• George W. Bush Campaigning in Close Senate Races
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[url]http://www.nytimes.com/2016/06/17/us/politics/george-w-bush-gop-fundraising.html[/url] [QUOTE]After eight years of largely abstaining from politics, former President George W. Bush is throwing himself into an effort to save his party’s most vulnerable senators, including several whose re-election campaigns have been made more difficult by Donald J. Trump’s presence at the top of the ticket. In the weeks since Mr. Trump emerged as the party’s presumptive presidential nominee, Mr. Bush has headlined fund-raisers for two Republican senators and has made plans to help three more. Among them are Senators John McCain of Arizona, who was one of Mr. Trump’s earliest targets of derision, and Kelly Ayotte of New Hampshire, who has struggled to respond to Mr. Trump’s inflammatory talk. Friends say that the former president is deeply bothered by Mr. Trump’s campaign message, especially his derogatory remarks about Muslims and immigrants. At the event with Mr. McCain, Mr. Bush stressed the importance of preserving the Republican-held Senate as a “check and balance” on the White House, suggesting that such a check was needed, whether the next president is Mr. Trump or Hillary Clinton, the presumptive Democratic nominee. Mr. Bush announced through a spokesman last month that he would not support Mr. Trump’s candidacy and would not attend the Republican convention in Cleveland next month. His father, former President George Bush, and his brother Jeb Bush, who was defeated and ridiculed by Mr. Trump in the primary campaign, are also staying away. It has been a painful year for the Bushes, as Mr. Trump has not only upended the party that they dominated for decades but has done so by publicly repudiating the 43rd president’s legacy. Mr. Trump denounced the 2003 invasion of Iraq as a foreign policy disaster, blamed Mr. Bush for the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, and painted his presidency as a failure. Yet Mr. Trump suffered little backlash from voters in the Republican primaries as a result.[/QUOTE] [QUOTE]Next week, he will appear in St. Louis at a fund-raiser for Senator Roy Blunt of Missouri. And similar events are being planned for Senators Ron Johnson of Wisconsin and Rob Portman of Ohio. “I’m pleased he is coming,” Mr. Blunt said in a brief interview this week on Capitol Hill. He added: “He hasn’t given a political speech since he left, so I am interested to hear what he has to say. In Missouri he is still very popular, as he is more and more all over the country.” Mr. Johnson said he was looking forward to his reception with Mr. Bush, in part because he has never even had a conversation with the former president, underscoring how much Mr. Bush has withdrawn from politics.[/QUOTE] [QUOTE]The support from Mr. Bush also reflects his rising standing. He was toxic to his own party in the final years of his presidency and left the White House deeply unpopular after two wars and a financial collapse that plunged the nation into recession. Few candidates were clamoring for his help. Outside of helping his brother and his nephew, George P. Bush, the Texas land commissioner, and his friend Ed Gillespie in a Virginia Senate race, Mr. Bush has largely stayed away from campaigns since returning to Texas in 2009, writing only a handful of personal checks for candidates who visited his Dallas office. But 47 percent of people nationally view him favorably now, according to a February poll from Quinnipiac University. (Mr. Trump’s favorability was at 31 percent in a June 15 national poll from Bloomberg Politics.) Further, Mr. Bush is highly popular among Republicans, especially the party elites who are big campaign donors. The hosts listed on the invitations for the fund-raisers for Mr. McCain and Mr. Blunt include some of the country’s leading Republican contributors who have recoiled from Mr. Trump’s candidacy.[/QUOTE] [quote]This week, after the deadly shooting in Florida by a United States citizen whose parents were from Afghanistan and who had pledged allegiance to the Islamic State, Mr. Trump called for an expanded ban on Muslim immigrants. “We need to tell the truth also about how radical Islam is coming to our shores,” Mr. Trump said, accusing Muslims in the United States of not doing enough to stop terrorism. Mr. Trump’s speech was in stark contrast to the approach Mr. Bush took after the 2001 attacks. “The face of terror is not the true faith of Islam,” Mr. Bush said in a speech on Sept. 17, 2001, at the Islamic Center in Washington. “Islam is peace.” He criticized reported attacks against Muslims in America. “They need to be treated with respect,” Mr. Bush said.[/QUOTE]
Are the democrats about to regain a Senate majority?
I can't believe we've seriously gotten to the point where it's refreshing and relieving to see George W. Bush.
[QUOTE=MissZoey;50539048]Are the democrats about to regain a Senate majority?[/QUOTE] From what I've read there are more tight Republican races than Democrat ones this election, so while it doesn't mean they will, it makes it harder for Republicans to maintain the majority, then you have whatever knock-on effect trump is, and the consensus is that he will have a negative effect, so it means the Democrats have a shot [editline]17th June 2016[/editline] Personally in Ohio I think the race could go either way, Portman is a fucking tool, but Strickland is running against his own track record
I was actually expecting to read that is Bush campaigning for his own Senate seat. Good on him.
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