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Ballotpedia's Daily Presidential News Briefing - February 2, 2016
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Ballotpedia's Daily Presidential Briefing was sponsored by the Leadership Project for America. | ||||
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Tuesday's Leading Stories
- With more than 180,000 voters coming out to caucus, Monday night’s Iowa Republican caucus smashed 2012’s turnout record by nearly 60,000 people. Ted Cruz took the top spot with 27.7 percent of the vote and eight delegates. Donald Trump came in second with 24.3 percent and seven delegates. Also receiving seven delegates was Marco Rubio, who was a close third with 23.1 percent. (The Des Moines Register, ABC News)
- In the Democratic Iowa caucus, Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders were virtually tied for much of the night. At least three precincts were decided by a coin toss because the results were so close. The Democratic Party of Iowa eventually declared Clinton the winner on Tuesday morning with 699.57 state delegate equivalents to Sanders’ 695.49 state delegate equivalents. Despite this, many news outlets are still holding off on making the official call. (The Hill, Iowa Democratic Party, CNN)
- Martin O’Malley suspended his presidential campaign on Monday night. “The road has been long, but our course has been true. A great many people have put their time and talents into my campaign and I thank each of you from the bottom of my heart. Whoever our nominee is, we must all hold strong, together,” O’Malley said in a statement. (Martin O'Malley for President, The Washington Post)
- Another former governor, Mike Huckabee, also suspended his presidential bid on Monday night. He tweeted, “I am officially suspending my campaign. Thank you for all of your loyal support.” (CNN)
- U.S. Sen. Tim Scott (R-S.C.) endorsed Marco Rubio on Tuesday. “I'm putting my confidence and trust in Marco Rubio because I believe he takes us to that better future. Marco Rubio understands that, here in America, it's not about where you start, but where you're going,” Scott said in a video endorsement . (NBC News)
Polls
- Donald Trump holds a wide lead over Ted Cruz in New Hampshire, 30 percent to 12 percent, according to a CNN/WMUR poll released on Monday. Another 35 percent, however, say they would not vote for Trump under any circumstances. (University of New Hampshire)
- A poll from Franklin Pierce University and The Boston Herald has Trump maintaining an even larger lead in New Hampshire with 38 percent support. Cruz follows with 13 percent. (The Boston Herald)
- On the Democratic side, Bernie Sanders holds a sizeable lead over Hillary Clinton with 57 percent to Clinton’s 34 percent, according to the latest CNN/WMUR poll of New Hampshire Democrats. A Franklin Pierce University/Boston Herald poll, also released on Monday, similarly found Sanders leading Clinton by 20 points with 57 percent support. (University of New Hampshire, The Boston Herald)
Democrats
Hillary Clinton
- On Monday, Hillary Clinton said her detractors were “selectively leaking” information about the investigation into her private email server. “There is nothing new and I think the facts are quite helpful here. It's a little bit like what the Republicans and others have tried to do with respect to Benghazi. Just a lot of innuendo, a lot of attacks. I just know that after I testified for 11 hours, answered every question, nothing new came up,” she said. (Talking Points Memo)
- Federal judge Rudolph Contreras scheduled a status conference for February 9 to receive an update on the Freedom of Information Act lawsuit regarding Clinton’s private email server while secretary of state. The State Department is scheduled to have released all relevant documents by the end of the month. (NBC News)
- Prior to the Iowa Democratic Party formally declaring her the winner of Monday night’s caucus, Clinton gave a victory speech in Des Moines, Iowa. She said, “I stand here tonight breathing a big sigh of relief—thank you, Iowa! ... I want you to know, I will keep doing what I have done my entire life. I will keep standing up for you. I will keep fighting for you. I will always work to achieve the America that I believe in. Join me! Let's go win the nomination!" (Slate)
Bernie Sanders
- In his own victory speech following the Iowa Democratic caucus on Monday night, Bernie Sanders declared the contest “a virtual tie.” He reminded his supporters where his campaign had started, saying, “We have no good organization, we had no money, we had no name recognition, and we were taking on the most powerful political organization in the United States of America.” He thanked them for sending “a very profound message” to the establishment. (The Huffington Post)
- Sanders’ campaign criticized the Iowa Democratic Party (IDP) for failing to collect the results of 90 precincts because they were not properly staffed with caucus chairs. “We are currently getting results from our small number of outstanding precincts, and results continue to be reported on our public website. These outstanding precincts have chairs who we are in the process of contacting to get their results. It is inaccurate to report that these precincts did not have chairs,” the IDP said in a statement. (The New York Times)
Republicans
Jeb Bush
- Jeb Bush’s campaign raised $7.1 million in the final quarter of 2015, nearly half of its third quarter haul of $13.3 million. (The Washington Post)
- After placing sixth in the Iowa Republican caucus, Bush’s campaign distributed a set of talking points for how to minimize the importance of the contest. “The real race for the nomination begins on February 9th in New Hampshire. It will set the race going forward and today, Jeb Bush is in a very strong position in the state,” the memo reads. It continues, “The Jeb 2016 campaign has never made Iowa a centerpiece to winning the nomination. We have long viewed Iowa as just one of 56 contests, electing 30 delegates out of 2,472 going to the Convention to select our nominee.” (Politico)
Ben Carson
- On Monday night, Ben Carson accused his Republican rivals of using “lies and dirty tricks” to try to defeat him. “Even tonight, my opponents resorted to political tricks by tweeting, texting and telling precinct captains to announce that I had suspended my campaign - in some cases asking caucus goers to change their votes,” he wrote in an email to supporters. (Politico)
- Carson spokesman Larry Ross dismissed reports that Carson was planning to suspend his campaign because he was taking one day off from the campaign trail to travel to Florida. “After spending 18 consecutive days on the campaign trail, Dr. Carson needs to go home and get a fresh set of clothes. He will be departing Des Moines later tonight to avoid the snow storm and will be back on the trail Wednesday. We look forward to tonight's caucus results and to meaningful debates in New Hampshire and South Carolina,” Ross said. (CNN)
- Digital marketer Ken Dawson said on Monday that Carson’s campaign intended to saturate the mobile ad market in Iowa. “We’re looking for a complete domination of mobile in Iowa. A lot of these folks have never caucused before and this could provide a last little push,” he said. (The Wall Street Journal)
- In reaction to The Des Moines Register poll that placed him in fourth place with 10 percent support, Carson said on Monday, “There's a tendency for a lot of the media to ignore me. But the people are not ignoring me." He asserted his support had increased over the past few days. Carson ultimately landed in fourth with 9.3 percent of the vote. (CNBC, The Des Moines Register)
- According to an analysis of Carson’s campaign financial disclosures by Gawker, a third of the $27 million spent in the final quarter of 2015 went to companies owned by campaign staffers. (Gawker)
Chris Christie
- Chris Christie said on Monday that although it was “pretty safe to say” he would not win the Iowa caucuses, he would be satisfied with beating the other governors in the race. “[W]e have always thought that what we want to be is the number one governor coming out of these two races. That if we beat Jeb Bush, John Kasich, Mike Huckabee, that we're the number one governor left, then that moves us on to the – to the future races,” Christie said. (RealClearPolitics)
- Campaigning in Iowa on Monday, Christie also went on the offensive against the senators remaining in the race. He said, “Seven years ago, we made a huge mistake. We elected a first-term United States senator to the presidency of the United States. Somebody who had never managed anything more than a 30-person Senate staff, and who never had made a decision of consequence that they were going to be held accountable for where people’s lives were on the line.” He added, without naming freshman senators Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio, “We wonder why the government got so messed up [during Obama's term]. We shouldn’t wonder. And we shouldn’t make the same mistake again.” (The Blaze)
- Christie’s greatest source of funds in the final quarter of 2015 came from Gibson Dunn & Crutcher, the law firm which conducted the investigation into the George Washington Bridge lane closure controversy. Employees there donated $65,500. (NJ.com)
Ted Cruz
- Cruz called his Iowa caucus win a “victory for the grassroots” in a speech to supporters on Monday night. He continued, “Tonight is a victory for courageous conservatives across Iowa, and all across this great nation. Tonight the state of Iowa has spoken. Iowa has sent notice that the Republican nominee for the next president of the United States will not be chosen by the media. Will not be chosen by the Washington establishment. Will not be chosen by the lobbyists. But will be chosen by the most incredible powerful force, where all sovereignty resides in our nation by we the people.” (Vox)
- The Tea Party Patriots Citizens Fund, the largest Tea Party organization in the country, endorsed Cruz on Sunday. “We seek a candidate who shares our values: personal freedom, economic freedom, and a debt-free future,” said the Fund’s chairwoman Jenny Beth Martin. (Conservative Review)
- Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin (R), who was stumping for Donald Trump in Iowa, said on Monday that it was “very shameful” that Ted Cruz would mail misleading pamphlets to voters about their voting history. "That, to me, is very reflective of politicians thinking that they know best or that they know the intricacies of your life so they can make decisions for you. So that's what I've been concerned about with this whole caucus process,” she said. (CNN)
Carly Fiorina
- In an interview on Monday, Carly Fiorina distinguished her business experience from Donald Trump’s. She said, “Donald Trump has made billions of dollars personally, buying people inside the system. He freely admits it. Technology, the industry I’ve been in all my life, it is the most relentlessly competitive industry in the world. It is the least regulated industry, in the world.” Fiorina also noted that she was able to hire “armies of accountants and lawyers and lobbyists” to manage Hewlett-Packard’s tax burden, but small businesses do not have this luxury and are getting “crushed” as a result. (Breitbart)
Jim Gilmore
- Jim Gilmore received just 12 votes in the Iowa caucus on Monday night. (USA Today)
Mike Huckabee
- Mike Huckabee made a final address to Iowa voters prior to the caucus where he said he was the only candidate to take on the “Clinton political machine,” fighting against them in Arkansas for 20 years. To Donald Trump supporters, he said, “I appreciate what he’s saying about trade, getting money out of politics, and getting the Wall Street guys. But this is the message I won with eight years ago and I haven’t changed a bit. Maybe the TV networks haven’t given me the kind of attention they’ve given him, but if you want someone who’s actually governed effectively, then I think I’m the guy who can not just carry that message, but can actually deliver it in government.” (Breitbart)
John Kasich
- While campaigning in New Hampshire on Monday, John Kasich encouraged two of his Republican rivals to stop running negative campaigns. “I'm here to say to my good friends Chris Christie and Jeb Bush, they should take their negative nonsense off television. I'll tell you with all these people in the field what are you supposed to do? Just play whack-a-mole when somebody gets ahead of you and you beat them over the head. It's ridiculous. So why don't we finish the last week with people saying what they're for rather than, first of all, making up stuff about what somebody else is doing, which is all baloney?" Kasich said. (Politico)
Rand Paul
- Rand Paul used Ted Cruz’s misleading mailer to Iowa residents on their voting history “score” to create a parody version measuring the attendance record of U.S. senators running for president. “Hear about Ted Cruz's shady mail piece? Iowa, we need a President who will show up for the job,” Paul tweeted, along with the image of a grade report giving Cruz a C and Marco Rubio a D for attendance. (CNN)
- In an interview on Monday morning, Paul said he was not sure how he would perform in Iowa because “the polls are becoming increasingly erratic, all of them, because it's much more difficult to get people on the phone, even the pollsters will tell you this, it's hard to find people on the phone, it's hard to find young people, it's hard to get the spread that you need for the demographic. So I think the polls are way off.” He noted, however, “I've never lost a race before.” (RealClearPolitics)
- Paul placed fifth in the Iowa caucus and told supporters, “Tonight is the beginning. Liberty will live on. We fight on.” His campaign later released a statement saying it believed the Republican nomination was still in reach. (The Des Moines Register)
Marco Rubio
- Marco Rubio celebrated his third place performance in Iowa with a speech to supporters on Monday night. He said, “For months they told us because we didn't have the right endorsements or the right political connections, we had no chance. They told me that we have no chance because my hair wasn't gray enough and my boots were too high. They told me I needed to wait my turn, that I needed to wait in line. But tonight, tonight here in Iowa, the people of this great state have sent a very clear message.” (Vox ,The Washington Post)
- According to CNN, Rubio’s campaign has identified Jeb Bush as its greatest competitor in securing the support of voters looking for an alternative to Donald Trump and Ted Cruz because “Bush is the only establishment candidate who has built a national organization that rivals Rubio's.” (CNN)
- BuzzFeed reported that 109 Bush donors together contributed approximately $249,500 to Rubio’s campaign in December. (BuzzFeed)
Rick Santorum
- Rick Santorum is beginning a 46-county tour of South Carolina this week. (WYFF)
Donald Trump
- In his concession speech to Ted Cruz on Monday night, Donald Trump said, “We finished second, and I want to tell you something: I'm just honored. I'm really honored. And I want to congratulate Ted, and I want to congratulate all of the incredible candidates, including Mike Huckabee, who has become a really good friend of mine.” He did not concede the primary race, however, saying he would “go on to easily beat Bernie, or Hillary, or whoever the hell we throw up there.” (The Huffington Post ,The Washington Post)
- Trump expressed surprise that Chris Christie said his support would fade over time. “He shouldn’t be talking like that, I’m surprised that he would be talking like that. I know him and I guess he used to be a friend until this all happened,” Trump said. (Politico)
- In the final quarter of 2015, Trump loaned $10.8 million to his own campaign. (USA Today)
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
