A former US Attorney who resigned in the wake of the ATF’s botched ‘Fast and Furious’ operation called Sen. Chuck Grassley’s staff “willing stooges for the Gun Lobby.”
Watch Cain’s ‘Major Announcement’ Live right here. Scheduled to start at 12 noon ET, with Cain speaking around 1 PM.
Influential Republican Rep. Steve King of Iowa says the Cain campaign is dead — no matter what the candidate actually says today.
You’ll note that Herman Cain didn’t drop out of the presidential campaign. He “suspended” his campaign. And that’s not just a spinny weasel word. It has significant campaign finance implications. For one, it means he can continue to raise money.
In certain cases I believe but I have not yet been able to confirm that ‘suspending’ can leave a candidate eligible for matching funds, under certain circumstances. Again, we’re still trying to confirm this latter point. And we’ll update you when we do.
Here’s a good way to visualize the entirety of Cain’s campaign.
Earlier today, we asked whether formally ‘suspending’ his campaign might still allow Herman Cain to get matching funds for his campaign. Our reporter on the campaign finance beat, Ryan Reilly, got hold of campaign finance law expert Joseph M. Birkenstock.
Here’s his answer:
“Obviously you can only get matching funds to actively run the campaign… The question isn’t only whether you can get them, but whether you can use them. You can only spend the matching funds on a qualified campaign expense. If you’re not actively campaigning, the only thing that would be a qualifying expense is a winding down expense… So the cost involved in laying people off and shutting down offices. Having enough facts to support the conclusion that what you’re doing counts as a qualified expense can be pretty tricky.”
In case you didn’t know there’s a sorta debate tonight on Fox News. It’s basically a quick round-robin type interview on Mike Huckabee’s Fox show where Huck and a panel do little mini-interviews with each successive candidate.
Newt …
8:09 PM: Newt’s campaign made sure to send ‘Good Newt’ tonight, pretty cool and polished, making good reference to his knowledge of the workings of the federal government without seeming pompous. I think if you’re a Republican looking to be reassured that Newt’s got his feet on the ground and himself under control, you probably think he’s doing pretty well.
8:19 PM: Newt finishing up. Think he did pretty well.
Santorum ….
8:29 PM: It seems he’s pro-life. Now the AG of Florida (one of the questioners) is flipping out over water standards that are strangling Florida.
Perry …
8:39 PM: Perry seems to have gotten himself in a bit of a jam saying he could basically abolish ‘Obamacare’ with an executive order on day one. Ken Cuccinelli, Virginia AG, seized on this, seeming to realize this didn’t make any sense. Now, Mitt Romney has repeatedly said he’d basically give a waiver to every state on day one in office. And that would severely hobble the law. The key though is that Perry didn’t seem to know that he couldn’t just do something like a executive order veto. He fell back on saying he’d have ultra-politicized appointees who’d undermine the law. But Cuccinelli was right on this. Perry muffed it.
And now Bachmann …
Okay, forget about Bachmann. She’s being silly. But the real stand-out here is Ken Cuccinelli, the very right-wing Attorney General of Virginia. With candidate after candidate he’s asking really sharp and probing questions and even more the follow-ups — pretty much in each case pressing candidates when it’s clear they don’t really understand or aren’t paying attention to the basics of constitutional law or really obvious questions about relations between the states and between the states and the federal government.
Like pretty much every Republican candidate, Bachmann says she wants to abolish the EPA. Then Cuccinelli asked, well, what about when states have a dispute between them? What about when Ohio’s plants are sending pollution into Pennsylvania? She vaguely said that this could be handled on a case by case basis. But a special law every time this happened, he shot back? Obviously that didn’t make sense. He didn’t press the point past the point when it was obvious She really hadn’t considered the question. He had a similar exchange with Perry. Maybe Cuccinelli should be nominee.
And Mitt, bringing up the rear …
9:33 PM: Mitt starts off saying that the EPA is the president’s tool to destroy the free enterprise system and prevent economic growth.
9:35 PM: Romney says federal government does have a role in federal government: attacking teachers’ unions.