#tx-sen

Two prominent Republicans targeted by Donald Trump and his minions for defeat over their insufficient loyalty to his regime have lost their campaigns for Congress and governor this evening after they were rejected by right wing voters in Kentucky and Georgia, demonstrating that wannabe authoritarian Trump’s hold on the party remains strong, even as his regime reaches historic levels of…

Midterm contests are heating up, with thirty-three Senate seats up for election in the looming 2026 elections. The Democratic Party is looking to bounce back from an awful 2024 this cycle and provide a check on Donald Trump’s vengeance presidency, which will be a lot easier if the party can flip both chambers of Congress. Democrats lost the Senate in 2024, but based on the trend of local…

Stop me if you’ve heard this one before: Is this the year we flip Texas Blue? Some early results coming out of the Lone Star State might be suggesting that.

Results from Williamson County, near Houston,  show Joe Biden ahead with nearly all the votes counted. Trump won this county by nearly 10% in 2016! Whether Biden wins the state or not, these results signify a massive rebellion by suburban voters against Trump and the GOP more generally.

If Biden wins Texas, it’s practically curtains for Trump. The Democratic nominee wouldn’t need to flip any other states that Trump won in 2016 to get an electoral college victory.

Despite our disappointment that pseudo-historian David Barton decided against a run for US Senate in Texas, we are taking solace in the fact that Rep. Steve Stockman announced yesterday that he would challenge Sen. John Cornyn in the Texas GOP primary. Cornyn is hardly a moderate, but Tea Party groups have been itching to oust him.

Stockman’s entry into the race comes just weeks after the Houston Chronicle investigated his murky finances, but the far-right congressman has much more going for him than questionable financial dealings. Here are five of Stockman’s most extreme and outlandish political ploys:

1. Birther & Election Trutherism

It’s no wonder that WorldNetDaily is positively giddy about Stockman’s Senate campaign, as the congressman shares the website’s birther views and has worked with birther activists. Stockman even suggested that President Obama stole the 2012 election, calling it a “scam.”

2. Impeachment

Stockman endorsed a WorldNetDaily book, “Impeachable Offenses: The Case For Removing Barack Obama From Office,” and even sent copies to every member of Congress. He followed up with WorldNetDaily by telling the pro-impeachment “news” site that he is working with a Religious Right law firm to investigate President Obama and make the case for impeachment.

Even before Obama was sworn in for a second term, Stockman floated the idea of impeaching the president for his executive actions targeting gun violence in response to the Sandy Hook massacre, likening the president to Saddam Hussein.

3. Guns

In a letter on behalf of the radical National Association for Gun Rights, Stockman alleged -- completely falsely -- that President Obama is working with the United Nations to implement gun “confiscation on a global scale” and an “international gun registry.” But Stockman’s extremist views don’t end there. “If babies had guns, they wouldn’t be aborted,” he famously quipped on Twitter. He also once organized an AR-15 giveaway.

In July, Stockman teamed up with a group led by a prominent neo-Confederate activist to submit an amicus brief to the Supreme Court challenging the government’s authority to prosecute straw purchases of firearms.

4. Anti-LGBT

Stockman denounced the 2012 reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act, from which he wanted to exclude protections for LGBT people: “This is a truly bad bill. This is helping the liberals, this is horrible. Unbelievable. What really bothers — it’s called a women’s act, but then they have men dressed up as women, they count that. Change-gender, or whatever. How is that — how is that a woman?” In an interview with a conservative talk show host, he made fun of transgender women by speaking in a high-pitched voice.

5. Immigration

The congressman has said that immigration reform is a tool “to destroy America,” calling the Senate reform bill a “joke” that will “destroy our country” and bring down the GOP. He even claimed that the Senate bill isunconstitutional and insisted [PDF] that the House refuse to vote on any bill regarding immigration.

Bonus:

After NRA board member Ted Nugent threatened the life of President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Stockman rewarded him with a ticket to the State of the Union Address.

WASHINGTON -- Sen. Ted Cruz says that he is expecting a vote Wednesday on his amendment to defund Obamacare until economic growth is restored, adding that he is willing to risk a government shutdown if Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) and President Barack Obama stand in the way.

In a joint press conference Wednesday morning with Sens. Mike Lee (R-Utah), James Inhofe (R-Okla.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.), Cruz urged members of Congress to include his Restore Growth First amendment in the continuing resolution to fund the government, telling his Republican colleagues in both chambers to join him in an "important stand for principle." Cruz then challenged Democrats to support the measure in order to avert a possible government shutdown.

"I think it's the right position for Republicans to be taking," Cruz said. "And I think it would be exactly the right decision to then send it back to Harry Reid and President Obama and ask if Harry Reid and President Obama are willing to try to shut the government down in order to insist that Obamacare be fully funded now even though it could well push us into a recession."

Cruz -- who has previously introduced legislation to fully repeal Obamacare -- added, "In my view, Obamacare should be repealed in its entirety. But at a minimum, Obamacare should not be implemented at a time when the economy is grasping [sic] for breath."

Cruz first raised the prospect of a government shutdown on Monday, when he told conservative radio host Laura Ingraham that, in order to delay Obamacare funding, "you've got to be willing to risk President Obama shutting down the government if he won't go along with it."

Cruz readily acknowledged Wednesday that his amendment is unlikely to pass the Senate, which is controlled by Democrats. But he argued that since there is a "very good chance" the continuing resolution will be amended in the Senate and sent back to the House, he would be "very encouraged" if the House included his amendment to defund the president's health care plan.

The House, however, declined to include an amendment to defund Obamacare when it passed a continuing resolution last Wednesday, despite more than two dozen Republicans pushing for such a provision.

On Tuesday, Rep. Jim Bridenstine (R-Okla.) also floated the idea of a possible government shutdown in order to force Democrats to agree to temporarily defund Obamacare, telling conservative radio pundit Mike Huckabee that "if they want to fund the government, they've got to defund Obamacare."

Since the health care law's passage in 2010, congressional Republicans have tried to repeal it more than 30 times.

Apparently every Democrat automatically despises the troops, even when those Democrats once volunteered to serve in the armed forces. It's a trope Republicans have pulled out ever since the Nixon years. The Obama era--replete with drone strikes, Libyan intervention, and the death of Osama bin Laden—has robbed Republicans of a bit of their bluster. But on Saturday Ted Cruz, the newly elected U.S. Senator from Texas, breathed new life into the old smear when he tarred two highly decorated former veterans.

A quick refresher about the two men he claims somehow oppose the U.S. military. In 1966, secretary of state nominee John Kerry, while studying at Yale University, enlisted in the U.S. Navy. In 1968, at the peak of the conflict, he requested to serve in Vietnam. The U.S. government ultimately awarded Kerry three Purple Hearts, a Bronze Star, and a Silver Star for his service. Contra the despicable Swift Boat ads trotted out in the 2004 presidential campaign, Kerry is indisputably a war hero.

In 1967, Chuck Hagel, the secretary of defense nominee, was called before the draft board and volunteered to serve in the U.S. Army. Hagel saw combat in  both Vietnam and Cambodia. Along with the shrapnel from a mine explosion still lodged in his chest, Hagel walked away from the war with two Purple Hearts and a host of other commendations.

The two men would later serve together in the U.S. Senate—Kerry as a Democrat, Hagel as a Republican. Neither voted consistently against the use of American forces abroad. Both, in fact, approved the resolution granting George W. Bush approval to pursue the foolish Iraq War. 

Yet for Ted Cruz, who never served in the military, both Kerry and Hagel are dangerous peaceniks who cannot be trusted. Cruz, who has quickly earned a reputation in Washington for serving up Michelle Bachmann-style red meat to the right-wing crowd, didn't elaborate on his statement on stage and ducked out of the conference without fielding questions from the media. But it's simple to see where his objection lies: President Obama nominated Kerry and Hagel. If a Democratic president has nominated you, you must loathe the military. And if you're just another chicken-hawk Republican, you must love it more.

Today, Texas Republican primary voters selected Ted Cruz as their candidate to replace retiring U.S. Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison (R-TX). Cruz, a former Solicitor General of Texas and law clerk to Chief Justice William Rehnquist, is among the nation’s most skilled Supreme Court advocates. Yet his considerable intellect is rivaled by his very poor judgment. Here are just five of the most revealing windows into Cruz’ Tea Party worldview:

1) Ted Cruz Believes George Soros Leads A United Nations Conspiracy To Eliminate Golf: In 1992, President George H.W. Bush joined the leaders of 177 other nations in endorsing a non-binding UN document known as Agenda 21. This twenty year-old document largely speaks at a very high level of generality about reducing poverty and building sustainable living environments. Nevertheless, Cruz published an article on his campaign website claiming that this non-binding document is actually a nefarious plot to “abolish ‘unsustainable’ environments, including golf courses, grazing pastures, and paved roads.” To top it off, Cruz lays the blame for this global anti-golf conspiracy at the feet of a well-known Tea Party boogieman — “The originator of this grand scheme is George Soros.”

2) Ted Cruz Wants To Gut Social Security: In an interview with the Texas Tribune Cruz labeled Social Security a “ponzi scheme” and outlined a three-step plan to gut this essential program. Cruz would raise the Social Security retirement age, cut future benefits, and implement a George W. Bush-style plan to privatize much of the program.

3) Ted Cruz Wants To Party Like It’s 1829: The Constitution provides that Acts of Congress “shall be the supreme law of the land,” and thus cannot be nullified by rogue state lawmakers. Cruz, however, co-authored an unconstitutional proposal claiming two or more states could simply ignore the Constitution’s command and nullify the Affordable Care Act so long as they work together.

4) Ted Cruz Is An Islamophobe: At a campaign event earlier this month, Cruz touted another of the Tea Party’s favorite conspiracy theories, claiming that “Sharia law is an enormous problem” in this country. Although it is common for far right politicians to claim that American law is somehow being replaced with Islamic law, these claims have absolutely no basis in reality.

5) Ted Cruz Campaigned On How He Helped Texas Kill A Mexican: Cruz’s very first campaign ad encouraged GOP primary voters to support him because he helped make it easier for Texas to kill an “illegal alien.”

Ted Cruz, the former Texas Solicitor General who gained the support of tea party groups in his campaign for U.S. Senate, has won the Republican primary runoff — virtually tantamount to election in deep-red Texas — in the race to succeed retiring GOP Sen. KayBailey Hutchison.

With 20 percent of precincts reporting, Cruz has 54 percent of the vote, compared to 46 percent for Lt. Gov. David Dewhurst, who had the support of Gov. Rick Perry and much of the state GOP establishment.