Rep. Raul Labrador (R-ID) announced that he’ll seek a third term in Congress, not run for governor, the Idaho Spokesman-Review reports.
Said Labrador: “I’ve decided to end all the speculation and announce that I have no plans at this time to run for Governor. I do not feel that I have yet completed the mission you sent me to Congress to do. There is still much work to be done. Whether at the state or the national level, I will always be an advocate for Idaho.”
Hillary Clinton “is fielding offers from colleges and universities — including Harvard and her law school alma mater, Yale — to give her a formal academic role, a move that would give her a platform outside her family’s foundation,” Politico reports.
“The advantage to Clinton of an academic platform, beyond the scope of her policy interests, could be huge for someone considering a presidential run. It would provide her with a credible backdrop for speeches and events that would take her outside of a hotel ballroom or something sponsored by her family’s foundation or another outside group.”
The Wonk Wire “chart of the day” shows how the U.S. population distribution has changed over time.
Very cool animation.
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We previously noted the pro-Hillary Clinton super PAC “Ready for Hillary” had raised more than $1 million so far.
Political Moneyline has the names of the donors.
Newt Gingrich reprimanded his fellow Republicans in unusually harsh terms, blaming GOP lawmakers for developing “zero” alternatives to President Obama’s health care reform law, CNN reports.
Said Gingrich: “I will bet you, for most of you, you go home in the next two weeks when your members of Congress are home, and you look them in the eye and you say, ‘What is your positive replacement for Obamacare?’ They will have zero answer.”
He added: “We are caught up right now in a culture, and you see it every single day, where as long as we are negative and as long as we are vicious and as long as we can tear down our opponent, we don’t have to learn anything. We have to do the homework.”
A new Quinnipiac poll in New York City finds Eliot Spitzer (D) leads Scott Stringer (D) by 19 point in the race for comptroller, 56% to 37% among likely primary voters.
A new Public Policy Polling survey in North Carolina finds Gov. Pat McCrory’s approval rating dropping for the first time to 39% while 51% disapprove.
Roll Call is tracking how members of Congress are spending their August recess.
“I don’t know how I missed so many signs.”
— Rev. Jesse Jackson, quoted by the Chicago Tribune, arriving at his son’s sentencing hearing.
NBC News reports
that “a prominent conservative group marshaled new polling data on
Wednesday to try and convince reluctant Republicans that forcing a
government shutdown over ‘Obamacare’ wouldn’t necessarily harm the GOP,
or cost the party control of the House of Representatives.”
“Heritage
Action for America – one of the conservative groups leading the charge
to pressure Republican lawmakers against voting to continue government
spending unless they can defund President Barack Obama’s health care law
– said its new poll of likely voters in 10 relatively competitive
congressional districts showed that forcing such a shutdown would not be
fatal for the GOP in 2014.”
As the GOP establishment backs away from threats by conservatives to shutdown the government in an attempt to defund Obamacare, another potentially more dangerous plan is emerging.
Sources tell the National Review “the House GOP will probably avoid using a shutdown as leverage and instead use the debt limit and sequester fights as areas for potential legislative trades. Negotiations over increasing the debt limit have frequently been used to wring concessions out of the administration, so there may be movement in that direction: Delay Obamacare in exchange for an increased debt limit.”
Jonathan Chait: “This is actually even more dangerous than shutting down the government. A government shutdown is disruptive, but can be endured. Nobody knows just what would happen if Congress were to default on payments to holders of Treasury bills, but it could be catastrophic, and at the very least would probably spur bondholders to demand a premium from Washington for years or decades to come. Republicans here are talking themselves out of using a conventional bomb and instead using a nuclear bomb.”
Rep. Raul Labrador (R-ID) told the Idaho Statesman he’ll announce today whether he’ll run for re-election to Congress in 2014 or challenge Gov. Butch Otter in a Republican primary.
South Carolina State Sen. Lee Bright (R) announced his U.S. Senate candidacy by calling incumbent Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) “a community organizer for the Muslim Brotherhood,” the Columbia State reports.
Said Bright: “During the recess, when I would hope that he would be around folks in South Carolina, getting their feelings on so many issues that affect their lives, he has instead chosen to take his time to be a community organizer for the Muslim Brotherhood and that concerns me. He needs to spend more time listening to what the brothers in South Carolina have to say.”
Graham last week visited Egypt with Sen. John McCain (R-AZ).
Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) said that defunding Obamacare would be “highly unlikely,” the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reports.
Said Johnson: “Even if we were to not pass the continuing resolution (to fund the federal government), you’re not going to be able to defund Obamacare, absent of President Obama signing a law, which I think is highly unlikely. So I appreciate the fact that they’ve raised the issue. But defunding Obamacare, with President Obama in the White House and Harry Reid in the Senate, I think is next to impossible.”
“When Pat McCrory, a Republican former mayor of Charlotte, was elected governor last year, he pledged to ‘bring this state together,’ and to focus on bread-and-butter issues amid an ailing economy,” the New York Times reports.
“But with Republicans controlling all branches of the state government for the first time in more than a century, the legislature pushed through a wide range of conservative change. The Republicans not only cut taxes and business regulations, as many had expected, but also allowed stricter regulations on abortion clinics, ended teacher tenure, blocked the expansion of Medicaid, cut unemployment benefits, removed obstacles to the death penalty, allowed concealed guns in bars and restaurants, and mandated the teaching of cursive writing.”
“Just this week, Mr. McCrory signed into law strict voter identification
requirements, prohibiting same-day registration and cutting early
voting.”
Daily Beast: “Barring a miracle where tens of thousands of votes appear out of the ether (and in New Jersey that can’t be entirely ruled out), turnout will be well under 10% of registered voters in a statewide race that received national media attention.”
The New York Times has a must-read piece on the Clinton Foundation, long Bill Clinton’s domain since its formation in 2001, which “will become the nerve center of Hillary Rodham Clinton’s increasingly busy public life.”
“This fall, Mrs. Clinton and her staff will move into offices at the foundation’s new headquarters in Midtown Manhattan, occupying two floors of the Time-Life Building. Amid speculation about her 2016 plans, Mrs. Clinton is adding major new initiatives on women, children and jobs to what has been renamed the Bill, Hillary & Chelsea Clinton Foundation.”
Roll Call: “Members of Congress say the darndest things. Of course, not every member has a knack for delivering quotable material, but some just can’t help it.”
Taegan Goddard is the founder of Political Wire, one of the earliest and most influential political web sites. He also runs Political Job Hunt, Electoral Vote Map and the Political Dictionary.
Goddard spent more than a decade as managing director and chief operating officer of a prominent investment firm in New York City. Previously, he was a policy adviser to a U.S. Senator and Governor.
Goddard is also co-author of You Won - Now What? (Scribner, 1998), a political management book hailed by prominent journalists and politicians from both parties. In addition, Goddard's essays on politics and public policy have appeared in dozens of newspapers across the country.
Goddard earned degrees from Vassar College and Harvard University. He lives in New York with his wife and three sons.
Goddard is the owner of Goddard Media LLC.
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