Ted Cruz

Did California save Ted Cruz?

November 13, 2018 By Jon Coupal Leave a Comment

Chuck DeVore is just one of thousands of former Californians who have moved to Texas. But DeVore is unique. Not only did he serve in the California Assembly, but he remains heavily engaged in policy issues as Vice President of National Initiatives at the Texas Public Policy Foundation, a free market think tank based in Austin.

DeVore is a frequent guest on national television shows to speak on economic issues, including how progressive policies suppress economic growth. Moreover, he has firsthand experience with the movement of people and money between the two economic titans, California and Texas.

The migration of businesses from California to Texas is well-documented. Big names, like Charles Schwab, Campbell’s Soup, Burger King, Waste Management and other billion-dollar businesses severed their California connections for Lone Star liberty. In fact, it was entertaining to watch the sparring between then-Texas Governor Rick Perry — who frequented California to poach businesses from California — and the Golden State’s own Jerry Brown who tried to portray Texas as hick-country governed by a buffoon.

More than just businesses, it is people who have left California in numbers significantly larger than those coming in from other states. From 2007 to 2016, California has experienced net domestic out-migration of a million citizens, and the number-one destination? You guessed it. Texas. Of course, that doesn’t mean that California has lost population, in fact it has gained. But those gains have come from immigration – both documented and otherwise — and new births.

To read the entire column, please click here.

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Chuck DeVore, Jon Coupal, Ted Cruz, Texas

Ted Cruz Gets Yelled At By California RNC Delegates – VIDEO

July 26, 2016 By CPR Editors 1 Comment

In the following clip from Showtime’s Circus, Ted Cruz gets heckled and booed by California delegates on the floor, directly in front of him, at the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, as he makes his “vote your conscience” non-endorsement of Donald Trump. (Thank you to delegation member Greg Flap Cole.)

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Donald Trump, RNC, Ted Cruz

Never Mind Never Trump

June 2, 2016 By Bill Saracino 13 Comments

To do a brief full disclosure, I was a national director of the Super PAC which created the Draft Ben Carson for President movement and, after he officially announced his candidacy, the Super PAC (2016 Committee) supporting that candidacy. After Carson withdrew I wanted to support Marco Rubio, but he imploded shortly after Carson, so for about a nano-second I was the congressional district chairman for Ted Cruz in my Glendale, CA based congressional district.

That means Donald Trump was my fourth choice for president. He is now my first choice, indeed the only choice that makes any sense. He is the only choice that gives hope that America and her traditional freedoms will not be thrown down the rat hole represented by putting another Democrat in the Oval Office on January 20, 2017.

Since Trump clinched the nomination thousands of trees and millions of electrons have been sacrificed to document the nascent (for UCLA grads that means “new”) “Never Trump” movement among Republicans. There are some well-meaning activists, supporters of one or more of the other 147 GOP candidates for president, among the Neverland folks. Many newbies to the political process among them, their disappointment is palpable and understandable. They get a pass. What is not excusable is, for lack of a better definition, the “conservative establishment” types who are spearheading and cheerleading for the NeverTrump, Neverland crusaders.

I know most of the NeverTrump/Neverland folks. I’ve worked with some of them. A smaller group of them I consider friends. That said, with very few exceptions the NeverTrump leadership (largely confined to the East Coast) consists of navel gazing, thumb sucking narcissists. Most of them have never run for office or been in a hands-on position in a winning political campaign. I wouldn’t trust them to win a municipal water board campaign in California.

But they are “very important people” and “deep thinkers” – just ask them. In fact, you don’t need to ask them, they’ll tell you…over and over again. They are mad as Hell that the Republican primary voters did not follow instructions. So to punish the GOP plebeians who disobeyed orders and nominated someone outside the acceptable Conservative Caste, these conservative “leaders” are willing to turn the country, and most importantly the Supreme Court, over to Hillary/Bernie/Joe, all of whom would govern as Obama’s third term.

As my dear old friend John Nolan used to say, “stupid, stupid, stupid. I am so tired of stupidity!” (Side note to personal and political friends, John Nolan was Pat’s father).

I am hardly blind to Donald Trump’s deficiencies as the ideal conservative or even ideal Republican. But neither am I blind to the fact that one – and only one – issue truly matters for the future of the country, and that is the future of the Supreme Court of the United States.

Like it or not SCOTUS is where the action is in re: determining the future direction of American governance. For the past 40 years, from Roe v. Wade through Kelo (eminent domain) to gay “marriage” and Obamacare, the left has won its most significant victories in SCOTUS – victories it could never have won at the ballot box. Sadly but truly, SCOTUS has had and will continue to have much more influence on America than any majority in Congress.

The next president is likely to have at last two and perhaps four appointments to SCOTUS. Given the current 4–4 balance in SCOTUS, the next president will set the ideological balance for the next 20–30 years, and that ideological majority will form America’s politics, mores and future … until most of you reading this column are dead.

We cannot be sure what kind of appointees we’d get from President Trump, but we most certainly can be sure what we’d get from Hillary/Bernie/Joe – far left ideologues who would pave the way for America’s descent into a dark, extended nightmare of socialist tyranny.

My NeverTrump-Neverland friends rightfully point out that there’s no assurance that Trump’s appointees would be stellar conservative constitutionalists. They are right of course. SCOTUS appointments are notoriously fickle. Hence Ronald Reagan’s huge mistake in putting Sandra Day O’Connor on the bench juxtaposed with George H.W. Bush’s enormous favor to America in adding Clarence Thomas to the Court. So who was the better conservative in that trade-off?

Here’s the exercise I want Trump deniers to do. Pick a number between one and one hundred, said number representing what you think are the odds that President Trump would put good judges on SCOTUS. Then pick a similar number for Hillary/Bernie/Joe. This is a trick question, as it really doesn’t matter what number you chose for Trump. His number is going to be bigger than the Democrats’ number, which is zero. That is game, set and match for me.

There are many other issues on this topic worthy of discussion, and I will do my best in future columns to do justice to both the pro and anti Trump viewpoints. I will close with a quote from the always wise Dennis Prager, who recently wrote: “I just don’t understand how anyone who understands the threat the left and the Democrats pose to America will refuse to vote for the only person who can stop them.”

Bill Saracino is a member of the Editorial Board of CA Political Review.

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Ben Carson, Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, Marco Rubio, SCOTUS, Ted Cruz

Cruz’s Fiorina Pick a Play for California

April 29, 2016 By Joel Fox 3 Comments

Ted Cruz’s choice for vice-president was made with California in mind.

With Donald Trump running swiftly toward the nomination, his closest rival, Senator Ted Cruz, tried to grab the spotlight by naming his vice-presidential nominee, former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina.

Fiorina, off a presidential run of her own, has a California pedigree, although the Silicon Valley executive decamped to Virginia after losing the United States Senate contest to Democrat Barbara Boxer in 2010.

However, that senate run may have a lot to do with Fiorina’s early selection by Cruz as his running mate.

Cruz (and the rest of the No-on-Trump GOP) is running out of time to prevent Trump from gaining the necessary delegates and forcing a contested convention in Cleveland. California is the big prize with 172 delegates. A strong showing by Trump in California could shut the door on the hopes of those who don’t want Trump to be the nominee.

But, it is important to know that California delegates are selected mainly by a candidate winning the Republican vote in each congressional district. Only registered Republicans can vote in the California Republican presidential primary.

Despite Fiorina losing to Boxer by a million votes out of about 9.5 million votes cast in 2010 (Boxer 52%; Fiorina 42%), Fiorina defeated Boxer in 20 of California’s 53 congressional districts. The county map shown here shows Boxer’s strength (in blue) mostly along the coast and Fiorina’s victories (in red) generally inland.

Testing Fiorina’s strength in the closed Republican Primary of 2010, she captured all but five congressional districts won by former Congressman and State Finance Director, Tom Campbell, in the Bay Area — most likely Kasich country in the coming GOP primary.

The question for the Cruz campaign: will Fiorina’s 2010 effort in the congressional districts translate to the 2016 presidential campaign?

Fiorina is a good speaker and can connect with Republican voters when given the opportunity. The Cruz campaign has the best ground game in the state of all the Republican candidates so that should help.

Cruz’s gamble is that enough California voters remember Fiorina fondly to support his campaign so that he can grab enough congressional districts to stop Trump from getting the necessary delegates the New Yorker needs to prevent a convention fight.

Given the track record of California voters’ lack of knowledge about political contests once those contests have passed, that is a long bet. Maybe the Republican faithful will make a difference this time.

Originally published by Fox and Hounds Daily

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: carly fiorina, Donald Trump, Ted Cruz

Effort to thwart terrorism must start at the U.S. border

March 31, 2016 By Susan Shelley 2 Comments

Nearly 15 years after the 9/11 attacks, we are still debating what to do to fight terrorism.

Following the attacks in Brussels, President Obama called for bringing the killers to justice, Donald Trump called for waterboarding captured terrorists, and Hillary Clinton called for increased surveillance and interception of communications.

Ted Cruz wants proactive policing in Muslim communities to uncover radicalism, Bernie Sanders wants the international community to come together, and John Kasich wants heads of state to assemble teams to examine vulnerabilities and close security gaps.

Cruz would try “carpet bombing” ISIS territory and Trump would use overwhelming military power against the Islamic State.

Trump also would control the borders more tightly, an idea derided by Clinton, who said America doesn’t “hide behind walls.”

We’ll see.

There are problems with every approach. Overwhelming military force leaves unanswered the question, “And then what?” Will we permanently station U.S. troops to hold the territory and protect the innocent population from the seething rage of rival factions? It’s an option some have supported in the past. Others have waited in line for six hours to rally for candidates who are against it.

The plan to bring terrorists to justice suffers from two major problems. Arresting a terrorist seems only to create a job opening in the organization. And U.S. courts are not friendly to secret intelligence sources or coerced confessions. It’s easy to sneer at “reading terrorists their Miranda rights,” but our justice system protects the rights of the accused, and if we weaken those protections, we all will be at greater risk of wrongful convictions.

Military tribunals are an option for captured foreign terrorists, but Obama wants to close the prison at Guantanamo, which may complicate the process.

Increased surveillance of communications and “pro-active policing” risk further violating the rights of innocent Americans. The Fourth Amendment guarantees the right to be secure from unreasonable searches and seizures and requires the government to get a search warrant. The Fourth Amendment survived the Civil War, the First World War, the Second World War, the Korean War, the Vietnam War and the Cold War. Are we going to lose it in a war against terrorists?

It’s a great idea to have international cooperation and to close security gaps. We’ve been trying to do that for a lot longer than 15 years.

That leaves border control. There is room for improvement on that.

Rep. Ron DeSantis, R-Fla., chairman of the House Subcommittee on National Security, recently held a hearing on the use of asylum claims to avoid deportation. It has long been U.S. policy to allow immigrants, particularly women and children from Central America, to stay in the United States if they assert that they have a credible fear of persecution at home.

In the past, many asylum seekers who entered the U.S. illegally were held in custody until their cases were heard in court, but in 2009 Obama changed that policy. Now anyone who says the magic words “credible fear of persecution” is released and given permission to work in the U.S.

Last year, hundreds of immigrants from Egypt, Somalia, Pakistan, Iran and Syria who were caught entering the U.S. were able to stay in the country by saying those magic words.

“Dangerous criminals and potential terrorists are gaming the system without consequence,” DeSantis said. “These numbers illustrate vulnerabilities throughout our immigration system.”

We could probably tighten that up pretty quickly. But first we need a president who thinks it’s a problem.

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Border security, Donald Trump, Fourth Amendment, Hillary Clinton, Immigration, Susan Shelley, Ted Cruz, Terrorism

Trump Has Big Lead in New California Poll

March 17, 2016 By James V. Lacy 33 Comments

In a new poll on the eve of two crucial primary votes in Ohio and Florida, Donald J. Trump has a commanding lead among Republicans in California, which is the state with the largest single remaining source of delegates on the path to the Party’s nomination for President.

When matched with his three other contenders: Ted Cruz, John Kasich, and Marco Rubio, Trump wins the “closed” California Republican primary with 38.3% of the GOP vote, compared to 22.4% for Cruz, 19.7% for Kasich, and 10.1% for Rubio. Voters registering an “undecided” opinion were 9.6%. Trump’s almost 16% advantage over Cruz is statistically significant and well above the margin of error of the poll, which is 4.8%. The poll results demonstrate that Trump’s standing among Republicans in the Golden State has grown significantly in the last two months. (In January, in a similar poll using a smaller sample size, the Field Organization pegged Ted Cruz as the leader in California, 25% to 23% for Trump.) Trump’s lead is commanding in all four “Board of Equalization” districts across the state, suggesting if the election were held today, that he would win in virtually all of the state’s Congressional Districts and capture all of the state’s delegates.

A total of 172 delegates to the Republican National Convention are up for grabs in the 2016 California primary election, more than 7% of all delegates who will decide the next Republican Presidential nominee, and 14% of the delegates needed to win the nomination.

The poll was commissioned by Landslide Communications. This new Landslide Communication’s California Poll of Republican Presidential Preferences of likely Republican voters in the 2016 primary election is the second such poll to be released. In early February, 2015, Landslide released a similar poll showing Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker leading in the state, with similar results confirmed in a subsequent Field Organization poll a week later using a smaller sample size.

Poll Frequencies, NSON Opinion Research’s Summary, and Demographic Cross Tabs are available for download at the end of this article.

Further Details on Landslide’s California Poll appear below.

California’s importance in 2016 Presidential election to Republicans:

California is a decidedly “blue” state in which Democratic Governor Jerry Brown recently won re-election by over one million votes, bucking a national trend that favored Republicans. And a Republican candidate for President has not won the state of California since 1988.

However, because California is the largest state in the union by population, with 53 Congressional districts, California has a very large delegation up for grabs for GOP presidential contenders at the next Republican National Convention.

There will likely be a total of 2,461 delegates at the 2016 GOP Convention. California is allotted 172 of those delegates, about 7% of the total. Of California’s delegates, 10 are awarded to the candidate who wins the statewide vote. In addition, a candidate who finishes first in any one of California’s 53 Congressional districts is awarded 3 delegates. The state party chairman and two national committee members are also delegates. The winning margin at the Republican National Convention will be 1,230 delegates. Theoretically, a candidate who could sweep California’s Republican Presidential primary election could count on the state to deliver just over 14% of the total delegates needed for victory.

List of Presidential contenders in poll:

Poll participants were read a randomized list of the 4 candidates to choose from.

Poll questions:

The poll questions were prepared by James V. Lacy, Managing Partner of Landslide Communications, Inc. Landslide is one of the largest producers of election slate mail in California. Lacy is the author of the book “Taxifornia” and editor and contributing author of “Taxifornia 2016: 14 Essays on the Future of California” available at Amazon.com, and is a frequent guest commentator on California issues on Fox Business News Channel’s “Varney & Company.” Lacy is also an election law and nonprofit organization attorney through his law firm, Wewer & Lacy, LLP, and is a recipient of the American Association of Political Consultant’s “Pollie” Award. Lacy is not associated with any Presidential campaign. Landslide Communications, Inc., has a history of conducting polls in California, including presidential polling and in the 52^nd Congressional District race in 2014 between incumbent Scott Peters and Republican challenger Carl DeMaio.

Interview list:

The list used to make the calls was based on a sophisticated, representative election turn-out model for likely Republican voters in the 2016 California Presidential primary election prepared by Political Data, Inc., located in Norwalk, a respected source of voter files.

To account for a slight bias in the delegate selection process that awards a small “bonus” pool of delegates based on the statewide result, the interview list was balanced for region by Board of Equalization District, with the two more Republican leaning BOE districts of four having marginally more interviews reflected in the statewide total than average, to most accurately reflect the opinion of California’s Republican population.

Interviews and data compilation:

The poll questions were completed by 407 likely Republican voters in the 2016 California Presidential primary election based on Political Data’s model. (The Landslide Communication’s sample size is 25% larger than the sample size used by the Field Organization for similar polling in California.) The sample size is considered large enough by NSON Opinion Strategy, a respected strategic public opinion research company based in Salt Lake City, Utah, to offer statistical significance in outcome, with +/- 4.8% margin of error at a 95% confidence level statewide. Telephone survey interviews were conducted statewide over two days from Wednesday, March 9th through Thursday, March 10th, by NSON Opinion Strategy.

A summary of the poll prepared by NSON, along with “frequencies” and “crosstabs” may be downloaded below.

For comment, please contact James V. Lacy at 714-878-6191.

James V. Lacy is publisher of California Political Review.

CA Rep Pres Pri – Frequencies

16′ CA GOP Presidential Primary Poll (March)

CA Rep Pres Pri – Crosstab Tables

Filed Under: Top Stories Tagged With: Donald Trump, Election 2016, GOP, GOP Convention, James Lacy, John Kasich, Landslide Communications, Presidential Primary, Ted Cruz