Ballotpedia's Daily Presidential News Briefing - June 3, 2016
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Friday's Leading Stories
- House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) endorsed Donald Trump on Thursday in an op-ed for his hometown paper The Janesville Gazette. “It’s no secret that he and I have our differences. I won’t pretend otherwise. And when I feel the need to, I’ll continue to speak my mind. But the reality is, on the issues that make up our agenda, we have more common ground than disagreement. For me, it’s a question of how to move ahead on the ideas that I—and my House colleagues—have invested so much in through the years. It’s not just a choice of two people, but of two visions for America. And House Republicans are helping shape that Republican vision by offering a bold policy agenda, by offering a better way ahead. Donald Trump can help us make it a reality,” Ryan wrote. (The Janesville Gazette)
- In an interview with The Wall Street Journal on Thursday, Trump said that Gonzalo Curiel, the federal judge presiding over a class-action lawsuit against Trump University, had “an absolute conflict of interest” in the case because he was “of Mexican heritage” and a member of an association of Latino lawyers. “I’m building a wall. It’s an inherent conflict of interest,” Trump said. He added that he might have his lawyers file a motion to request the case be reassigned. (The Wall Street Journal)
Polls
- According to a Rasmussen Reports survey released on Thursday, Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump are nearly tied nationally, 39 percent to 38 percent. “Among voters not affiliated with either major political party, Clinton leads 36% to 30%. But one-out-of-three unaffiliated voters (34%) favor another candidate or are undecided. Even at this early stage of the campaign, there is an unusually high number of voters that Clinton and Trump have alienated or are still unable to attract for some other reason,” the pollsters reported. (Rasmussen Reports)
Democrats
- The Virgin Islands and Puerto Rico will hold Democratic caucuses on Saturday and Sunday, respectively. There are 67 delegates at stake over the weekend. (CNN)
Hillary Clinton
- On Thursday, Hillary Clinton spokesman Brian Fallon said that Clinton “respects the Justice Department decision” to seek the death penalty against Dylann Roof, who allegedly shot and killed nine members of a historically black church in Charleston, South Carolina, last year. (The Huffington Post)
- In a foreign policy speech on Thursday, Clinton said that Donald Trump was unfit to be president because of his temperament. She said of his policies, “They’re not even really ideas: just a series of bizarre rants, personal feuds, and outright lies. He’s not just unprepared, he’s temperamentally unfit to hold an office that requires knowledge, stability and immense responsibility. This is not someone who should ever have the nuclear codes — because it’s not hard to imagine Donald Trump leading us into a war just because somebody got under his very thin skin.” She also questioned Trump’s “bizarre fascination with dictators and strongmen who have no love for America,” like Russian President Vladimir Putin and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un. (The New York Times, Vox)
- Trump called Clinton’s speech “pathetic” during a rally in California on Thursday night. “It was so sad to watch. She’s up there and supposed to be a foreign policy speech. It was a political speech, had nothing to do with foreign policy,” he continued. (The New York Times)
- Sanders responded to Clinton’s speech in a statement on Thursday by criticizing her record as secretary of state. He said, “I agree with Secretary Clinton that Donald Trump’s foreign policy ideas are incredibly reckless and irresponsible. But when it comes to foreign policy, we cannot forget that Secretary Clinton voted for the war in Iraq, the worst foreign policy blunder in modern American history, and that she has been a proponent of regime change, as in Libya, without thinking through the consequences.” (Bernie Sanders for President)
- Glen Caplin, a former communications director for U.S. Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.) and former U.S. Rep. Anthony Weiner (D-N.Y.), has joined Clinton’s campaign as a senior national spokesman. (Politico)
- CNN highlighted the actions the Clinton campaign is taking to guard against an “embarrassing” loss to Sanders in California next Tuesday: “Now, suddenly confronting the possibility of defeat in a state where they have deep ties, Hillary Clinton's campaign has ramped up its efforts. It appointed Buffy Wicks, a veteran of both Obama campaigns, as state director, and has opened offices in 11 cities. The campaign also went up with TV ads for the first time last Friday, beginning with a modest six-figure ad buy in the Fresno, Sacramento and Los Angeles areas. Current and past public officials including Boxer, ex-Secretary of Labor Hilda Solis, San Francisco Mayor Ed Lee, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti and the state's Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom have participated in get-out-the-vote efforts across the state, volunteering at phone banks, speaking at rallies, marching in parades and helping open local campaign offices.” (CNN)
- According to emails obtained by The Associated Press, Clinton has employed an extensive “image-control apparatus” to direct audience interactions at campaign events and control the tone of introductory remarks to align with the campaign’s messaging. (U.S. News & World Report)
Bernie Sanders
- Bernie Sanders announced on Thursday that he would be introducing an alternative bill to address the debt crisis in Puerto Rico. According to Fortune, “His bill would allow the Federal Reserve to give the territory emergency loans and provide broad bankruptcy protections, unlike legislation approved by a House committee last week that would create a control board to oversee limited debt restructuring. Sanders’ bill would also boost Medicaid and Medicare payments to the island and designate $10.8 billion to rebuild the territory’s crumbling infrastructure.” (Fortune)
- Martha Fuller Clark, a superdelegate from New Hampshire and vice chairwoman of the state party, announced on Thursday that she was supporting Sanders because 60 percent of voters statewide and 70 percent of voters in her district supported him. She said that she was told by the Democratic National Committee that she could not remain neutral until the convention. Sanders also picked up two other superdelegates this week: Maureen Monahan, the vice chair of the Nebraska Democratic Party, and Hawaii Democratic Party Chair Tim Vandeveer. (NH1 News, Politico)
- On Thursday, the Sanders campaign released "Be Bold, Change the System", a new four-minute web ad about an African-American man from Baltimore who was incarcerated for fourteen years and used education to change his life. (Inquisitr)
Republicans
- The Republican National Committee announced on Wednesday that Helen Aguirre Ferré, a former adviser to Jeb Bush’s presidential campaign, would serve as its new director of Hispanic media relations. Several media outlets noted on Thursday that Ferré has since deleted several negative tweets and retweets critical of Donald Trump. (Talking Points Memo)
- In an interview on Thursday, U.S. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) expressed concern that Trump was fatally damaging the Republican Party’s relationship with Latino voters. "And I think the attacks that he's routinely engaged in, for example, going after Susana Martinez, the Republican governor of New Mexico, the chairman of the Republican Governors' Association, I think, was a big mistake," he said. McConnell compared the potential harm to the party to that incurred when Barry Goldwater opposed the Civil Rights Act of 1964. (CNN)
Donald Trump
- Trump tweeted on Thursday that he intended to have his executives reopen Trump University once the lawsuits against it were “disposed of and the case won” because there was “so much interest in it.” (CBS News)
- Bloomberg reported on Thursday that hedge fund billionaire Robert Mercer was being courted to play a central role in a to-be-developed super PAC supporting Trump. Mercer donated $16.7 million to outside political groups in the 2016 election cycle, including $13.5 million to the pro-Ted Cruz super PAC Keep the Promise I. (Bloomberg)
- In an interview with The Associated Press, South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R) said that she wished Trump spoke differently because divisive rhetoric has the power to motivate violence like the Charleston church shooting. She added that she did not believe Trump’s supporters were racist. “That's a different kind of anger. They're upset with Washington, D.C. They're upset nothing's got done. The way he communicates that, I wish were different,” Haley said. (Associated Press)
- Real estate investor Tom Barrack announced that Rebuilding America Now, a new super PAC which filed with the Federal Election Commission on Thursday, already has $32 million pledged to it from four donors. “The close ties between this Trump group and the official campaign could assuage concerns from wealthy donors about where to place their funds,” CNN noted. (CNN)
- Violence erupted at a Trump rally in San Jose, California, on Thursday, after Trump supporters and protesters came to physical blows in front of police officers who initially did not act because they “were under orders to not break ranks,” BuzzFeed reported. Officials from both the Clinton and Sanders campaigns condemned the violence. (BuzzFeed)
- At the event, itself, Trump argued that Clinton was supporting President Barack Obama and more progressive policies to avoid criminal prosecution. “Bill Clinton hated him, and Hillary Clinton hated Obama. Now it’s, ‘Yes sir, Mr. President sir. What would you like? What would you like me to say here, sir?’ The only reason she’s behaving like this and the only reason she’s been dragged so far left, believe me, is she doesn’t want to go to jail over the emails, okay? Believe me, that's the only reason. One simple reason,” Trump said. (New York Magazine)
Third Party Candidates
Jill Stein (Green Party)
- Jill Stein wrote an op-ed in The Hill on Thursday to advocate for all presidential candidates to be included in the general election debates “who are on the ballot for a majority of voters, representing a potential majority of electoral college votes.” She continued, “Opening the debates should be part of a broader reform that replaces the private, partisan Commission on Presidential Debates. When the CPD seized control of our national debates, it not only took charge of who gets to debate, but also who sits in the audience, who moderates, and what press is allowed access. Thus today’s sham debates have been engineered to drum up support for the bipartisan corporate agenda, and suppress all traces of alternatives. It’s time for a new non-partisan Commission that transforms these spectacles into real debates that engage and inform voters as the true engine of democracy.” (The Hill)
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
