gop primary

Hosted by Charlie Sykes.

Dan Crenshaw, a 33-year-old former Navy SEAL, won the GOP primary runoff election in Texas's second congressional district on Tuesday night. With 90 percent of precincts reporting, Crenshaw led his opponent, state representative Kevin Roberts, 70 percent to 30 percent.

For two weeks now Donald Trump has been whining that he is the victim of sinister, shadowy forces colluding to deny him the Republican presidential nomination. This miniature campaign began with an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal in which Trump complained about the Colorado convention, calling it…

Indianapolis

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with senior writer John McCormack on his recent piece about the remaining GOP contests leading up to the Cleveland convention.

Is Donald Trump as good at making deals as he says? He’d better be or his chances of winning the Republican presidential nomination are likely to vanish before his eyes.

Of all the arguments against Donald Trump, the softest has been his poor prospects for victory in the general election. True, he has consistently polled worse against Hillary Clinton than have Ted Cruz, John Kasich, and virtually every other person who ran. But polls change. And if Trump were to…

On CNN's Out Front with Erin Burnett last night, the boss challenged Donald Trump's senior aide Ed Brookover on charges the Trump campaign made in the wake of its humiliating loss to Ted Cruz in Wisconsin on Tuesday. Joining them was Kellyanne Conway, who heads Ted Cruz's super PAC.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with editor William Kristol on Trump's big loss in the Wisconsin primary.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with staff writer Jay Cost on the state of the 2016 GOP nomination.

The WEEKLY STANDARD Podcast with editor William Kristol on the state of the GOP primary race, and what Ted Cruz and Marco Rubio need to do to challenge Trump on super Tuesday.

Vox's Ezra Klein wrote a good piece of analysis Monday about how unpredictable politics has become. He notes that the four surprising political developments we've seen in the last few months—Speaker of the House John Boehner resigning from Congress, and Scott Walker dropping out of the presidential…

Rand Paul announced his candidacy for president this week, and the libertarian Republican was immediately greeted by a chorus of doomsayers. NBC News went with the headline, "Why Rand Paul Probably Can't Win Republican Nomination." Dick Morris says, "Rand Paul can’t win." The New York Times's Nate…

Ben Sasse has just won a decisive victory in the Nebraska Republican Senate primary. As of this writing, the race has been called by the Associated Press and Sasse holds a 27 point lead over his nearest competitor, with 79 percent of precincts reporting. Having clinched the primary win, early…

The New York Times is up with a story today, "Tea Party Activists See Own Groups Among Washington Adversaries," about the supposed tension between national Tea Party groups and local Tea Party activists. The lede of the piece involves an anecdote -- and I use that term loosely, as it seems to bear…

Republican congressman Paul Broun, who is running for the U.S. Senate in Georgia, has paid part of his annual taxpayer-funded budget as a House member on a campaign consultant company.

Washington Free Beacon: "Veteran of the Charlie Sheen media campaign joins Team Obama"

James Lileks: "The Toll"

Derek Thompson: "The Collapse of Print Advertising in 1 Graph"

Phil Klein: " Romney aces Florida test"

Austin Ameican Statesman: "Perry stays in presidential race, says it 'wasn't a hard decision'"

As voters get their first formal chance to weigh in on the Republican presidential nomination process, here are five questions that will be answered during tonight’s Iowa caucuses:

It’s likely that no candidate will win so much as 30 percent of the votes cast in Tuesday’s Iowa caucuses. Yet you can bet that the press corps will crown as the big winner the candidate who gets perhaps one-quarter of the votes of caucus-goers in a state that’s half the size of the average…

Suffolk reports on its latest poll of likely voters in New Hampshire's first in the nation primary:

The Virginia Republican Party is apparently planning to require voters in the March 6 Virginia GOP presidential primary to sign a form that says, “I, the undersigned, pledge that I intend to support the nominee of the Republican Party for president.”

1. I thought Newt Gingrich did not do well. Not just when he defended his (essentially indefensible) work at Freddie Mac, but also when he cited FDR as a model for how he would handle the court. Terrible argument, one that any self-proclaimed constitutional conservative should be concerned about.

My better half stumbles across some interesting reports from people in New Hampshire:

According to the latest Gallup poll, support for Newt Gingrich has dropped from 37 percent to 31 percent in just the course of a week. He still maintains a comfortable lead over Romney, whose support has held steady at 22 percent in Gallup's poll. However, the rapid drop suggests that maybe some of…

The Hill: "Dem lawmaker blasts ‘Professor Obama’ as arrogant, alienating"

Gallup’s polling of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents now shows Newt Gingrich with a 15-point lead over runner-up Mitt Romney — 37 to 22 percent. In the previous Gallup poll, taken three weeks ago, Gingrich led Romney by just 1 point — 22 to 21 percent.  Gingrich appears to have…

Nate Silver: "The Buyer’s Remorse Primary"

Mark McKinnon: "Chris Christie's Best Reason to Run"

Despite continued claims that he’s not running for the White House, credible news outlets continue to report that Chris Christie is still considering running for president. But should he run?

The Associated Press reports: 

In the Wall Street Journal, Karl Rove previews tonight’s debate, saying that it “presents opportunities and dangers for each candidate.”  Rove writes that Rick Perry “has had two okay-to-mediocre debate performances,” which “is dangerous.”  He says that Perry needs to convey that he would be a good…

A CBS News/New York Times poll taken from September 10th-15th (both before and after the most recent debate) shows Rick Perry with a 7-point edge (23 to 16 percent) over Mitt Romney among registered voters who intend to vote in a Republican primary or caucus. Newt Gingrich has moved into a tie with…

Yesterday, the Des Moines Register reported that former New York governor George Pataki, who has been considering a run for the Republican nomination for president, will travel to Iowa's Polk County this weekend for a local GOP fundraiser:

GOP presidential candidate Mitt Romney told Fox News's Neil Cavuto this afternoon that he will reveal his plan on job creation on September 6, the same week President Obama is set to unveil his own. Romney's speech is part of a strategy to "pick up the pace" in a new phase of the campaign.

Gallup is out with a new poll showing four of the Republican candidates for president beating or within striking distance of Barack Obama among registered voters. Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney has the greatest advantage, beating Obama 48 percent to 46 percent.

A day after Sarah Palin released a campaign-like video documenting her recent trip to Iowa, veteran campaigner and former George W. Bush adviser Karl Rove said he believes the former Alaska governor will enter the race for president. Byron York at the Washington Examiner reports:

The big GOP primary news of the day is Jon Huntsman's surprisingly strong showing in the straw poll at the Republican Leadership Conference in New Orleans: