American Crossroads
Politico’s Morning Score reported today that California Senate candidate Lorettta Sanchez has thrown her support behind the DCCC’s third Congressional recruit for CA-21, Daniel Parra:
Sanchez recently found herself in hot water following an offensive Native American war cry at a campaign event. Parra should denounce Sanchez’s insulting remarks, but will he?
The Clinton campaign is continuing its media blackout that has been going on for 27 days, or roughly 39,000 minutes. While the former Secretary was in Mason City, IA attending a grassroots event with supporters, MSNBC ran a segment bashing the former Secretary for not answering questions.
It’s a day of the week that ends in “-day,” so Hillary Clinton’s unethical and out-of-touch behavior is at the center of the news. Check out 5 of the worst stories coming out of the Clinton campaign’s callous Friday afternoon news dump of their personal financial disclosure:
There’s a reason government officials can’t accept gifts: They tend to have a corrupting effect. True, Hillary Clinton wasn’t a government official at the time the money was given. But it is very, very, very hard to see six-figure speaking fees paid by longtime political boosters with interests before the government — to a woman who has been running for president since the last time she lost — as anything but a gift . . . And while most Democrats will shrug it off — or at least pretend to — it’s the kind of behavior voters should take into account when considering whether they want to give a candidate the unparalleled power of the presidency. It goes to the most important, hardest-to-predict characteristic in a president: judgment.
On Monday, Clinton will return to Iowa for events aimed at highlighting what she would do to help small businesses if elected president. As Clinton she ramps up her second presidential campaign, the former secretary of state has tried to introduce herself as a champion of the middle class and “everyday Americans,” but her wealth has repeatedly complicated that message. The filings also revealed, for instance, that the former secretary of state made close to $12 million from 51 speeches, while the former president fetched a slightly higher value on the 53 speeches he gave, for a total of more than $13 million . . . The Republican super PAC America Rising also knocked Bill Clinton for still accepting an Arkansas State government pension, even as he makes millions in paid gigs.
Since leaving her post as secretary of state, Hillary Clinton earned millions of dollars delivering 41 paid speeches in the U.S. to a variety of companies and organizations. At least 10 of those groups have been lobbying Congress and federal agencies on trade, an issue that has divided Democrats as the Obama administration pushes for a 12-nation pacific trade deal – and around which Hillary Clinton has remained mum.
Three days after revealing that her own husband-and-wife cottage industry brought in more than $30 million since the start of 2014, Hillary Clinton arrives in Iowa on Monday to pitch herself as an advocate for small business . . . Finding out where Clinton stands hasn’t been easy: The last time the Democratic frontrunner took questions from the press was four weeks ago today — April 20 in Keene, N.H. When she has spoken to reporters, it has been for a question or two at a time, generally shouted at the end of one of her roundtables. Her refusal to do the kind of extended press conference that would allow for follow up questions has led to protests from journalists and gibes from her Republican rivals.
Bill and Hillary Clinton have raked in at least $30 million since January 2014, according to financial disclosure forms released on Friday. The Clintons’ total haul for the past year was roughly $25 million, which is more than double the annual salary of the average Fortune 500 chief executive.
Since declaring for president, Hillary Clinton has highlighted the pay disparity between CEOs and “the average worker.” The Clintons’ staggering income, on the other hand, is simply what the hardworking power couple requires to pay their bills.
Russ Feingold famously refused outside money during his tenure as a U.S. Senator. So steadfast was Feingold’s belief that outside money was bad for politics that he told Politico in 2010 that he would “absolutely” rather lose than see outside groups air ads on his behalf. [Read more…]
Last Saturday, Democrat Ami Bera was the “top host on the invitation” for the event where Senate candidate Loretta Sanchez made her Native American “war cry” gesture, according to The Los Angeles Times. Will Bera stand up against the shocking gesture made by Sanchez or remain silent on her insulting actions?
By the way, this is not the first time Bera has been in hot water with an ethnicity for refusing to speak up. He refused to formally condemn the Indian government’s role in the 1984 massacre of the Sikhs during the 2014 campaign, sparking widespread criticism from Sikh leaders.
When will Hillary Clinton answer a question from the media?
That question was the general theme of this week’s Sunday show line up. It has been 26 days since Hillary Clinton answered a question from the media, and the former Secretary of State has answered a mere 9 questions since launching her second Presidential campaign six weeks ago.
Clinton’s silence on key issues like the Trans Pacific Partnership is starting to frustrate members of the media and Democrats alike.
On CBS Face The Nation, The Washington Post’s David Ignatius found Hillary Clinton’s silence on TPP ‘troubling’ and said it seemed like the former Secretary of State was running scared from the liberal wing of the Democratic Party.
Chuck Todd highlighted Clinton’s lack of accessibility with this graphic:
The Meet the Press panel that included former Obama campaign manger David Axelrod went on to bash Hillary Clinton’s lack of media accessibly.
The other story that dominated the Sunday shows, was the Friday news dump regarding the ‘dead broke’ Clintons netting $30 million since the beginning of 2014. ABC George Stephanopoulos called the number ‘eye-popping’.
While BuzzFeed D.C. bureau chief John Stanton said about Hillary Clintons reported earnings:
“I don’t think anybody thinks she understands what their life is like. She has been in the public eye for what 30 years really, and she is clearly a wealthy woman. This whole notion that she attempting to act like she was an everyman, was sort of a bad idea I thought at the outset and I don’t think it does much more than tell people yeah, she is super rich just like we thought she was.”
Here at America Rising, we are creative techniques to make life difficult for Clinton, and people are taking notice. This week, the front page of The New York Times featured how we’re making Democrats lose trust in Hillary Clinton.
This article was excerpted from The New York Times. Click here to read the full article online.
A Twitter post recently caught the eye of Bill McKibben, the environmental advocate and godfather of the Keystone XL pipeline protests. It included an image from “The Simpsons” showing Homer and his family basking in mountains of cash in their living room, followed by a report on Hillary Rodham Clinton’s appearing at a fund-raiser with a lobbyist from the Keystone fight.
Mr. McKibben’s environmental organization, 350.org, has been trying to raise awareness about the ties it sees between lobbyists for the oil pipeline and former aides to Mrs. Clinton. He promptly shared the post with his 150,000 Twitter followers, and the reaction was immediate.
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It was not another environmental organization or even a liberal challenger to Mrs. Clinton. Instead, it was a conservative group called America Rising PAC, which is trying, with laserlike focus, to weaken the woman who almost everyone believes will be the Democratic Party’s candidate for president in 2016.
For months now, America Rising has sent out a steady stream of posts on social media attacking Mrs. Clinton, some of them specifically designed to be spotted, and shared, by liberals. The posts highlight critiques of her connections to Wall Street and the Clinton Foundation and feature images of Democrats like Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York, interspersed with cartoon characters and pictures of Kevin Spacey, who plays the villain in “House of Cards.” And as they are read and shared, an anti-Clinton narrative is reinforced.
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Conservative strategists and operatives say they are simply filling a vacuum on the far left, as well as applying the lesson they learned in 2012, when they watched in frustration as Mitt Romney was forced to expend time and resources in a protracted primary fight. By the time he secured his party’s nomination, President Obama hardly had to make the case that his opponent was a coldhearted plutocrat; Republicans like Newt Gingrich had already made the argument for him in the primaries.
Few Republicans are more familiar with that nightmare than Matt Rhoades, who was Mr. Romney’s campaign manager. He founded America Rising in response to a recommendation contained in an autopsy of Romney’s failed presidential run that was ordered by the Republican National Committee. The group’s original goal was to compete with American Bridge, the Democratic opposition research group, but its focus under Mr. Rhoades has been to subject Mrs. Clinton to an ordeal similar to Mr. Romney’s.
“The idea is to make her life difficult in the primary and challenge her from the left,” said Colin Reed, America Rising’s executive director. “We don’t want her to enter the general election not having been pushed from the left, so if we have opportunities — creative ways, especially online — to push her from the left, we’ll do it just to show those folks who she needs to turn out that she’s not in line with them.”
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This year, Zac Moffatt, a co-founder of Targeted Victory, a right-leaning political technology firm, who handled Mr. Romney’s digital operation and has worked with groups like America Rising and American Crossroads, laid out the strategy in a memo to several clients. “There was a hole to fill in the market,” he said, and if Democrats were not willing to challenge Mrs. Clinton, Republicans could do it themselves.
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For example, as Mrs. Clinton was traveling through Las Vegas this month on a campaign swing, “liberal Democrats” (as identified by Targeted Victory’s voter file) in the Las Vegas area saw a video pop into their Facebook news feeds, highlighting recent news reports about foreign government donations to the Clinton Foundation. The video was shared by America Rising and received over 6,300 views, most from people who would never follow a group like America Rising on social media.
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This article was excerpted from The New York Times. Click here to read the full article online.
“For months now, America Rising has sent out a steady stream of posts on social media attacking Mrs. Clinton, some of them specifically designed to be spotted, and shared, by liberals. The posts highlight critiques of her connections to Wall Street and the Clinton Foundation and feature images of Democrats like Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Mayor Bill de Blasio of New York, interspersed with cartoon characters and pictures of Kevin Spacey, who plays the villain in “House of Cards.” And as they are read and shared, an anti-Clinton narrative is reinforced.”
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“‘The idea is to make her life difficult in the primary and challenge her from the left,’ said Colin Reed, America Rising’s executive director. ‘We don’t want her to enter the general election not having been pushed from the left, so if we have opportunities — creative ways, especially online — to push her from the left, we’ll do it just to show those folks who she needs to turn out that she’s not in line with them.’”
Click here to read the full article from the New York Times.
Last night we learned that the “dead broke” Clintons are actually anything but, according to Hillary Clinton’s latest personal financial disclosure. Aside from nearly doubling their income, with a staggering amount coming from paid speeches, we also found some other interesting factoids:
Hillary Clinton earned over $5 million from her 2014 memoir, Hard Choices.
Bill Clinton still gets an Arkansas State pension, even as taxpayers foot his $16 million post-presidency lifestyle.
Hillary Clinton is a trustee in 4 different trusts.
Hillary Clinton made almost $12 million from 51 speeches, 10 of them were abroad. That’s an average of over $230,000 per speech.
Bill Clinton made over $13 million from 53 speeches, 5 of them were abroad. That’s an average of $250,000 per speech.
The Clintons did not disclose their speeches when the fees went to the Clinton Foundation, despite government ethics regulations.
3 of Bill Clinton’s speeches abroad had a price tag of $500,000… each.
Since Hillary announced her candidacy for president, Bill has given 4 speeches (you know, to keep paying the bills).
The Clintons also opened a Vanguard 500 Index Mutual Fund in 2014. The fund includes holdings in some of the very companies Hillary and Democrats decry, including
Today, we learned that the Clintons, who Hillary Clinton claimed were “dead broke” and were struggling to pay for “mortgages for houses,” are “among the highest earners in the top 1% of the population.”
According to The New York Times, the Clintons have nearly doubled their income since her last disclosure, earning a modest $30 million since the beginning of 2014, including $25 million to give some speeches.
Well at least now Bill Clinton will be able to pay his bills!