Photograph by Pete Marovich/Bloomberg

Senator Rand Paul, a Republican from Kentucky, questions a witness during a Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations hearing in Washington, D.C., on May 21, 2013. Apple Inc. Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook defended his company’s use of offshore tax shelters before U.S. senators who castigated the most-valuable technology company for avoiding $9 billion and more in payments.

A small corner of hell may be freezing over.

Sen. Rand Paul, the Kentucky Republican and fierce Obama administration critic, today opposed a bill to provide arms to Syrian rebels with an argument that could have come straight from the White House. Officials there have resisted greater involvement in the two-year-old civil war between rebel groups and President Bashar al-Assad.

White House spokesman Jay Carney, asked about arming rebels on May 9, said the administration doesn’t want to “make decisions that inadvertently cause more chaos or more violence in Syria.”

Paul warned of the same danger during a Senate Foreign Relations Committee meeting to mark-up the bill.

“I’m concerned with the slippery slope to war,” Paul told fellow senators before the bill passed with a bipartisan boost, 15-3. It now goes to the Senate for a vote.

Paul wasn’t alone in his objections. Democratic Sens. Chris Murphy of Connecticut and Tom Udall of New Mexico also raised concerns.

“By arming, are we making the situation better?” Udall asked his colleagues.

Paul said U.S. officials don’t know enough about the opposition fighting the “murky” war. The bill would allow the U.S. to arm “people associated with al Qaeda” who are fighting against Assad, and U.S. weapons could also reach Islamists who target Christians, he suggested.

Either way, he said, there’s no way to be sure that any U.S. weapons reach “good, liberty-loving Jeffersonian democrats.”

Original post is Paul Echoes White House in Opposition to Arming Syrians by Political Capital.

Photograph by Scott Olson/Getty Images

A grain bin is relocated near Sumner, Iowa.

Senator Rand Paul heads to Iowa today for the start of what amounts to a presidential exploratory tour, one that’s bucking some party orthodoxy as he mulls a 2016 bid and seeks to expand his base beyond the limited-government Tea Party movement.

Of special interest to Iowans, Paul as a Senate candidate in 2010 expressed suspicion about federal farm subsidies received by virtually every farmer in Iowa. He now favors “means testing” for such assistance, he said in an interview.

At $23.6 billion, Iowa ranked second among states for total farm subsidy payments collected from 1995 through 2011, according to the Washington-based Environmental Working Group, a conservation-advocacy organization that tracks subsidies. The state is the biggest U.S. producer of corn and soybeans.

“I think there are people that know we are in such bad shape that we ought to see beyond parochial or personal or special interests,” he said. “I think the farm program is evolving toward fewer payments towards farmers.”

Read the full story here.

Original post is Paul Talks Farm Subsidies Ahead of Iowa Trip by Political Capital.

Photograph by Joe Raedle/Getty Images

American Airlines passengers wait in line for a flight at Miami International Airport on April 16, 2013 in Miami, Florida.

The Obama administration has warned that sequestration will lead to long delays for air travelers, but Congressional fliers still have one program that’s under the radar: Free airport parking.

“It’s about the only thing we got left,” said Sen. Saxby Chambliss, when he was asked about the congressional perk at Reagan National Airport on a recent Monday.

The free lot, with 92 spots, is nestled underneath the metro rails and is the closest lot to both the new and old terminals.

The fringe benefit dates back to when the federal government owned the region’s airports, including Reagan National and Dulles. It costs about $100,000 a year to man the security booth, said Rob Yingling, an airports authority spokesman. But those 92 spots could translate into $738,760 a year, at Reagan’s daily rate of $22.

“The operation of restricted parking spaces at Reagan National pre-dates the 1987 formation of the Airports Authority and is a courtesy extended to the diplomatic corps, members of Congress and Supreme Court justices, who are here conducting the nation’s business,” Yingling said.

“Any effects of federal sequestration on the operations of TSA (passenger and baggage screening), FAA (air traffic control), and CBP (international ports of entry) are completely separate from the Airports Authority’s operation of the airport facility,” he said.

Some lawmakers, like Chambliss and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, drive themselves. Others, like Sen. Robert Menendez, a Democrat from New Jersey, sometimes have their aides pick them up.

“This is something that has been going on for many years really,” said Rep. John Lewis, a Democrat from Georgia, stepping into a late-model Mercedes sedan.

“My staff person comes up and picks me up,” he said, which makes traveling to his congressional district “a little easier.”

Original post is Free Airport Parking: Lawmakers Enjoy D.C. Perk by Political Capital.

Photograph by Win McNamee/Getty Images

Sen. Rand Paul introduces his father, Republican presidential candidate Rep Ron Paul on January 2, 2012 in Davenport, Iowa.

Like father, like son?

Not if he knows what’s good for him, some are saying of Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky — suggesting that, for all the popularity his father enjoyed in his bids for a presidential nomination, he’ll need to find his own way to the Republican Party’s nod if he seeks it in 2016.

And look who’s spreading that news: Dad.

A Rand Paul White House Path Complicated By Dad’s Legacy – NPR (blog) bit.ly/13NomBk #RonPaul #tlot #tcot

— Ron Paul (@RonPaul_2012) April 22, 2013.

It makes for an interesting father-son chat about these political facts of life.

As Liz Halloran reports in the NPR dispatch that retired Rep. Ron Paul of Texas has shared on Twitter:

“Though many state-level Republicans who disdained his father, largely over his non-interventionist foreign policy stance and a demeanor they believed stopped short of presidential, are indicating a willingness to give the younger Paul a listen, they say he has work to do.”

“Ron Paul and his supporters have left a very bad taste in the mouth of many Republicans,” says Jeff Jorgensen, a Republican county chairman in Christian conservative western Iowa. “I don’t want anyone out there to get the impression that we’re throwing in with Rand Paul.”

And this:

“We are in turmoil at the state level,” says Jorgensen, the Pottawattamie County chairman, and a member of the state Central Committee. “But it appears that Ron Paul’s support in Iowa is trending down, and will continue to do so going into 2014.”

To do well in the Hawkeye State, he says, the younger Paul “has to distance himself from his dad’s people.”

Of course, as the younger Paul notes, simply saying you’re thinking about 2016 has the benefit of keeping you in the chatter about 2016. Just spell the name right.

Original post is Rand Paul’s Ron Paul Advice by Political Capital.

Original post is Rand Paul Eyes 2016 as Reaching Out on Immigration, Race by Political Capital.

Photograph by T.J. Kirkpatrick/Getty Images

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY), center, and Sen. John Isakson (R-GA) depart from a Senate subway car as Senate Republicans and Democrats head to their weekly policy luncheon on March 19, 2013 in Washington, DC.

Rand Paul, the Republican senator from Kentucky with a libertarian outlook and son of the retired congressman from Texas who ran for president with an appeal to libertarian instincts, says there is a goal for government.

Protecting your property.

“If you look at lawless parts of the world where there is no protection of property – where you can’t protect your property… you can’t borrow against that property, so no capital develops and there is no capitalism and there is no marketplace,” Paul says in an interview with National Public Radio’s “Tell Me More” airing today.

“So the government does have a role; they are an arbiter,” Paul says. “They are they the one who protects property, protects the sanctity and the name that goes and attaches to the house. They protect transactions. They protect commerce. There is a role for government.”

Paul, son of Texan Ron Paul, is setting out on his own quest for the Republican Party’s presidential nomination. He is taking his pitch to Iowa, addressing party activists there in May. And he is taking his pitch to places where Republicans haven’t fared well — he spoke this week on the campus of Howard University in Washington, one of the nation’s pre-eminent black colleges.

“I think, in some ways, they (Republicana) have sort of given up, and I’m here to say that the Republican Party, to be a national party, can’t give up on any ethnic group and can’t say to any ethnic group, ‘We don’t care about your vote.’ ” Paul says in his interview with NPR’s Michele Martin. “We need to be out there competing for the African-American vote.”

It’s not a reach, he suggests.

“I believe that our drug laws are too harsh, too long and unfair to minorities,” he says. “These aren’t things I say just because they might be popular at Howard, but I say them because I truly believe in them. And think these are issues that if it got out that not all Republicans weren’t the same, that there were Republicans who were interested in issues like this, I think all of a sudden you will see some of the African-American vote saying, ‘You know what, we believe in economic opportunity, we think high taxes are not good for the economy, we just thought Republicans didn’t like us for some other reason.”’

And while he’s at it, Paul promises to protect everyone’s property.

Original post is Rand Paul: Role of Government by Political Capital.

Photograph by Chris Maddaloni/CQ Roll Call

Members of Newtown, Ct. clergy set up more than 3,300 grave markers on the Mall during a 24-hour vigil to support the gun violence legislation.

What do Sens. Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire and Roger Wicker of Mississippi have in common?

The same thing that Sens. Mark Pryor of Arkansas and Mark Begich of Alaska have in common.

They bucked their parties today in allowing gun-control legislation to advance in the Senate.

The difference is that more Republicans sided with Ayotte and Wicker today in voting yes: 14 others.

No other Democrats sided with Pryor or Begich in voting no.

The vote, the first hard measure of congressional sentiment since the shootings in Newtown, Connecticut, that claimed the lives of 20 first-grade children and six educators  on Dec. 14, was 68-31. The Senate needed at least 60 votes to advance the legislation to debate. The Democrats who rule the Senate, with 53 Democratic seats and two caucus-supporting independents, couldn’t have done this today without Republican support.

The proponents of legislation that is likely to center around a bipartisan agreement for more background checks for gun-buyers crafted by Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Pat Toomey of Pennsylvania drew support from Republicans such as John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina as well as Mark Kirk of Illinois, Bob Corker of Tennessee and Johnny Isakson of Georgia.

Democrats Pryor and Begich  probably had something else on their minds today: They both face re-election in 2014.

There is a large cast of Republicans who opposed this vote who also have elections on their minds as well, including three for whom the 2016 bell may be ringing: Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, a newcomer to Washington, already is making the rounds of Republican primary states for 2016. Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, another prospect for the party’s 2016 presidential sweepstakes, also voted no. So did Kentucky’s Sen. Rand Paul, who has Iowa on his mind. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, focused on his 2014 re-election campaign, voted no as well — after initially threatening a filibuster fight.

In the end, it could serve the Democrats from Arkansas and Alaska who voted against this simple vote to advance a bill to debate with their voters back home.

It’s also possible that the Republicans with eyes on ’16 who voted no will be thanked for that in their party’s caucuses and primaries. Yet, it’s less certain how it may play among a general electorate, whom polls show supporting more thorough background checks for gun-buyers in the aftermath of one of the worst shootings in modern American history by a margin of 9-1.

Nine to one, sort of like 16-2 — 16 who also can read the polls.

Original post is Senate’s Gun-Control Rebels: 16-2 by Political Capital.

Photograph by Drew Angerer/Getty Images

Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) talks with a reporter outside the Senate chamber on Capitol Hill on March 22, 2013 in Washington, DC.

It’s never too early to book a dinner for the 2016 primary elections.

Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky already is lined up for the Iowa Republican Party’s Lincoln Day Dinner on May 10.

And now comes word from the Palmetto State that Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas will headline the South Carolina Republican Party’s Silver Elephant Dinner on May 3.

And, oh, the South Carolina Democrats already had landed Vice President Joe Biden for their fundraising dinner the same night.

“Elected in November, Cruz already is being mentioned as a possible presidential candidate,” the Post and Courier of Charleston notes. “Cruz’s visit will mark his first visit to an early presidential primary or caucus state.”

“The Republican banquet, the party’s main annual fundraiser, will also feature a tribute to former U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint, a Cruz endorser who resigned in December to head up the conservative Heritage Foundation.”

And as if South Carolina didn’t have enough going on this spring, former Gov. Mark Sanford appears on his way to rehabilitation from his “Appalachian Trail” adventure in a runoff today for his party’s nomination for an open House seat, as Bloomberg’s Greg Giroux reports.

Original post is Ted Cruz’s Silver Elephant Dinner: Debut Tour of 2016 Party Circuit by Political Capital.

Photograph by Alex Wong/Getty Images

Senator Rand Paul arrives to address the 40th annual Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) on March 14, 2013 in National Harbor, Maryland.

Rand Paul is getting things rolling early in Iowa, whose 2016 presidential nominating caucuses are still nearly four years away. The Kentucky Republican will be the keynoter at the Republican Party of Iowa’s annual Lincoln Day dinner on May 10 in Cedar Rapids.

The Des Moines Register takes note of the appointment — in a state whose Republicans ranked Paul’s father No. 3 in the 2012 caucuses — as a measure of how popular was the senator’s 13-hour drone-protesting filibuster on the Senate floor during the confirmation of John Brennan for CIA director. So says the party chairman.

The family already has a following there — Paul’s father Ron ran No. 3 in the 2012 caucuses in a close contest belatedly handed to former Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania. And the son is coming out of the American Conservative Union’s CPAC last weekend, where he narrowly placed first among many with 25 percent of the ballots in a straw poll that carries considerably less meaning than even Iowa’s Straw Poll.

The Register  quotes a Republican operative as calling the Iowa party “little more than a ‘Paul for President’ outpost.” State party chairman A.J. Spiker explained that Paul’s filibuster was his ticket:  “As the first-in-the-nation state, we immediately extended an invite to Senator Paul to allow him to introduce himself to Iowa Republicans,” Spiker said in a statement.

Santorum, not one to take no for an answer, is making his own Iowa appearances in April — a double-header on Tax Day, with lunch at the The John Paul II Medical Research Institute’s “Give Cures” event in Des Moines, and the other as keynoter at the Iowa Faith & Freedom Coalition that night at the Des Moines Christian School.

The Lincoln Dinner’s the big date, though. Others who have spoken include former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, the 2008 caucus winner, and Virginia’s Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli and Gov. Bob McDonnell.

Paul’s already talking about his date:

“People do get more attention when they go to Iowa,” Rand Paul says on CNN.

— John McCormick (@McCormickJohn) March 19, 2013.

 

Coyly, that is:

RT @cbellantoni: Wolf to Rand Paul: “Are you running for president?” Paul: “I haven’t made a decision.”

— Dylan Byers (@DylanByers) March 19, 2013

Original post is ‘Paul for President Outpost?’ – Iowa by Political Capital.

Photograph by Joe Klamar/AFP via Getty Images

Mariachi musicians sing and play as they go from house to house to encourage people to come to vote on election day at the Sun Valley’s Latino district, Los Angeles County, on November 6, 2012 in California.

The sudden openness of Republican leaders to an overhaul of immigration laws — including a path to either legal residency or citizenship for many of the 11 million undocumented immigrants already in the U.S. — stems from another “drubbing” at the polls.

With 71 percent of Hispanic voters casting their ballots for President Barack Obama in November, the Republican Party is hungry for inroads with an electorate who, according to surveys, find little identification with the party — just 22 percent of Hispanics identify themselves as Republican.

And as the debate gets underway on Capitol Hill this Spring, it’s worth remembering what Paul Taylor and fellow researchers at the Pew Research Center told us after November’s election:

The Hispanic electorate is likely to double by 2030.

By the numbers, the Pew Hispanic Center has found this in Census data, Election Day exit polling and its own national survey of Hispanic immigrants:

–  The nation’s 53 million Hispanics comprise 17 percent of the total U.S. population but just 10 percent of all voters last year. “To borrow a boxing metaphor, they still ‘punch below their weight.”’

– Their median age is 27 years—and just 18 years among native-born Hispanics—compared with 42 years for that of white non-Hispanics. In the coming decades, their share of the age-eligible electorate will rise markedly through generational replacement alone.

– Hispanics will account for 40 percent of the growth in the eligible electorate in the U.S. between now and 2030, at which time 40 million Hispanics will be eligible to vote, up from 23.7 million now.

– If 10 percent of all voters last year were Hispanic, it would mean that as many as 12.5 million Hispanics cast ballots. So what about the 40 million who did not vote or were not eligible to vote?

– 11.2 million are adults who were eligible to vote but chose not to.

– 5.4 million are adult legal permanent residents who could not vote because they have not yet become naturalized U.S. citizens. “The naturalization rate among legal immigrants from Latin America and the Caribbean trails that of other legal immigrants by a sizable margin—49 percent versus 72 percent — according to a Pew Hispanic analysis of the 2011 March Current Population Survey. The new Pew Hispanic survey finds that a major reason Hispanic immigrants naturalize is to gain civil and legal rights, including the right to vote. ”

– 17.6 million are under the age of 18. The vast majority (93 percent) of Latino youths are U.S-born citizens and thus will automatically become eligible to vote once they turn 18. Today, some 800,000 Latinos turn 18 each year. By 2030, this could grow to 1 million a year, adding a potential electorate of more than 16 million new Latino voters by 2030.

– Nine in 10 Hispanic immigrants who have not yet naturalized say they would if they could.

– 7.1 million are adult unauthorized immigrants and would become eligible to vote only if Congress were to pass a law creating a pathway to citizenship for them.

The analysis following the election by Taylor and colleagues at Pew also noted this: “Judging by the immediate post-election comments of leading Democratic and Republican lawmakers, the long-dormant prospects for passage of such legislation appear to have been revived by Latinos’ strong showing at the polls.”

A report this week from Republicans performing an autopsy on the 2012 election concluded that the party must “embrace and champion comprehensive” changes in the immigration laws.  “If we do not, our party’s appeal will continue to shrink to its core constituencies only,” it says. “Comprehensive immigration reform is consistent with Republican economic policies that promote job growth and opportunity for all.”

Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, a champion of the Tea Party, plans to take a stand for citizenship today, in an address to the Hispanic Chamber of Congress. It’ll be noteworthy to see how many of his followers “Stand with Rand” on this one.

While the poor performance of the Republican Party at the polls last fall has generated great interest in finding a way to connect with more Hispanics by 2016 and beyond, which is likely to make more Hispanics eligible to vote — many more by 2030 — as things stand today, he dynamic poses another problem for the Republican Party, helping explain some of the wariness underlying the debate underway.

Original post is Hispanic Electorate Doubles Republican Party’s Troubles by Political Capital.