Hillary Clinton promoted Donald Trump as way to damage GOP

Among the documents in the leaked John Podesta emails recently posted by Wikileaks was a strategy memo that suggested that the Clinton campaign may have colluded with the Democratic National Committee and the media to promote certain Republican primary candidates that the Democrats considered extreme. If genuine, the memo indicates that the Clinton campaign interfered with the Republican primary with the help of the media.

The memo was an attachment to an email with the Wikileaks ID number 1120. It was sent to numerous staff members on April 23, 2015 with the subject line “[AGENDA & MEMO] Friday Strategy at 8:00 AM ET.” The email was sent by “MASTOR,” probably a reference to Marissa Astor, who is listed as a surrogate on the Hillary for America organizational chart. The attachment file name is “150407 Strategy on GOP.”

The memo is addressed to “The Democratic National Committee” and is dated April 7, 2015. The introduction says that its purpose is to “outline the strategy and goals that a potential Hillary Clinton presidential campaign would have regarding the 2016 Republican presidential field.” The introduction notes that, even though Hillary Clinton was not yet the Democratic nominee, “most of what is contained in this memo is work the DNC is already doing.”

The memo lays out three strategies to “make whomever the Republicans nominate unpalatable to the majority of the electorate.” First, the Clinton campaign planned to “force all [emphasis theirs] Republican candidates to lock themselves into extreme conservative positions that will hurt them in a general election.” Second, they wanted to “undermine any credibility/trust Republican presidential candidates have” among independent voters. Finally, they planned to “muddy the waters on any potential attack launched against HRC.”

In “operationalizing the strategy,” the memo described a plan to “use the [Republican] field to inflict damage on itself.” The Clinton campaign wanted to use “more extreme candidates” as “’Pied Piper’ candidates” who would seem to “represent the mainstream of the Republican Party.”

The memo identified three “Pied Piper” candidates by name. They were Ted Cruz, Donald Trump and Ben Carson. At the time the memo was written, Donald Trump was still two months away from declaring his candidacy. It is not clear if the Clintons directly influenced Trump to enter the race.

“We need to be elevating the Pied Piper candidates so that they are leaders of the pack and tell the press to them [sic] seriously,” the memo says. This indicates coordination between the Clinton campaign, the DNC and members of the media.

The memo goes on to identify several “more established” candidates who needed special attention to
“undermine their credibility among our coalition (communities of color, millennials, women) and independent voters.” The candidates identified as bigger threats to the Clinton campaign were Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio, Scott Walker, Rand Paul, Bobby Jindal and Chris Christie.

To “muddy the waters,” the memo suggested building a dossier on each Republican candidate in the areas of “transparency & disclosure, donors & associations, and management & business dealings.” In a statement that presaged this week’s attacks on Donald Trump, the memo says, “any information on scandals or ethical lapses on the GOP candidates would serve well. We won’t be picky.”

 While the email does not contain a “smoking gun” that indicates that Clinton enticed Donald Trump to enter the Republican primary, it is apparent that Trump was considered a weak and extreme candidate who could hurt the rest of the Republican field. The reference to the press may help explain the large amounts of friendly press coverage that Trump received during the primary. There is also no indication that the Clinton campaign thought that Donald Trump could actually win the Republican primary and become the party’s nominee.

In the end, Hillary Clinton’s plan to sabotage the Republican primary must have exceeded her wildest expectations.  One of her “Pied Pipers” actually won the nomination and became the Republican candidate for the presidency. Hillary was ready when he did.

Read the full story on The Resurgent

Why a hard line on immigration will lose the election

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Amid the Republican battle on illegal immigration and deportation of illegal immigrants, the effect of immigration policy on the general election is lost. The general election will likely hinge on the outcome of a handful of swing states, most of which were won by Barack Obama in 2008 and 2012. In order to win the White House, the Republican candidate must flip the states of Florida, Iowa, Ohio and Colorado as well as win North Carolina, which was won by Obama in 2008 and Mitt Romney in 2012.

The hardline stance of several Republican candidates in the primary is almost certain to make it difficult or impossible for them to win these swing states in the general election. Losing even one of these states would put Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders in the White House. To understand why immigration may kill the chance of electing a Republican president, let’s take a closer look at the State of Florida.

The Center for American Progress, a left-leaning think tank, recently published estimates of the racial and ethnic composition of swing state electorates. The group estimates that the largest minority voter group in Florida will be Hispanics with an estimated 20.2 percent of the electorate. Blacks are projected to increase to 15.5 percent of voters and Asians to 2.2 percent.

Pew Research puts the share of Hispanic voters for 2016 slightly lower at 18.1 percent. In either case, the Hispanic share of the electorate is steadily increasing. Exit polling also reported by Pew found that Hispanics made up 17 percent of Florida voters in 2012 and 14 percent in 2008 so a 2016 share of 18-20 percent is realistic.

While all minority groups are growing in the state, Hispanics make up the fastest growing group. In this year’s election, minority voters are likely to make up between 35 and 38 percent of the electorate. This would be a substantial increase over the 33 percent they represented in 2008.

Who do these groups vote for? Washington Post exit polls show information specifically for Florida for the past two election cycles. As is well established, Obama won virtual unanimity among black voters with 95 percent in 2012 and 96 percent in 2008.  

Among Hispanic voters, Obama won a less commanding majority. In 2008, Obama won the Hispanic vote by 57 percent to John McCain’s 42 percent. In 2012, the total was practically the same with Obama at 60 percent and Mitt Romney at 39 percent. In Florida, Romney lost by 74,309 votes out of 8.4 million votes cast. That is a margin of 0.8 percent.

Many observers believe that Romney lost the race with a comment in a primary debate in January 2012. In that debate, Romney stated that his plan for dealing with illegal immigrants was “self-deportation.” The election could have easily turned on the feeling of many Hispanics that Romney and the Republicans didn’t like them and didn’t want them in the country.

If Hispanics respond to an innocuous remark in a debate with a landslide for Democrats, the question that needs to be addressed is how they would respond to a policy of mass deportations and the elimination of birthright citizenship. Many conservatives believe that Hispanics and other legal immigrants will back conservative candidates with a hard line on illegal immigration because they resent the illegals who don’t wait their turn. Is this belief supportable by fact?

In August 2015, a Gallup poll found that two-thirds of Americans support a pathway to citizenship for illegal immigrants. Among Hispanics, support for what some Republicans call “amnesty,” runs even higher. Seventy-seven percent of Hispanics favor a pathway to citizenship for illegals.

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On the issue of birthright citizenship, most Americans favor keeping the Constitution and birthright citizenship as is by a margin of 57-39 percent according to an August 2015 Pew poll. Among Hispanics, 73 percent oppose trying to end birthright citizenship.

The same poll found that 72 percent of Americans believe that illegal immigrants should be allowed to stay in the United States. Only 17 percent favor a national effort to deport all illegals. The survey did not give statistics on the question for Hispanics, but did note that 60 percent of Hispanics saw an increase in deportations as a bad thing and that 46 percent were concerned that a close friend or family member could be deported.

For most Americans, immigration reform is not an important issue. Last week, Gallup found that the economy was the most important issue for most voters at 17 percent. Ten percent of voters name immigration as the most important problem, placing it in a tie for third place with jobs and unemployment.

Hispanic voters agree that the economy and jobs are the most important issues according to a Univision poll from last July. Unlike most voters, Hispanics rank immigration as another “hot button” issue.

“A lot of individuals and a lot of people in the Hispanic community feel that the extreme right-wing, anti-immigration rhetoric tends to be code for anti-Hispanic rhetoric, and that’s why it has such traction,” said pollster Fernand Amandi. He added, “On the question of a pathway to citizenship, Hispanic voters that we asked say that the majority are more likely to support a candidate for president that advocates for a position that includes a pathway to citizenship, when it comes to a comprehensive immigration reform plan.”

Using the “Swing the Vote” tool from Five Thirty Eight, we can see that a shift of the Hispanic vote by three points nationally would move Florida to the Republican column. Specifically, in 2012, Obama won Florida by 74,309 votes. That means that flipping only 2.6 percent of Florida’s Hispanic vote would have flipped the state to Romney.

Winning 43 percent of Hispanics should not be an unattainable goal for Republicans. George W. Bush won 44 percent of Hispanics nationally as recently as 2004. Chris Christie won the Hispanic vote outright in New Jersey, a solidly blue state, in 2013.

The immigration vote will be important in other swing states as well. Colorado has a Hispanic electorate that, at 15 percent in 2012, is almost as large as Florida’s. Virginia and Ohio have fewer Hispanics, but have large immigrant populations, many of whom are naturalized and can vote. These voters can be reasonably expected to oppose candidates with policies that they perceive as anti-immigration and unfriendly.

The American Immigration Council estimates that almost five percent of Ohio’s population are immigrants. About half of these Ohioans are naturalized and eligible to vote. About two percent of Ohioans were Hispanic. This is 60 percent of Obama’s margin of victory in 2012.

In Virginia, the AIC statistics show that immigrants make up 11 percent of the population. About nine percent of these are Hispanic. Again, half of these Virginians are US citizens who are eligible to vote. Again, this is more than half of Barack Obama’s margin of victory.

Almost all swing states have Hispanic and immigrant populations that could easily be decisive in the 2016 general election. By focusing on the divisive issue of immigration rather than topics that unite voters against the Democrats, Republican candidates may be making it impossible to win the election in November.

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Scott Walker debuts in poll near Hillary Clinton

A new poll by Rasmussen found that Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker is near a statistical tie with presumptive Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton. The poll, released on March 3, found that Walker trails Mrs. Clinton by only five points in a head-to-head matchup. This was the first time that Rasmussen had asked about a Walker-Clinton matchup.

Rasmussen found that 46 percent of likely voters would vote for Mrs. Clinton while 41 percent preferred Gov. Walker. Six percent were undecided and eight percent preferred some other candidate. The margin of error in the poll was three percent.

At this point, Walker does better in a potential race against Mrs. Clinton than any other likely Republican. Other Republicans trail the former First Lady and Secretary of State by double-digit margins. Jeb Bush, the former governor of Florida, trails Mrs. Clinton 45-36 percent, little changed from a year ago. Retired neurosurgeon and first-time candidate for public office Ben Carson trails Clinton 47-36 percent.

The Real Clear Politics average of polls reports that other Republicans also trail Mrs. Clinton. New Jersey Governor Chris Christie fairs best with an average deficit of nine percent. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) trails by an average of 10 percent. Marco Rubio (R-Fl.) trails by 11 points. Former governor of Arkansas Mike Huckabee trails Clinton by an average 13 points, and Texas Senator Ted Cruz is an average 14 points behind.

Walker’s debut at a near tie is nothing short of remarkable given his lack of name recognition and Hillary Clinton’s established presence as the candidate to beat. On Feb. 21, the Washington Post noted that Walker had the “lowest name recognition of any candidate tested.” In July 2014, Gallup found that 91 percent of adults were favorable with Clinton. Fifty-five percent viewed her favorably.

Walker has generated controversy in several areas in recent weeks. He drew fire from liberals for not distancing himself from Rudy Giuliani’s comment that President Obama did not love America. The comment was made at a private dinner for Walker. He was also criticized for his statement that “the most significant foreign policy decision in my lifetime” was “in August of 1981, when Ronald Reagan fired the air traffic controllers” (as quoted by Politico).

Gov. Walker, who left college to take a job, has also started a discussion about whether a president should have a college degree. According to a Public Policy poll, 62 percent think that a degree is important, but only 38 percent say that they are less likely to vote for a candidate without a degree.

Scott Walker’s strong debut against Hillary is encouraging for Republicans, but his challenge will be to adapt from state to national politics. His strong start will undoubtedly make Walker, already a prime target of Democrats for his controversial policies in Wisconsin, the subject of even harsher attacks. It may be difficult for Walker to sustain his lead for the next year until the primaries.

 

Read the full article on Examiner.com

How to solve the GOP problem with minorities and millennnials

Barack Obama’s two presidential election victories were built on the backs of three groups in which he received landslide victories. Obama won with margins on the order of two-to-one with black, Hispanic and young voters both times he ran. These lopsided numbers provided him with the slim margin that he needed to eke out a victory over Mitt Romney in spite of a strong showing by Romney among white voters. If any Republican hopes to win a national election in the future, it is axiomatic that he must slice deeply into the Democratic advantage with minority and millennial voters.

 The Democratic plan has been one of targeting their message to individual demographic groups in a divide-and-conquer strategy. Black voters are told that Republicans are racist and want to suppress them at the polls and repeal the Voting Rights Act. Hispanics are told that Republicans are racist and want to deport them. Millennials are swayed by Obama’s “cool” factor. The razor thin rationales targeting the various demographic groups should be permeable to Republican attacks.

President Obama’s unpopularity and the failure of his agenda present a unique opportunity for Republicans. Voters who were firmly in the Obama camp may now be willing to listen to alternative viewpoints. Charles Ellison recently wrote in The Root that dissatisfaction with the president and high black unemployment are resulting in tempered black support for Democratic candidates. Likewise, high unemployment among millennials may hurt their support for Democrats as well. With respect to Hispanics, Democrats have promised immigration reform for six years and failed to deliver.

The necessary first step for Republicans is to remove the stumbling blocks that prevent minorities from voting for Republican candidates. Republican candidates should put themselves in the shoes of minority voters and acknowledge that black and Hispanic Americans do have a different experience than white Americans. Republicans should take this into account and consider how certain messages will sound to minority voters.

Guilt by association is real. Conservatives should temper their enthusiasm for the defense of people like George Zimmerman and Darren Wilson. Springing to the defense of alleged murderers, especially before all the facts are known, is just as wrong as calling for their heads. Conservatives should also distance themselves from racists such as Cliven Bundy and Donald Sterling. These people have the freedom to spout racist nonsense, but they don’t have the freedom to duck the consequences.

Conservatives should also refrain from pointing out that Al Sharpton, Jesse Jackson and the other race baiters are the real racists. It’s obvious, but also irrelevant, that there is a double standard.
The biggest stumbling block for Hispanics is immigration. The Tea Party fringe that insists on deportation and no “amnesty,” by which they mean any immigration reform, seems bent on driving Latinos permanently into the Democratic camp. These opponents of “amnesty” claim not to the see the problems in the current system in which businesses and farms depend on immigrant labor, but under which legal immigration can take decades.

The next step for Republicans is to show up. Republican candidates should make frequent visits to ethnic neighborhoods and listen to the voters there. This should not merely be an election year exercise. They should forge long-term relationships with community leaders. It is harder to paint a Republican as an evil racist if the people already know and trust him. Minority voters won’t vote for Republicans if Republican candidates don’t show up to ask for their votes.

Finally, Republicans should find out where a majority Americans agree with them and oppose the Democrats. An October 2014 Gallup poll found that the top three issues for voters were the economy (17 percent), dissatisfaction with government (16 percent) and unemployment/jobs (10 percent). These were the only issues to rank in double-digits and, coincidentally, a separate Gallup poll found that voters favor Republicans on these issues. These are the issues that Republicans should be talking about.

While Republicans should not mimic the Democratic ploy of making separate promises to different demographic groups, they should target campaign messages to different groups. While it is true that a rising tide lifts all boats and that conservative principles would benefit the nation as a whole, Republicans can no longer simply spin out a generic message and wait for minority voters to flock to their banner.

The best strategy may be to take the advice of economist Arthur Brooks, who wrote in the Wall St. Journal that conservatives must make their policies personal to voters instead of railing against abstract ideas and things. By connecting with voters on a personal level and explaining how conservative ideas can help the poor, Brooks says, “Conservative leaders will be able to stand before Americans who are struggling and feel marginalized and say, ‘We will fight for you and your family, whether you vote for us or not’—and truly mean it.”

This means that conservatives should spend less time talking about abstract ideas and social issues. Republicans must deemphasize issues like abortion, marriage and even the repeal of ObamaCare. They should completely stop talking about things like amnesty, impeachment, and birth certificates. At best these issues are divisive. At worst, they alienate voters.

What Republicans should spend more time talking about how is Democratic policies hurt real people and their families, playing to their advantage on the economy and jobs. Republican candidates should stand with the unemployed who have been unable to find jobs in the Obama economy, the family breadwinner struggling to support a family on less than he made in 2008, the college graduate with no employment prospects and the cancer patient whose health insurance policy was canceled due to the Affordable Care Act. Republicans should make an emotional connection with voters by putting names and faces to real effects of the Obama agenda.

When the Republicans win control of the Senate, passing immigration reform unilaterally should be a top priority. If President Obama chooses to veto Republican immigration reform, the Democrats might well incur the wrath of Hispanic voters, while the Republicans could, for once, be the party of “si’.” Democrats promised immigration reform for six years, but didn’t deliver. This leaves the GOP with an opportunity. One need look back no further than 2004, or even more recently to Chris Christie in New Jersey and Rick Perry in Texas, to see that a conservative can win Hispanic votes.

With respect to millennials, emphasizing jobs and playing down social issues may help the GOP since younger voters tend to be more liberal on social issues, but may lean conservative on size and role of government. Removing Obama from the ballot may help as well. Potential Democratic candidates such as Hillary Clinton, Joe Biden, and Elizabeth Warren lack the president’s hipness and youth appeal. In the pre-Obama elections, young voters were more closely divided. George W. Bush even tied the demographic with Al Gore in 2000.

Republicans don’t have to change their principles or write off entire demographics to the Democrats, but neither will these groups simply fall into the GOP camp by default. To win these voters, Republicans must show up, listen to their concerns, and convince them that conservative ideas will make their lives better. Read the rest on Examiner.com

The good, the bad and the ugly: A balanced look at Chris Christie

 

When Examiner published an article last week detailing how Chris Christie was the current Republican frontrunner for the 2016 elections as well as the only Republican who currently beats the likely Democratic nominee, Hillary Clinton, it set off a firestorm of indignation among some conservatives. Many deride Christie as a “RINO” who would be almost as bad as Clinton. Others go further and claim that Christie is a Democrat in disguise. A number of angry conservatives say that Christie is dead to them.

A good place to start when trying to determine whether a Republican is a RINO is the American Conservative Union. The ACU rates members of Congress and state legislatures by their votes and determines whether they are “true conservatives” or not. In a previous article, Examiner found that most Republicans who are commonly labeled RINOs easily pass Ronald Reagan’s 80 percent rule. The ACU does not rate governors, however, so one must examine Gov. Christie’s record in New Jersey.

The Good

There are many aspects of Christie’s career that conservatives can cheer. The governor seems to be an authentic fiscal conservative. John Nichols of The Nation, a liberal site, says that Christie is in the mold of Scott Walker of Wisconsin. Nichols cites a long list of complaints that include raising the retirement age for state employees and increasing their required contribution for insurance and retirement plans, opposing tax increases on the wealthy, vetoing minimum wage hikes and pay equity bills, and trimming state budgets. Christie has taken on New Jersey’s public employee unions and won. One teacher’s union leader even publicly wished him dead in a tasteless joke in 2009.

Christie has not raised taxes during his time as governor. Politifact does note that he cut several tax credits such as the state’s Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC) and Homestead Benefit, which provides a credit on property insurance. The EITC is a refundable credit that can be paid out to individual filers even if they have no tax liability. Politifact also confirmed that Christie balanced New Jersey’s budget as its constitution requires. Christie has also taken steps to fix New Jersey’s underfunded pension program according to the Trentonian. New Jersey’s pension problems are not resolved, but underfunded pensions are a national crisis that many states and cities have not even begun to address according to CNBC.

Christie is pro-life. In 2011, New Jersey News described Christie’s remarks before a pro-life rally at the statehouse in which he said that “every life is precious and a gift from God” and noted that he had cut funding for Planned Parenthood. Christie urged the activists “to speak calmly and clearly and forthrightly for the idea that this is an issue whose time has come.” Salon describes Christie’s conversion from a “non-thinking pro-choice person, kind of the default position” when he heard his unborn daughter’s heartbeat as seemingly much more genuine than Mitt Romney’s.

Christie’s appeal to minorities is also a very good thing for conservatives. As reported by Examiner after his re-election victory, exit polls from New Jersey show that Gov. Christie made deep inroads into Barack Obama’s core constituencies. Christie won female voters by 15 percent even though the Democratic candidate, Barbara Buono, was a woman. He also won Hispanic voters outright with 51 percent (compared to Buono’s 45 percent). Although Christie did not win the black vote, at 21 percent his percentage of the black vote was three times greater than Romney’s. A successful Republican presidential candidate will have to appeal to minority voters.

With respect to global warming and climate change, the Huffington Post noted that when Christie ran for governor in 2009, he had “an impressive green agenda” on his website according to the New Jersey Environmental Federation, but that it has remained only on the website. Since then, he told a town hall meeting in 2010 that he was “a little skeptical” that humans are responsible for climate change. The Post story goes on to say that Christie withdrew New Jersey from the Northeast’s regional cap-and-trade plan, weakened the state’s renewable energy standard and used $210 million from the state’s clean energy fund to balance the budget. On the other hand, Christie opposed oil drilling and liquefied natural gas (LNG) facilities off the New Jersey coast.

The Bad

The news about Christie isn’t all good for conservatives, however. For example, Christie accepted the Medicaid expansion of the Affordable Care Act. He justified approving the expansion by noting that New Jersey’s Medicaid program was already so large that the potential expansion of the program under Obamacare was minimal, a claim confirmed by Politifact. Christie did veto a bill making the expansion permanent, telling N.J. Spotlight that if the terms of the expansion change “because of adverse actions by the Obama administration, I will end it as quickly as it started.” Republican governors John Kasich of Ohio and Mike Pence of Indiana also accepted the Obamacare Medicaid money according to the N.Y. Times.

Many conservatives also do not like Christie’s position on gun control. In 2009, Christie told Sean Hannity that he supported “common sense laws that will allow people to protect themselves” but also favored some gun control measures that would protect police. He noted that the state’s Democratic legislature would not allow easing restrictions on guns.

In the aftermath of the Newtown massacre, Christie established a task force to “responsibly expand New Jersey’s strict gun control measures” according to the Washington Times’ Emily Miller. Christie signed 10 gun control bills into law, including a measure that required the state to submit mental health records to the FBI for instant background checks, but vetoed three others, including a ban a .50 caliber rifles. The NRA hailed the vetoes even though the group rated Christie as a “C.”

On same sex marriage, Christie is also at odds with many conservatives. In October 2013, he dropped the state’s appeal of a court decision striking down New Jersey’s marriage law in spite of the fact that he had previously vetoed a bill that would have allowed same sex marriages. The decision can likely be explained by the fact that previous court decisions made it very unlikely that Christie would have prevailed in court. Additionally, it is clear that the people of New Jersey supported the redefinition of marriage. A Rutgers Eagleton poll at the time showed that 61 percent of New Jersey voters favored marriage for same-sex couples compared to only 27 percent who were opposed. Sixty-seven percent opposed continuing the appeal. Even the state’s Republicans were almost evenly split on the court decision and whether to appeal although slight majorities of Republicans opposed both. Coming right before the election, pursuing the unpopular appeal could have sunk Christie’s campaign.

Christie’s decision to sign a bipartisan bill banning gay reparative therapy is harder to justify. Politico reported that Christie’s note accompanying the bill said that he believed that people were born gay and denied that homosexuality is a sin, a position inconsistent with his Catholic faith. A similar ban in California was challenged on First Amendment grounds and upheld by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in August 2013. At least two lawsuits have been filed against New Jersey’s ban according to NJ.com.

Christie’s appointment of Sohail Mohammed to the New Jersey Superior Court was also controversial. Mohammed is a native of India who immigrated to the U.S. as a teenager. As an attorney, he specialized in immigration law and represented dozens of immigrants who were detained in the aftermath of the Sept. 11 attacks. Mohammed’s career is profiled on Superlawyers.com.

The criticism of Mohammed seems to stem mostly from the fact that he is a Muslim and the fear that he might help to institute sharia law in New Jersey. Some critics also point to his ties with the American Muslim Union which some believe is tied to Islamic terrorists. Of the controversy, Christie said in the Wall St. Journal, “It's just crazy, and I'm tired of dealing with the crazies.”

Speaking of immigration, Republican hardliners won’t like the governor’s history on illegal immigration. In 2008 when he was a federal prosecutor, Christie told a gathering of Latinos that illegal immigration was a civil, not criminal, matter and that, technically speaking, illegal immigrants are not committing a crime by being in the country illegally according to NJ.com. Although he is correct, “illegal [unlawful] presence” is a civil violation, not a misdemeanor or felony, Christie drew criticism from conservatives for the remark. New York Magazine noted that Christie only prosecuted 13 illegal immigration cases between 2002 and 2007, a very low number considering New Jersey’s status as a port of entry the state’s large immigrant population. In December 2013, Politico reported that Christie had announced that he planned to sign New Jersey’s DREAM Act.

The Ugly

One of the hardest things for conservatives to get past may be Christie’s “bro-mance” with President Obama. When Hurricane Sandy struck New Jersey and New York a week before the 2012 election, the two executives toured storm damaged areas and traded compliments. A famous photo shows the two men shaking hands, Obama resting his hand on Christie’s shoulder, in Atlantic City on Oct. 31, 2012. Many conservatives, such as pollster and pundit Dick Morris, blame Christie for making Obama look like a bipartisan leader, an appraisal that had eluded him for the previous four years.

An Examiner analysis of 2012 exit polls found that 64 percent of voters said that the president’s response to the hurricane was a factor in their vote and 62 percent of these voters chose Obama. Both Rasmussen and Gallup polling showed an uptick in Obama’s approval ratings in the days after Hurricane Sandy struck New York.

There are several theories as to why Christie, who actively supported Mitt Romney, became a cheerleader for Barack Obama less than a week before a very close election. The most likely answer is that Christie was doing what he thought was best for his state. It probably did not hurt that the move was also good for Chris Christie. The governor’s approval rating jumped to 70 percent after the storm according to Philly.com.

In the end, Chris Christie can’t be accurately termed a RINO, but neither is he a hardcore conservative. If he were, he would be unelectable in a state as blue as New Jersey. In reality, Christie seems to be a fiscal conservative who is moderate on most social issues. Christie’s views might play well with moderate voters in a general election, but the recent shift towards libertarianism by many in the Republican Party makes it unlikely that he will get past the primary unless other candidates split the votes of social conservatives and Tea Partiers.

Read this on Examiner.com:

The Good - The Bad - The Ugly

Christie leads GOP pack of 2016 hopefuls

A pair of new polls hints at a likely matchup between Chris Christie and Hillary Clinton for the 2016 presidential race. Christie and Clinton are the current favorites for their party’s presidential nomination. Christie is the only Republican who currently leads Clinton in head-to-head polling.

A Fox News poll released Dec. 27 found that Chris Christie and Hillary Clinton lead the nomination fight for 2016. Among Democrats, 68 percent prefer Hillary Clinton as the next presidential nominee. Clinton holds a 56 point lead over Vice President Joe Biden, the second place finisher. Elizabeth Warren, currently a U.S. Senator from Massachusetts, was third with seven percent. New York governor Andrew Cuomo ranked fourth with four percent. Maryland governor Martin O’Malley and Massachusetts governor Deval Patrick both garnered one percent.

Chris Christie, recently re-elected governor of New Jersey, topped the Fox News list of Republicans for 2016. Christie’s 16 percent was four points better than the second place finishers, but hints at a much tougher fight for the Republican nomination than Hillary Clinton is likely to face.

There is a strong fight for second place in the Republican poll. Senator Ted Cruz (Tex.), Rep. Paul Ryan (Wisc.), and Jeb Bush, the former governor of Florida, all scored 12 percent. Rand Paul, the junior senator from Kentucky, received 11 percent. Florida Senator Marco Rubio finished fourth with eight percent and Scott Walker, the governor of Wisconsin, received six percent. 2012 candidates Rick Perry and Rick Santorum both have the support of three percent in the current poll.

Republicans are also much more uncommitted than Democrats at this point. Seventeen percent of Republicans (one percent prefer other candidates, five percent prefer none of the above, and 11 percent don’t know) are uncommitted to any of the top candidates. On the Democratic side only eight percent are uncommitted (two percent prefer none of the above and six percent don’t know). This means that a serious Democratic challenger would have to attack Hillary’s record in an attempt to reduce her lead, while Republican hopefuls can focus their efforts on undecided voters with a more positive message.

A second poll from Dec. 26 by CNN/Opinion Research focuses on head-to-head races between top Republicans and Hillary Clinton. The only Republican who outpolled Clinton was Chris Christie. Christie edged out Clinton by 48-46 percent. The result was within the margin of error for the poll.

Christie “performs particularly well among independents, winning nearly six in 10 in that key group," CNN Polling Director Keating Holland said. "He also wins a majority of suburbanites and older voters, something that no other GOP hopeful [that was] tested was able to do against Clinton. Christie doesn't win in the Northeast, although he does hold Clinton to a bare majority there, but he has a solid edge in the Midwest while playing Clinton to a draw in the South and West.” Even though Clinton won among women by 10 points, Christie outpolled her among men by a 14 point margin.

Two other national polls in recent weeks also show Christie and Clinton in a statistical dead heat. A Quinnipiac poll from Dec. 19 favored Clinton 44-43 while Public Policy, a Democratic polling firm, gave Christie a 45-42 edge on Dec. 18.

The Republican who fared second best against Clinton in the CNN poll was Paul Ryan. Ryan is House Budget Committee chairman and was Mitt Romney’s vice presidential candidate in 2012. Ryan has earned prominence for his role in negotiating an end to the government shutdown and the recent budget agreement. In current polling, Ryan trails Clinton by eight points.

All other potential Republican challengers currently trail Mrs. Clinton by double digit margins. In third place, Rand Paul trails by 13 points (41-54 percent). The other three potential candidates ranked in the poll trail by nearly 20 point each. Ted Cruz loses 39-57 percent while Marco Rubio is at 37-56 percent. Jeb Bush fared worst of all at 37-58 percent.

With two years to go before the beginning of the 2016 primary season, Hillary Clinton is the heavy favorite for the Democratic presidential nomination while Chris Christie holds a slight edge among Republicans. With the current travails of Obamacare still underway and ominous signs appearing for Democrats, the current political climate may be unusually fluid.

Originally published on National Elections Examiner

Elections hint at problems for Dems

Democrats are still celebrating the victory of Terry McAuliffe over Ken Cuccinelli in Virginia, but the elections on Nov. 5 should ring alarm bells for the Democratic Party. Chris Christie’s resounding victory in New Jersey showed that Republicans can be competitive in blue states while McAuliffe’s margin in Virginia was much narrower than expected.

The McAuliffe campaign raised and spent far more than Cuccinelli. Politico reports that McAuliffe outraised Cuccinelli by almost $15 million. The funding disparity meant that Cuccinelli was not able to air campaign ads in the final two weeks of the campaign.

The Republican Party has been criticized for not providing support to Cuccinelli, but the Politico article points out that the Republican National Committee spent $3 million on the Cuccinelli campaign while the Republican Governor’s Association spent $8.3 million. Dick Morris points out that Republicans tried to aid Cuccinelli when the race became competitive in late October, but at that point it was too late to buy air time for ads.

A bigger problem than the lack of money from political groups was Cuccinelli’s lack of fundraising prowess. The Cuccinelli campaign raised only $11.7 million compared to McAuliffe’s $28 million. The Washington Post notes that businessmen who previously supported Republican Bob McDonnell backed McAuliffe this year, making it difficult for Cuccinelli to raise funds.

The bad news for Democrats is that the mountains of cash that McAuliffe spent barely eked out a victory, even with a Libertarian candidate drawing Cuccinelli voters by a margin of two to one. As previously reported by Examiner, McAuliffe’s double digit lead in mid-October had all but evaporated by the end of the month. The likely reason for McAuliffe’s difficulties was the steady stream of bad news relating to the implementation of the Affordable Care Act. Unless a dramatic change occurs over the next year, Obamacare may prove to be a drag on Democratic candidates in next year’s midterm elections.

Voter demographics in the Virginia race are also troubling for Democrats. Strategist and pollster Dick Morris points out that a major question in surveying the race was whether turnout would mirror 2012 or 2010. Exit polls show that turnout closely resembled the off-year election of 2010. The surge of minority Democrats that propelled Barack Obama to two election victories in Virginia did not materialize when he was not on the ballot in either 2010 or this week.

Ezra Klein of the Washington Post agrees. “A Republican looking at these numbers should feel disappointed by last night's election but hopeful about next year's,” he says, noting that the core demographics of Obama’s electoral success, women, minorities, and young voters, all decreased as a percentage of the electorate, as did the percentage of Virginia voters identifying as Democrats.

With Barack Obama off the ballot, his ability to get out the vote is considerably curtailed. Obama’s ability to rally voters may get worse as his approval rating drops with disappointment in Obamacare. A Gallup poll from Nov. 5 showed Obama’s approval rating at 39 percent, a historic low. If the makeup of voters in 2014 resembles the electorate in Virginia from this week, the Democrats may suffer a defeat similar to the 2010 Republican congressional landslide. Democratic hopes for winning control of the House are in jeopardy and with 20 Senate Democrats up for reelection Republican control of both houses of Congress is a very real possibility.

Chris Christie’s victory in New Jersey presents a different set of problems for Democrats. Although Christie is reviled by Tea Party Republicans as a “RINO,” the New Jersey governor has proven adept at reaching into traditional Democratic vote strongholds.

Exit polls from New Jersey show that Gov. Christie made deep inroads into Barack Obama’s core constituencies. Christie won women voters by 15 percent even though the Democratic candidate, Barbara Buono, was a woman. He also won Hispanic voters outright with 51 percent (compared to Buono’s 45 percent). Although Christie did not win the black vote, at 21 percent his percentage of the black vote was almost two-and-a-half times greater than Cuccinelli’s (eight percent).

Some Republicans would charge that Christie’s success is a result of abandoning traditional conservative principles. Christie claims to be a conservative and John Nichols wrote in The Nation that he is right. According to Nichols, Christie cultivates a moderate image to appeal to New Jersey’s voters, but his policies are in line with other Republican governors.

Nichols details how Christie has enacted Wisconsin-style “austerity” in New Jersey and clashed repeatedly with unions. He pulled the state out of a regional carbon emissions program, scaled back renewable energy targets, and vetoed a plan for early voting. Christie’s record on social issues is also conservative. He is pro-life and defunded Planned Parenthood from the New Jersey budget. He also vetoed New Jersey’s gay marriage law.

Christie’s conservative record is not perfect, however. As the L.A. Times pointed out on Nov. 5, Christie his support for in-state tuition for illegal aliens will trouble the right. He also dropped a state appeal to a New Jersey Supreme Court decision that allowed marriages to proceed and signed a bill banning gay conversion therapy. Christie also has a mixed record on gun control. Many Republicans will not easily forget or forgive Christie’s “bro-mance” with President Obama in the wake of Hurricane Sandy.

Nevertheless, a Gallup poll from June found that Christie is the most popular Republican politician. The poll found that Christie had approval ratings of greater than 50 percent with members of both parties as well as the public at large. No other Republican topped 50 percent outside the party. Even if Christie is not the Republican nominee in 2016, his success shows that Republicans can win in blue states without abandoning their principles.

Taken together, the two elections this week portend a difficult future for Democrats. President Obama’s legacy, the problem-ridden Affordable Care Act, could spell disaster for many Democratic candidates just as the president becomes unable to help them.

Originally published on Elections Examiner