. On both forms, he claimed no income.”

Sanders Still Won’t Endorse Clinton

June 17, 2016 at 10:01 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 200 Comments

Rick Klein: “Leave it to this candidate, and leave it to this political year, to create a new variety of candidacy. After his speech to supporters Thursday night, Bernie Sanders is still an active candidate for president. But that doesn’t mean he’s engaging in any campaign activity. He stated clearly that he wants to defeat Donald Trump. But, since he declined to endorse someone (can’t imagine who) actually running against him in the general election, he’s not yet saying how he wants to accomplish that.”

“The broad goals of his ‘political revolution’ – fighting for the working class, galvanizing a generation, even reforming the Democratic Party – might be things that Hillary Clinton and her team can get behind. But coming from a candidate who was beaten by Clinton in every measurable way – and, if the reminder is needed, never wanted to even be a Democrat until a year ago – Sanders is in danger of losing the leverage he accumulated relatively fast. The party would not countenance Clinton doing what Sanders is now; that’s an undeniable fact, as anyone who remembers 2008 would know. The question now becomes how long Sanders can keep his revolution going without wearing out his welcome.”

Sahil Kapur: Sanders’ long refusal to endorse Clinton hurts his leverage

Every Republican for Himself?

June 17, 2016 at 8:44 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 74 Comments

In his interview for Meet the Press that will air on Sunday, House Speaker Paul Ryan essentially gave every Republican license to follow their conscience in whether or not to support Donald Trump.

TODD: Do you think it is that members in the House Republican conference follow your conscience? If you don’t want to support him, don’t. do it —

RYAN: Oh, absolutely. The last thing I would do is tell anybody to do something that’s contrary to their conscience. Of course I wouldn’t do that. Look, believe me, Chuck. I get that this a very strange situation. Trump is a very unique nominee. But I feel as a responsibility institutionally as the speaker of the House that I should not be leading some chasm in the middle of our party. Because you know what I know that’ll do? That’ll definitely knock us out of the White House.

Translation: We are getting very close where it will be every Republican for himself.

Trump’s Poll Ratings Are Historically Bad

June 17, 2016 at 7:34 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 56 Comments

Politico: “Trump is setting modern records for political toxicity — at least for a major-party candidate this far out from an election. Seventy percent of Americans surveyed in an ABC News/Washington Post poll out this week had an unfavorable opinion of Trump, up 10 points over the past month. The poll showed Trump’s favorable rating cratering at 29 percent, down from 37 percent last month.”

“The numbers were similar in a Bloomberg Politics poll: Trump’s favorable rating is just 31 percent, with 66 percent viewing him unfavorably. That’s only marginally better than in March, when 29 percent viewed Trump favorably, and 68 percent had an unfavorable opinion.”

“But it’s not just the overall unfavorable numbers — it’s the intensity of the antipathy toward Trump, and the lack of enthusiasm for him.”

The Hill: “GOP insiders fear that Trump, whose yearlong run for the presidency has been fueled by sheer force of personality, has not grasped the depth of the challenges he now faces.”

Election Forecaster Doesn’t Believe His Own Model

June 17, 2016 at 7:17 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 57 Comments

Free Beacon: “Alan Abramowitz, a political scientist at Emory University, built a model that has correctly predicted presidential elections since 1992. The model says the GOP is set to win the presidency this year, 51 percent to 49 percent. But Abramowitz says to ignore his findings, not because they are wrong but because they describe an election that is not actually taking place.”

Said Abramowitz: “The model is based on the assumption that the parties are going to nominate mainstream candidates who will be able to unite the party, and that the outcome will be similar to a generic vote, a generic presidential vote for a generic Democratic versus a generic Republican.”

He adds: “It would not shock me if Trump ends up losing, if Clinton wins the election by a very comfortable margin.”

Democrats Are Ready for Rubio

June 17, 2016 at 7:09 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 19 Comments

Washington Post: “An online ad released Friday by the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee previews the sort of campaign Rubio can expect to endure should he decide to reverse the decision, made when he entered the presidential race last year, to forego re-election to run for president.”

“The ad highlights the scores of votes and committee hearings Rubio missed while pursuing the presidency, the repeated pledges he made during that campaign not to return to the Senate and his vote in December against a Democratic proposal to bar suspected terrorists from purchasing guns.”

Quote of the Day

June 17, 2016 at 7:03 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 18 Comments

“I think the tailspin could be really bad — historic proportions bad. I think it’ll be a historically bad loss. I’ve said that from the very beginning.”

— Former White House press secretary Tony Fratto, quoted by The Hill, on the impact of Donald Trump’s presidential campaign on the Republican party.

Clinton Holds Small Lead In Virginia

June 17, 2016 at 7:00 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 38 Comments

A new Public Policy Polling survey in Virginia shows Hillary Clinton just ahead of Donald Trump in the presidential race, 48% to 45%.

Bush Tries to Save Senate Seats

June 17, 2016 at 6:20 am EDT By Taegan Goddard 29 Comments

“After eight years of largely abstaining from politics, former President George W. Bush is throwing himself into an effort to save his party’s most vulnerable senators, including several whose re-election campaigns have been made more difficult by Donald Trump’s presence at the top of the ticket,” the New York Times reports.

“In the weeks since Mr. Trump emerged as the party’s presumptive presidential nominee, Mr. Bush has headlined fund-raisers for two Republican senators and has made plans to help three more. Among them are Senators John McCain of Arizona, who was one of Mr. Trump’s earliest targets of derision, and Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, who has struggled to respond to Mr. Trump’s inflammatory talk.”

Sanders Winds Down Campaign

June 16, 2016 at 9:50 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard 269 Comments

Sen. Bernie Sanders signaled “that he was winding down his bid for the Democratic presidential nomination, but he did not explicitly quit the campaign or endorse rival Hillary Clinton,” the Los Angeles Times reports.

Said Sanders: “The major political task that we face in the next five months is to make certain that Donald Trump is defeated and defeated badly. And I personally intend to begin my role in that process in a very short period of time.”

Politico: “Delivering his first speech to supporters in a week — an uncharacteristically long period of silence for a campaign built around massive rallies throughout the country — Sanders got as close as he has to acknowledging that Clinton has won, but he devoted the bulk of his remarks to outlining the “political revolution” he has been stumping for over the past year.”

Dozens of Diplomats Protest Obama’s Syria Policy

June 16, 2016 at 8:50 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard 66 Comments

“Dozens of State Department officials this week protested against U.S. policy in Syria, signing an internal document that calls for targeted military strikes against the Damascus government and urging regime change as the only way to defeat Islamic State,” the Wall Street Journal reports.

“The ‘dissent channel cable’ was signed by 51 mid- to high-level State Department officers involved with advising on Syria policy in various capacities… The cable… repeatedly calls for ‘targeted military strikes’ against the Syrian government in light of the near-collapse of the cease-fire brokered earlier this year.”

“The views expressed by the U.S. officials amount to a scalding internal critique of a longstanding U.S. policy against taking sides in the Syrian war, a policy that has survived even though the regime of President Bashar al-Assad has been repeatedly accused of violating cease-fire agreements and Russian-backed forces have attacked U.S.-trained rebels.”

The GOP Is Stuck with Trump

June 16, 2016 at 6:00 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard 157 Comments

Amy Walter: “To those GOPers still thinking/hoping that Trump will ‘get the message’ and suddenly become a more focused and disciplined candidate, I have a nice bridge in Brooklyn to sell you. Here’s the deal, Trump is not going to change. Ever. This is the candidate who won the primaries. This is the candidate you are going to nominate in July. And, this is the candidate who you will have to decide to support or not in November. There’s simply no other option.”

McCain Blames Obama for Orlando Shooting

June 16, 2016 at 3:33 pm EDT By Taegan Goddard 236 Comments

Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) argued that President Obama was “directly responsible” for the terror attack in Orlando by not stopping the spread of ISIS, the Washington Post reports.

“McCain’s statement goes beyond the criticism of Obama that has been leveled by his Republican colleagues in the Senate, and echoes remarks made this week by presumptive GOP presidential nominee Donald Trump, who seemed to connect Obama to the attack… Federal law enforcement officials have said the gunman, Omar Mateen, pledged allegiance to Islamic State leader Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi but they have not disclosed any evidence that Mateen had any direct contact with adherents of the terror group or whether he was specifically directed by the Islamic State in any way.”