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Ballotpedia's Daily Presidential News Briefing - August 12, 2015
From Ballotpedia
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Ballotpedia's Daily Presidential Briefing was sponsored by the Leadership Project for America. | ||||
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Wednesday's Leading Stories
- Hillary Clinton will release the private server she used while serving as secretary of state and a thumb drive with copies of thousands of her emails to the FBI, her campaign announced on Tuesday. Clinton’s decision comes on the same day members of Congress were told “top secret” information was found on Clinton’s email system. (The Washington Post)
- Poll: According to a new poll from Franklin Pierce University and the Boston Herald, Bernie Sanders leads Hillary Clinton in New Hampshire for the first time by seven points. (Boston Herald)
- Poll: Franklin Pierce University and the Boston Herald also conducted a poll of likely Republican voters in New Hampshire, finding Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio had the highest favorable ratings at 62 percent each. Donald Trump, Rand Paul, Lindsey Graham, George Pataki and Chris Christie all had unfavorable ratings of 41 percent or higher. In a hypothetical Republican primary, Trump still leads in the state with 19 percent support. (Boston Herald)
- Poll: Donald Trump has expanded his lead in early primary states to Missouri, according to a new poll by Public Policy Polling. Trump tops the field there with 23 percent. Jeb Bush and Ben Carson follow with 11 percent each. Chris Christie, Bobby Jindal, Rick Perry, Rick Santorum, George Pataki, Jim Gilmore and Lindsey Graham each scored 1 percent or less. (Public Policy Polling)
Democrats
Joe Biden
- According to a Gallup poll released on Tuesday, Democrats are split on whether Joe Biden should run for president with 45 percent in support and 47 percent against. If Biden were to run, 80 percent said they were at least open to supporting him. (Gallup)
- Biden is scheduled to attend a memorial service for the officers killed in the Chattanooga shootings at two military recruiting centers. (The Washington Times)
Lincoln Chafee
- In an interview on MSNBC on Tuesday night, Lincoln Chafee said he was fine with the Democratic National Committee’s decision to hold only six debates. “I’m okay with it. There are going to be many opportunities for us to come together and talk about the issues,” Chafee said, noting the candidates would also attend several forums where they could discuss policy in a non-debate format. (MSNBC)
Hillary Clinton
- Hillary Clinton met with Black Lives Matter activists privately in New Hampshire on Tuesday to discuss Clinton’s drug policy and criminal justice reform. (CNN)
- Clinton is scheduled to campaign in Puerto Rico on September 4, 2015. Jeb Bush and Martin O’Malley have both already visited the island, which is facing a severe debt crisis. (NBC News)
Martin O’Malley
- In New Hampshire, a new Franklin Pierce University and Boston Herald poll found Martin O’Malley register less than 1 percent support. (The Washington Post)
Bernie Sanders
- Prior to announcing his interest in a presidential bid, Larry Lessig was an informal advisor to Bernie Sanders' presidential campaign. He wrote a memo to Sanders on how to best address campaign finance and voting rights reform a month ago. “I considered continuing to try to push people inside the Sanders campaign on policy prescriptions, but it wouldn’t have changed the probability of the problem getting solved,” Lessig said. (Politico)
- After Sanders tweeted about tuition-free public college on Tuesday, American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten responded, “@berniesanders U know I love you, Bernie! U are a champion on so many issues & you in the Senate & Hillary as Prez would change America!” (The Blaze)
Republicans
Jeb Bush
- U.S. Senators Dean Heller (R-Nev.) and Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) will officially endorse Jeb Bush this afternoon at a rally in Reno. (Reno Gazette-Journal)
- In his speech at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library on Tuesday night, Bush emphasized the importance of allies in the Middle East to combat the Islamic State and terrorism. He also outlined his five-point plan to address instability in Iraq, which entails supporting Iraqi forces and increasing engagement with Sunni tribes, providing air support, allowing “a greater range of action” for soldiers stationed in the region, giving military support to the Kurds and renewing diplomatic efforts between Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds. (The Tampa Bay Times)
Ben Carson
- In an interview on Fox Business, Ben Carson promoted his revenue-neutral proportional tax scheme. “You make $10 billion, you pay a billion. You make $10, you pay one [dollar]. [Of] course I would get rid of all the deductions and all of the loopholes but here’s the key, people, they look at a guy who put in a billion dollars, he’s got $9 billion left, that’s not fair – we need to take more of his money. That’s called socialism. And what made America … a great nation was we had a very different attitude. We would say he just put in a billion dollars, let’s create an environment that’s even better for him so that next year he can make $20 billion and put in $2 billion. That’s how we went from nowhere to the pinnacle of the world in record time. And it’s growth, it’s not taking what’s there and dividing it up and making it smaller,” Carson said. (Fox Business)
Chris Christie
- According to an August 11, 2015, Franklin Pierce University/Boston Herald poll, support for Chris Christie in New Hampshire has dropped to 3 percent. (NJ.com)
- Christie signed the Americans for Tax Reform’s Taxpayer Protection Pledge on Wednesday to promise to “oppose and veto any and all efforts to increase taxes.” He joins Marco Rubio, Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, Rick Perry, Carly Fiorina, Rick Santorum and Ben Carson in making the pledge. (The Washington Times)
Ted Cruz
- Ted Cruz declined to say if he would issue endorsements from the White House if he were elected president. “We'll cross that bridge when we come to it. Let’s wait until we've won some states, won the nomination and won the general, and then we'll worry about endorsement strategies in subsequent elections," Cruz said. (CNN)
- Although Cruz’s campaign previously stated earlier this year that it had no plans to release bundler names, Cruz said in an interview on Tuesday that he would voluntarily disclose them in the future. “We generally opt toward disclosure. The names of our bundlers are not terribly secret given our fundraising events. The invites are all public, or quasi-public, or emailed out," he said. (CNN, The Washington Post)
Carly Fiorina
- In an interview with Breitbart, Carly Fiorina slammed the majority Republican leadership in Congress for inaction. “I’m frustrated. People worked incredibly hard–tens of thousands of activists across the country spent their time, energy, and money to win this historic majority in the House and a majority in the Senate. Change was promised, but people don’t see that change. Instead, the Pain Capable Unborn Child Act still hasn’t passed Congress, even though it’s the right thing to do and even the politically smart thing to do. It’s a leader’s job to produce results. The leadership in the Senate and the House need to produce results… or they need to step aside,” Fiorina said. (Breitbart)
- According to a new Rasmussen Reports poll released on Wednesday, “Fiorina’s now on the A-list, pushing former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee down to the second tier.” She earned 9 percent support. (Rasmussen Reports)
- Fiorina said on Wednesday she would be assert a greater military presence in China to combat the “new Chinese aggression.” “I would be conducting, actually now, at a moment when China’s economy is wavering a bit, I would be conducting more flyovers on the South China Sea. We cannot permit China to control a trade route through which passes $5 trillion worth of goods and services every year,” Fiorina said. (Politico)
Lindsey Graham
- While discussing Clinton’s use of a private email server for State Department business, Lindsey Graham said on Tuesday, “In all seriousness, the enemies of this nation are trying to penetrate at every level. I would advise the next president of the United States never to send an email, because the enemies are watching us. They are monitoring White House. We’ve had thousands of Americans’ data compromised. The Department of Defense is under constant attack.” (The State)
- Although Graham said he would do everything he could to “never submit a budget with one dime for Planned Parenthood,” he noted he would stop short of a government shutdown because the country’s military and intelligence community would be compromised. (Roll Call)
Mike Huckabee
- At a campaign stop in Iowa on Tuesday, Mike Huckabee encouraged the Republican field to temper their attacks on each other. “I believe that, quite frankly, we’re all trying out to be the quarterback of the Republican team. My attitude is that I want to get the job because I played a better game, not because I broke the legs of all the other people who are playing the game. I fear that if we disable each other so much that by the time we have finally selected a nominee, that person is so bitterly wounded that it becomes quite easy for the Democrat to step over his bloodied carcass and take the victory. We cannot let that happen,” Huckabee said. (The Des Moines Register)
John Kasich
- Former New Hampshire Attorney General Tom Rath endorsed John Kasich on Wednesday. Considered a “key” endorsement, Rath previously served as a senior advisor to Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign and in the George H.W. Bush administration. (The Wall Street Journal)
- A new poll from Franklin Pierce University/Boston Herald found Kasich rise in New Hampshire to 12 percent support. (The Columbus Dispatch)
Rand Paul
- Rand Paul said Tea Party conservatives should be concerned with the sincerity of Trump’s politics in a radio interview on Wednesday. “One of the things the Tea Party was upset about is fake conservatives. We were concerned about fake Republicans. People who said they were for one thing but really weren’t. I think that is a real concern with Trump—is he real or is he fake? It’s a reality TV show—is he acting? He used to be for Obamacare. He was for the bank bailouts. He used to be for gun control. He said the Democrats are better at running the economy than the Republicans. I wonder if he is in the right primary or not. He has given a hundred-grand to Clinton recently. Most of us think it is despicable to buy access to a politician. But isn’t it equally despicable to be the one paying. It’s despicable to receive the access, but it’s despicable to be buying access to the Clintons,” Paul said. (Breitbart)
Rick Perry
- According to Austin Barbour, a senior advisor to the pro-Rick Perry super PACs that have raised nearly $17 million, Perry’s recent campaign cash flow problems will not stop his march to the White House. “We saw in the campaign finance reports that they didn't raise as much as anyone would have liked, and we knew what that meant - that they were going to have to go lean and mean while we would need to diversify what we were doing to help the governor. We're building Perry's Iowa team. There's nothing in the playbook that says we can't do that as a super PAC,” Barbour said. (CBS News)
- State prosecutor Lisa McMinn is planning to appeal a lower court’s decision finding a coercion charge against Perry was unconstitutional. (The Dallas Morning News)
Marco Rubio
- After the Obama administration announced it would not invite Cuban dissidents to an event commemorating the opening of the U.S. embassy in Havana, Marco Rubio released the following statement: “This is a new low for President Obama and a slap in the face by this administration to Cuba’s courageous democracy activists. Cuban dissidents are the legitimate representatives of the Cuban people and it is they who deserve America's red carpet treatment, not Castro regime officials. What a pathetic policy President Obama has embarked on that shuns Cuban dissidents like this, yet has welcomed Castro regime officials to the White House.” (U.S. Senator for Florida, Marco Rubio)
Rick Santorum
- Commenting on Donald Trump’s proposal to bomb Iraq’s oil fields and perspective on Middle East politics, Rick Santorum said on Tuesday, “I think the oil field idea is a bad idea, but his idea that the government of Iran and Iraq are in cahoots and working together and causing problems for the United States to be successful is absolutely true." (CNN)
Donald Trump
- Donald Trump spoke at a rally in Michigan on Tuesday night with 2,800 attendees with a speech that covered his dismissal of Jeb Bush for having “no energy,” the rise of Mexico and China as a result of more “cunning” leaders and his continued support for the construction of a “big” and “powerful” wall on the border. (The Washington Post, Politico)
- On Tuesday, Trump criticized the way Bernie Sanders handled the interruption of his Seattle rally by two Black Lives Matter activists. “I would never give up my microphone. I thought that was disgusting. That showed such weakness, the way he was taken away by two young women – the microphone; they just took the whole place over. … That will never happen with me. I don't know if I'll do the fighting myself or if other people will, but that was a disgrace. I felt badly for him. But it showed that he's weak,” Trump said. (CNN)
- According to The Wall Street Journal, Trump has been running a lean campaign, foregoing ad buys or calling on wealthy friends to provide funding. Steve Stepanek, Trump’s chairman for New Hampshire, said Trump also does not do appearances outside of large rallies “because the crowds get too crazy.” (The Wall Street Journal)
Scott Walker
- Scott Walker signed a bill on Wednesday authorizing up to $400 million in taxpayer money be spent on a new arena for the NBA’s Milwaukee Bucks. Asserting the construction of the new arena will bring in $3 for every $1 spent, Walker said, “We think this is a good, solid move, as good stewards of the taxpayer's money. I think anybody investing in the world of small business would say that's a good return on investment." (The Huffington Post)
- Walker declined to say whether he supported a bill in the Wisconsin state legislature to ban research involving fetal tissue. “[W]e'll certainly watch throughout the process as to how they get something like that,” Walker demured. (The Chicago Tribune)
- On Wednesday, Walker announced state Rep. Ralph Norman (R-S.C.) would help organize his campaign in South Carolina, along with Joanne Jones and Allen Olson. (FOX 11 Online)
See also
- Presidential election, 2016
- Presidential candidates, 2016
- Presidential debates (2015-2016)
- Important dates in the 2016 presidential race
- Polls and Straw polls
- 2016 presidential candidate ratings and scorecards
