Subject: H4A News Clips 6.4.15
From: Alexandria Phillips <[email-masked]>
To: Alexandria Phillips <[email-masked]>
Date: Thu, 4 Jun 2015 07:37:26 -0400
List-Id: <HRCRapid.hillaryclinton.com>

*H4A News Clips*

*June 4, 2015*

*SUMMARY OF TODAY’S NEWS*

Today Hillary Clinton will give a speech at the Barbara Jordan Gold
Medallion Presentation in Houston, Texas.  Clinton will call for swift
action to restore the Voting Rights Act and will discuss ways to make it
easier for voters to access the voting booth and cast their ballots.
Clinton will also attend two fundraisers while in Texas.

Jeb Bush is expected to announce his candidacy for president on June 15th.

*LAST NIGHTS EVENING NEWS*

There was not 2016 coverage on any network tonight. Instead they covered
the hurricane growing and tornado threats, new evidence in the home of the
family that was killed in Washington DC, and the price of cancer
medication.

*SUMMARY OF TODAY’S
NEWS.......................................................................
**1*

*LAST NIGHTS EVENING
NEWS...................................................................... *
*1*

*TODAY’S KEY
STORIES...................................................................................
**4*

*Hillary Clinton to Speak at Latino Leaders Conference* // Latin Post //
Robert Ugarte - Jun 04, 2015 4

*Clinton to call for at least 20 days of early voting nationwide* // WaPo
// Anne Gearan – June 3, 2015                5

*Hillary Clinton Is Alone at the Top of Democratic 2016 Hill Endorsements*
// National Journal // Alex Brown – June 2,
2015...............................................................................................................................
6

*SOCIAL
MEDIA................................................................................................
**7*

*Matt Corridoni (5/3/15, 3:18 pm)* - "We can already trade & we
should...[but #TPP] is bad for us as a country." - @GovernorOMalley taking
a clear stance, once again, on
trade..................................................... 7

*Lisa Lerer (5/3/15, 5:24, pm)* - Law school seminar or Lincoln Chafee’s
presidential announcement? 7

*Trip Gabriel (5/3/15, 7:50 pm)* - Carly Fiorina releases her net worth:
$59 million.  Effective federal tax rate: 20
percent.......................................................................................................................................
7

*Ari Berman (5/3/15, 8:12 pm)* - Would be very big deal if every state had
20+ days of early voting, as HRC wants. 14 states have no early voting
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-pol…......................... 8

*HRC NATIONAL
COVERAGE..........................................................................
**8*

*Heroin epidemic leaves mark on 2016 presidential race* // WaPo // Katie
Zezima – June 3, 2015.... 8

*Hillary's Popularity Rollercoaster* // Politico // Jack Shafer – June 3,
2015.................................... 11

*Hillary Clinton is Too Liberal for Bill Clinton* // Politico // Alan
Greenblatt – June 2, 2015............ 12

*Concerns about Clinton records dates back to her tenure at State* // CNN
// Laura Koran – June 3, 2015           14

*Axelrod: Clinton “Hurt” By Only Doing “Sporadic” Events, Challenge Is For
Her To Take “Risks”* // Buzzfeed // Andrew Kaczynski & Megan Apper – June
3,
2015.......................................................................
15

*Democrats Wage a National Fight Over Voter Rules* // NYT // Maggie
Haberman & Amy Chozick – June 3,
2015.................................................................................................................................................
19

*Clinton to propose at least 20 days of early voting in every* state // USA
Today // David Jackson – June 3,
2015................................................................................................................................................
22

*Hillary Clinton to Attack G.O.P. Rivals on Voting Rights* // NYT // Amy
Chozick – June 3, 2015..... 22

*Hillary Clinton Works For The Support Of An Old Ally: The Teachers Union*
// Buzzfeed // Ruby Cramer – June 3,
2015.........................................................................................................................................
23

*Democrats finally get a contest as Hillary Clinton draws challengers* //
WaPo // Philip Rucker, Robert Costa & Anne Gearan – June 3,
2015.......................................................................................................
26

*Clinton pollster downplays Hillary's sinking poll numbers* // Politico //
Nick Gass – June 3, 2015. 29

*The Beltway’s Clinton derangement syndrome: What I saw inside a Hillary
campaign briefing* // Salon // Joan Walsh – June 3,
2015................................................................................................................
30

*When it comes to the Clintons and Wall Street: Democratic opponents are
silent* // McClatchy // Anita Kumar & Greg Gorden – June 3,
2015.......................................................................................................
33

*21 New ‘Clinton Cash’ Revelations That Have Imperiled Hillary Clinton’s
Campaign* // Breitbart – June 3,
2015................................................................................................................................................
34

*Iowa Poll: Bill and George W. May Not Hurt Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush*
// Bloomberg // David Knowles – June 3,
2015......................................................................................................................................
41

*Clinton rivals pounce as her ratings fall* // WaPo // Philip Rucker,
Robert Costa and Anne Gearan - June 3,
2015................................................................................................................................................
42

*Bush and Clinton seem inevitable. Except to voters*. // Yahoo News // Matt
Bai - June 4, 2015..... 46

*Why Hillary Can't Run on Her State Department Record* // Bloomberg // Josh
Rogin – June 3, 2015 48

*Americans split on whether Clinton cares about their needs* // AP // Julie
Pace & Ken Thomas – June 3,
2015.................................................................................................................................................
51

*Campaign Reporters Told There Will Be ‘NO Opportunities To Interview
Hillary Clinton’* // The Daily Caller // Chuck Ross – June 3,
2015.........................................................................................................
53

*Whoa, If True: Hillary Clinton Blows Off Autograph-Seeking Voter* //
Bloomberg // David Weigel – June 3,
2015................................................................................................................................................
53

*Georgina Bloomberg is backing Hillary for President * // NY Daily News //
Annie Karni – June 3, 2015              55

*Bill Clinton to Give Secret Address to Health Insurers* // The Weekly
Standard // Michael Warren – June 3,
2015................................................................................................................................................
56

*2016 Democratic White House hopefuls jockey for Hispanics’ support* // The
Washington Times // S.A. Miller – June 3,
2015..............................................................................................................................
56

*Meet the woman who's guiding Hillary Clinton's stance on police reforms*
// Fortune // Nina Easton – June 3,
2015.........................................................................................................................................
59

*The campaign to put Julian Castro on Hillary Clinton's VP shortlist* //
GABRIEL DEBENEDETTI and ANNIE KARNI // Politico – June 4,
2015................................................................................................
61

*Hillary Clinton Cannot Afford to Lose Black Voters* // National Jounal //
EMILY SCHULTHEIS – June 3,
2015................................................................................................................................................
64

*Emily’s List Focuses Its ‘Madam President’ Program on Clinton* // NYT //
Jonathan Martin – June 3, 2015     66

*Clinton campaign snares Box CEO in courting young tech millionaires* //
Reuters // Sarah McBride – June 3,
2015................................................................................................................................................
67

*Clinton campaign opens five more Iowa offices* // The Des Moines Register
// Tony Leys – June 3, 2015          69

*OTHER DEMOCRATS NATIONAL
COVERAGE............................................ **69*

*Chafee to unveil presidential run, puzzling longtime allies* // AP – June
3, 2015........................... 69

*Lincoln Chafee expected to announce longshot presidential bid* // WaPo //
Jose DelReal – June 3, 2015         71

*Launching '16 bid, Chafee refuses to rule out talks with IS* // AP // Lisa
Lerer – June 3, 2015........ 72

*Iraq War focus for Lincoln Chafee campaign launch* // CNN // Dan Merica –
June 3, 2015............. 74

*In Presidential Bid, Lincoln Chafee Calls For Metric System* // WSJ //
Byron Tau & Reid Epstein – June 3,
2015................................................................................................................................................
76

*Does Anybody Remember Lincoln Chafee's Facebook Password?*
//.............................................
77

Bloomberg // Ben Brody – June 3,
2015.....................................................................................
77

*President Obama’s popularity numbers are running well behind historic
norms* // WaPo // Scott Clement – June 3,
2015......................................................................................................................................
78

*O’Malley’s Mangled Wage Statistic* // FactCheck // Brooks Jackson – June
3, 2015....................... 79

*Martin O’Malley counters Hillary Clinton: I’m not new to immigration
reform* // Politico // Jonathan Topaz – June 3,
2015..............................................................................................................................
81

*Martin O'Malley: Makes No Sense To Keep 11 Million In Shadow Economy* //
NBC News // Suzanne Gamboa – June 3,
2015.............................................................................................................................
83

*Martin O'Malley Wrongly Says That Wages Haven't Gotten Better For
Americans* // HuffPo // Brooks Jackson – June 3,
2015.............................................................................................................................
85

*O’Malley on the Stump* // NYT // June 3,
2015...........................................................................
87

*Martin O’Malley Calls For More Restrictions on NSA Surveillance* // TIME
// Sam Frizell – June 3, 2015          87

*O’Malley super PAC to air early television ads in Iowa* // WaPo // John
Wagner – June 3, 2015.... 88

*Wall Street Execs Take Aim at O’Malley Campaign Hypocrisy* // Fox News //
Charlie Gasparino – June 3,
2015................................................................................................................................................
89

*Sanders Calls for 'Political Revolution'* // The Weekly Standard //
Michael Warren – June 3, 2015. 91

*Bernie Sanders Calls for More and Earlier Debates* // NYT // Alan
Rappeport – June 3, 2015........ 93

*Sanders slams Jeb Bush over Social Security remarks* // The Hill //
Rebecca Shabad – June 3, 2015 94

*GOP................................................................................................................
**95*

*Jeb Bush to announce presidential bid June 15 in Miami* // Miami Herald //
PATRICIA MAZZEI AND ALEX LEARY – June 4,
2015...............................................................................................................
95

*Jeb Bush, Taking His Time, Tests the Legal Definition of Candidate* // NYT
// Eric Lichtblau & Nick Corasaniti – June 3,
2015..............................................................................................................................
97

*With some donors doubting Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio seizes an opening* // WaPo
// Matea Gold & Sean Sullivan – June 3,
2015............................................................................................................................
100

*Why Jeb Bush Can't Bank On Faith Like His Brother Did* // NPR // Don
Gonyea – June 3, 2015.. 102

*There will be blood: Prepare for nasty Jeb Bush — but don’t expect any
fingerprints* // Salon // Jim Newell – June 3,
2015....................................................................................................................................
104

*Fox News Poll: Bush, Walker, Carson top GOP pack, support for Clinton down*
// Fox News // Dana Blanton – June 3,
2015............................................................................................................................
106

*Republican Conservative Base Shrinks* // Gallup // Frank Newport –June 3,
2015...................... 108

*Rick Santorum Wants Pope Francis To Stop Talking About Climate Change* //
HuffPo // Ed Mazza – June 3,
2015...............................................................................................................................................
110

*George W. Bush tops Obama on favorability in new poll* // The Hill // Mark
Hensch – June 3, 2015 110

*Texas’ Economic Hiccup Complicates Rick Perry’s 2016 Pitch* // WSJ //
Nathan Koppel & Colleen Mccain Nelson – June 3,
2015............................................................................................................................
112

*Scott Walker Says 2016 Announcement Coming After Budget Wrap at End of
June* // Ali Elkin – June 3,
2015...............................................................................................................................................
114

*Wisconsin Abortion Ban Would Allow Father To Sue For Emotional Distress*
// HuffPo // Laura Bassett – June 3,
2015........................................................................................................................................
114

*Scott Walker dead set against path to citizenship but has no answer for
what to do with 11 million undocumented residents* // Tampa Bay Times //
Alex Leary – June 3,
2015....................................................... 115

*Rand Paul calls out Jeb Bush for defending NSA* // Politico // Katie
Glueck – June 3, 2015.......... 117

*When Rand Paul steps in it* // Politico // MANU RAJU – June 4,
2015........................................ 118

*Scott Walker: Women Mostly Worry About Rape Pregnancies 'In The Initial
Months'* // Talking Points Memos // Ahiza Garcia – June 3,
2015......................................................................................................
121

*Rand Paul: GOP Isn't Entirely Responsible For Creating ISIS* // HuffPo //
Sam Levine – June 3, 2015                121

*'I use them, they use me': Local politicians profit from presidential
hopefuls in early-voting states* // LA Times // Seema Mehta – June 3,
2015....................................................................................................
122

*TOP
NEWS....................................................................................................
**125*

*DOMESTIC.................................................................................................
**125*

*Inequality a Major Issue for Americans, Times/CBS Poll Finds* // NYT //
Noam Scheiber & Dalia Sussman – June 3,
2015....................................................................................................................................
126

*Working dads make more money than working moms in every state* // WaPo //
Danielle Paquette – June 3,
2015...............................................................................................................................................
129

*Republican Senators Will Sponsor A Bill To Protect Pregnant Workers For
The First Time Ever* // Think Progress // Bryce Covert – June 3,
2015..................................................................................................
130

*House GOP votes to block administration on immigration* // AP // Erica
Werner – June 3, 2015.. 131

*INTERNATIONAL......................................................................................
**131*

*ISIS Making Political Gains* // NYT // Anne Barnard & Tim Arango – June 3,
2015....................... 131

*Cuba officially off U.S. terror blacklist* // CNN // Kevin Liptak – June
3, 2015.............................. 134

*OPINIONS/EDITORIALS/BLOGS................................................................
**136*

*Romney defeating Bush in GOP establishment primary* // The Hill // Brent
Budowsky – June 3, 2015             136

*Hillary Clinton is political, but her foundation isn’t* // Boston Globe //
Dan Payne – June 3, 2015 137

*Democrats, Don’t Freak Out!* // Slate // Jamelle Bouie – June 3,
2015....................................... 138

*A ‘favorable’ way to stop Hillary Clinton’s ‘trust’ fall* // WaPo //
Jonathan Capehart – June 3, 2015 140

*MISCELLANEOUS........................................................................................
**141*

*Lanny Davis: Hillary Clinton and the frenzy of the media* // The Hill //
Lanny Davis – June 3, 2015 142

*TODAY’S KEY STORIES*

*Hillary Clinton to Speak at Latino Leaders Conference
<http://www.latinpost.com/articles/57404/20150604/hillary-clinton-visiting-las-vegas-later-in-june-to-speak-at-latino-leaders-conference.htm>
// Latin Post // Robert Ugarte - Jun 04, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton, the Democratic Party's top presidential contender, will
return to Nevada later in June to give a speech at a large conference of
Latino political leaders. She continues to be a favorite among Latinos and
continues to push for the community's backing.

Clinton, the first Democratic candidate to vie for the party's nomination,
will return to Las Vegas on June 18 in a dash of appearances spanning the
country. The Associated Press reports Clinton will attend the 32nd annual
National Association of Latino Elected and Appointed Officials (NALEO)
conference, speaking in front of various Latino leaders from across the
nation.

The NALEO conference "presents a unique opportunity for Latino policymakers
to meet with their colleagues from all levels of government to address the
challenges and opportunities facing our communities and our nation,"
according to its website.

Clinton will speak at around 11:30 a.m. local time and the conference is
only accessible to those attending and the media.

Because of the conference's focus, Clinton will undoubtedly be talking
about Latino issues, but the topics have not been revealed as of yet. The
NALEO conference website adds that Congresswoman Dina Titus, D-Nevada,
Nevada Sen. Mo Denis, D-Las Vegas, Nevada Sen. Ruben Kihuen, D-Las Vegas,
and Assemblywoman Irene Bustamante Adams, D-Las Vegas, will also speak.

The last time Clinton visited Las Vegas she proclaimed her administration
would work towards establishing a path to citizenship for the 11 million
undocumented immigrants in the nation.

"We cannot wait any longer for a path for full and equal citizenship," she
said in early May, calling the Republicans' plan for legal status as "code
for second-class status."

Despite winning over many Latinos and retaining her place as the darling of
the Democratic electorate, Clinton has begun slipping in the polls. A
CNN/ORC poll released on Tuesday showed the Democratic candidate's numbers
have started going down.

In March Clinton's favorability rating stood at 53 percent; however, at the
end of May, it has fallen to 46 percent as her "unfavorable" rating rose to
50 percent. Yet, among non-whites Clinton remains strong with 65 percent.

The poll showed Clinton continued to surpass her Republican opponents as
the favored candidate.

In the past month, Clinton has made an effort to include Latinos in her
campaign, having included Lorella Praeli and Xochitl Hinojosa, both
well-known Latino leaders.

Clinton's visit to Las Vegas is part of a series of trips to states with
early caucuses or primaries. The Las Vegas Review-Journal explains Clinton
will be in Iowa from June 13 to 14, in New Hampshire on June 15, and in
South Carolina on June 17.

*Clinton to call for at least 20 days of early voting nationwide
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2015/06/03/clinton-to-call-for-at-least-20-days-of-early-voting-nationwide/>
// WaPo // Anne Gearan – June 3, 2015 *

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton plans to call for
an early voting period of at least 20 days in every state.

Clinton will call for that standard in remarks Thursday in Texas about
voting rights, her campaign said. She will also criticize what her campaign
calls deliberate restrictions on voting in several states, including Texas.

The former secretary of state's address at historically-black Texas
Southern University in Houston comes as Democrats pursue legal challenges
to voting rule changes approved by Republican legislatures in several
states.

Clinton and her allies claim the changes are aimed at narrowing the
electorate in ways that benefit Republicans.

“This is, I think, a moment when we should be expanding the franchise,”
Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta said in an interview. “What we see
in state after state is this effort by conservatives to restrict the right
to vote.”

The legal effort began late last month with lawsuits in Wisconsin and Ohio,
both presidential battleground states.

“This lawsuit concerns the most fundamental of rights guaranteed citizens
in our representative democracy — the right to vote,” lawyers wrote in a
federal complaint filed Friday in Wisconsin.

The challenge to a cutback in early voting in Wisconsin was filed by
lawyers including Democratic election lawyer Marc Elias, who is the Clinton
campaign’s top lawyer. Elias was not acting on behalf of the campaign,
although all Democrats including Clinton could benefit if early voting were
expanded.

“That right has been under attack in Wisconsin since Republicans gained
control of the governor’s office and both houses of the State legislature
in the 2010 election,” the lawsuit alleges.

*Hillary Clinton Is Alone at the Top of Democratic 2016 Hill Endorsements
<http://www.nationaljournal.com/2016-elections/hillary-clinton-is-alone-at-the-top-of-democratic-2016-hill-endorsements-20150602>
// National Journal // Alex Brown – June 2, 2015*

Hillary Clinton has racked up a slew of congressional endorsements in her
presidential bid. Her rivals either can't compete on the Hill or are only
doing so quietly.

Clinton's endorsement tally already stands at triple digits—nearly half of
all sitting Democrats. But lawmakers say they've heard little outreach from
Bernie Sanders and Martin O'Malley, Clinton's underdog rivals to lead
Democrats' 2016 ticket.

Even the group that provides the underdogs' best chance at winning allies
says the phone has stayed firmly on the hook: Both Sanders and O'Malley are
running to Clinton's left, but the Congressional Progressive Caucus says it
has heard no calls for support from either candidate. Instead, caucus
cochair Raul Grijalva has thrown his support behind Clinton, as have fellow
liberals like Reps. Rosa DeLauro and Jan Schakowsky.

While members say they would welcome the chance to hear from presidential
hopefuls, it appears those candidates have decided the road to the
nomination doesn't run through the Beltway—at least yet. "We've certainly
had opportunities in the past to have some of those declared candidates
come before us," said House Democratic Caucus Chair Xavier Becerra, citing
an O'Malley appearance on the Hill last year. "Certainly this caucus will
invite any declared candidate for president to come before us and address
the caucus members, because the members are very interested."

Haley Morris, a spokeswoman for O'Malley, said his team has already started
a thorough outreach campaign. But when it comes to Washington Democrats
backing Clinton, she said, O'Malley is "not worried about establishment
backing establishment."

Observers say there could be several reasons for the quiet on Capitol Hill.
First, at this early stage in the race, candidates are far more focused on
fundraising and building a ground game than getting members of Congress on
board. "I haven't really seen any [outreach] at all," said Rep. Dutch
Ruppersberger of Maryland. "There will probably be more action here when
the primaries start coming up."

Ruppersberger, who has not yet made an endorsement, cited his close ties to
both Clinton and O'Malley as his reason for staying out of the primary so
far.

Meanwhile, the candidates likely realize that Congress, too, has its focus
elsewhere right now. "This is appropriations season," laughed
Ruppersberger. And eight months out from Iowa's first-in-the-nation caucus,
most members are unlikely to get behind a candidate who has yet to
challenge Clinton in the polls.

But even with many members in wait-and-see mode, Clinton's challengers have
already seen many of their potential allies back the front-runner—including
in the home states of Clinton's rivals.

In O'Malley's home state of Maryland, with its clout-heavy congressional
delegation, Clinton has earned several high-profile endorsements: Minority
Whip Steny Hoyer and Budget Committee ranking member Chris Van Hollen, both
Marylanders, have endorsed Clinton. Sens. Barbara Mikulski and Ben Cardin
back Clinton as well.

Sen. Patrick Leahy of Vermont has endorsed Clinton, leaving undecided Rep.
Peter Welch as Sanders' only remaining home-state endorsement opportunity.
Meanwhile, the entrance of former Sen. Jim Webb of Virginia and former
Rhode Island Gov. Lincoln Chafee into the race hasn't stopped half a dozen
Virginia and Rhode Island members from backing Clinton over their long-shot
contenders back home.

Of course, no congressional endorsement will change Clinton’s status as the
favorite, and her challengers may be content to watch her rack up Capitol
Hill endorsements as they paint her as a creature of the Washington
establishment. While O’Malley will tout his state executive experience,
Sanders—an independent and self-described socialist—will likely have little
trouble distancing himself from the other candidates.

*SOCIAL MEDIA*

*Matt Corridoni (5/3/15, 3:18 pm)*
<https://twitter.com/mattcorridoni/status/606178152084344832>* - "We can
already trade & we should...[but #TPP] is bad for us as a country." -
@GovernorOMalley taking a clear stance, once again, on trade*

*Lisa Lerer (5/3/15, 5:24, pm)*
<https://twitter.com/llerer/status/606209944589893632>* - Law school
seminar or Lincoln Chafee’s presidential announcement?*

*Trip Gabriel (5/3/15, 7:50 pm)*
<https://twitter.com/tripgabriel/status/606246594065891328>* - Carly
Fiorina releases her net worth: $59 million.  Effective federal tax rate:
20 percent.*

*Ari Berman (5/3/15, 8:12 pm)*
<https://twitter.com/AriBerman/status/606236976157761536>* - Would be very
big deal if every state had 20+ days of early voting, as HRC wants. 14
states have no early voting http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-pol
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-pol>…*

*HRC** NATIONAL COVERAGE*

*Heroin epidemic leaves mark on 2016 presidential race
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/drug-epidemic-shapes-messages-on-the-presidential-campaign-trail/2015/06/03/2f63761c-00d0-11e5-805c-c3f407e5a9e9_story.html>
// WaPo // Katie Zezima – June 3, 2015 *

When aspiring presidential candidates step into Mayor Ted Gatsas’s office
here, he doesn’t let them leave without telling them about what he calls
one of the most pressing, dire issues his city faces: drug abuse.

“Every candidate that comes in here, what I say to them is, ‘It’s not only
an issue here in Manchester, New Hampshire. It’s a national issue,’ ” said
Gatsas (R). “If we don’t get our arms around it, it’s going to take over
our country.”

The nation is in the throes of an epidemic of prescription-drug and heroin
abuse — a wave that’s leaving its mark on the 2016 presidential campaign,
too.

Hillary Rodham Clinton has told supporters that drug abuse and mental
health will be key issues in her Democratic presidential campaign, and she
launched a policy-focused outreach effort on the issue. New Jersey Gov.
Chris Christie (R) recently participated in a round-table discussion at a
drug treatment facility here. Republican Carly Fiorina has spoken movingly
about losing a stepdaughter to addiction. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) has made
reforming drug laws and the criminal-justice system a centerpiece of his
presidential campaign. And former Florida governor Jeb Bush (R) said he
learned about New Hampshire’s heroin problem while touring as a potential
presidential candidate.

Drug addiction and treatment are no longer problems acknowledged only with
infrequent stump lines. They are driving a sustained conversation on the
presidential campaign trail.

And that conversation revolves around ending — not stepping up — the war on
drugs. It centers on the language of addiction and treatment, on the
sharing of deeply personal experiences and on calls from candidates for the
criminal-justice system to be restructured to make the government’s
response to illegal use less punitive.

It is being driven by voters such as Pamela Livengood of Keene, N.H., who
told Clinton last month that she has had to take on the care of her
grandson because of drug abuse.

“Grandpa and I have guardianship of him because of all the growing drug
problem in our area that my grandson’s mother can’t be quite so
responsible,” Livengood said carefully. “So we’ve picked it up and took
over, but we also need to see more for substance abuse help in our area.
There are very limited resources here.”

Clinton responded that she was “really concerned because, Pam, what you
just told me and I’m hearing from a lot of different people.” She described
drug use as a “hidden . . . quiet epidemic,” different from the
headline-grabbing phenomenon of the 1980s, that is “striking in small towns
and rural areas as much as any big city.”

According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, the number of
deaths nationwide involving heroin increased from 3,041 in 2008 to 8,260 in
2013, the most recent year for which statistics are available. In 2013,
16,235 people died from overdosing on prescription opiates; in 2008, 14,800
people died. Drug overdoses were the nation’s leading cause of injury death
in 2013,according to the CDC. Among people 25 to 64, overdoses caused more
deaths than traffic accidents.

Here in New Hampshire, the state’s medical examiner has called heroin abuse
“the Ebola of Northern New England.” New Hampshire recorded 325 drug
overdose deaths last year; about 90 percent of them involved opiates,
according to the medical examiner’s office. The state also has seen a rapid
increase in the number of deaths from the painkiller fentanyl, which is
often mixed with heroin.

“I am not at all surprised that it’s coming up in community conversations
around New Hampshire, because this is the community conversation that is
happening in New Hampshire right now,” said Tym Rourke, chairman of the
commission on alcohol and other drug abuse prevention set up by Gov. Maggie
Hassan (D).

Christie held a roundtable discussion last month at the Farnum Center, a
drug abuse treatment facility here and relayed a story he often tells,
about how a law-school classmate struggled with an addiction to
prescription painkillers. The friend died in a New Jersey hotel room with
an empty vodka bottle and an empty painkiller bottle.

“This is a treatable problem,” Christie said. “And we need to start talking
about it like an illness, not like some moral failure.”

On the same trip, the New Jersey governor discussed addiction at a
Manchester pizza place that had recently experienced the death of an
employee from a heroin overdose.

For years, Christie — a former prosecutor — has been advocating treatment
over incarceration for low-level drug offenders, sometimes framing that
approach as part of being “pro-life for the whole life.”

In response to a surge in opioid deaths in New Jersey, Christie signed a
bill in April to establish a statewide task force. He has expanded drug
courts and broadened access to naloxone, a drug that can reverse the
effects of an opiate overdose.

Paul has made reforming drug laws one of the signature issues of his time
in the Senate and in his presidential campaign, often telling audiences
that the war on drugs has failed — that it has “created a culture of
violence and put police in an impossible situation,” as he said in Las
Vegas in April — and that low-level drug offenders should go into treatment
rather than being jailed.

Carly Fiorina’s stepdaughter Lori Ann Fiorina died in 2009 at age 35 after
struggling for years with alcohol and drug addiction. Hours after
announcing her presidential bid last month, Fiorina said the country must
change the way it deals with people who are addicted to drugs.

“Drug addiction shouldn’t be criminalized,” she said on a conference call.
“We need to treat it appropriately.”

For all the talk, there’s little yet in the way of policy plans. The first
votes of the 2016 campaign are still months away, and so far, no candidate
has come up with concrete proposals on how he or she would handle the
epidemic from the Oval Office.

Over the past week, Clinton’s campaign has started to move in that
direction. Campaign advisers held Google hangouts with treatment providers,
law enforcement officials and others in Iowa and New Hampshire, and Clinton
asked voters to share their thoughts on and experiences with substance
abuse with her in a Facebook chat. The campaign has said it will use the
information to develop policy proposals.

Clinton herself has spoken about addiction numerous times in New Hampshire
and brought it up at a campaign event in Iowa. The former U.S. secretary of
state said she had heard all over Iowa about two issues: mental illness and
drugs.

“The drug epidemic, meth, pills in Iowa — and then I got to New Hampshire
and at my very first coffee shop meeting I heard about the heroin epidemic
in New Hampshire,” Clinton said in Mason City, Iowa, last month. “This is
tearing families apart, but it is below the surface. People aren’t talking
about it, because it’s something that is hard to deal with.”

During a stop in Davenport, Iowa, on Saturday, Clinton rival Martin
O’Malley was asked by two women in the audience about the issue. Both were
wearing T-shirts with a photo showing one of the women’s sons, who had died
of a heroin overdose.

“Sadly, many of us are becoming much more expert on the tragedy of heroin
overdose deaths in our country because of what’s happened recently,” said
O’Malley, the former Maryland governor, who hugged both women.

O’Malley sought, with limited success, to combat the issue during his
tenure as governor, which ended in January. In 2014, 578 people in Maryland
died of heroin overdoses, a 25 percent increase over 2013 and more than
twice the number who died from using the drug in 2010.

One question Republican candidates will face — but which Clinton and
O’Malley will not — is how they plan to cover addiction treatment if they
want to repeal the Affordable Care Act. That law mandates that insurance
plans make substance-abuse and mental-health treatment essential benefits.

But even under the ACA, treatment is often hard to come by, and barriers to
access remain. A report issued last month by the National Alliance on
Mental Illness suggested that some patients are still being denied care.

“The issue is, [candidates are] talking about it, but are they committed to
making sure that adequate funding and services are available for these
people?” said Dedric L. Doolin, senior deputy director of the Area
Substance Abuse Council in Cedar Rapids, Iowa. Doolin wants candidates to
ensure long-term treatment will be funded.

Here in Manchester, Gatsas, the mayor, said he is bringing together law
enforcement officials, treatment providers and others to try to tackle the
issue locally. But they will not be the only ones hearing from the mayor,
who said he plans to continue to press the issue with current and
prospective presidential candidates. He predicts that his constituents
will, too.

Candidates now “hear it even more on the stump, because people want to
know, ‘What are you going to do?’ ”

*Hillary's Popularity Rollercoaster
<http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/06/hillary-clintons-popularity-rollercoaster-118606.html%3Fhp=t4_r%23.VW-tv1zBzGc>
// Politico // Jack Shafer – June 3, 2015 *

Political journalists abhor a vacuum, especially the vacuum that forms 17
months before a presidential election, attaches itself to their brains like
a sea lamprey and sucks hard.

Oh, political journalists have so much to write about this distant from a
general election. There are speeches to cover, fundraising numbers to
chase, campaign jockeying to chronicle, backstories to collate, campaign
staff rosters to collect, press management schemes to detect and vats of
wonkery to fry. Such coverage is all necessary and good, but at this point
even the press hounds will concede that they’re mostly barking at dust and
vapor, waiting for the field to thin and for primary ballots to be cast so
they can write more concretely about the race. (After all: Just how much
public appetite is there for in-depth coverage of George Pataki or Lincoln
Chafee?)

Until then, journalists casting for something tangible to hang their
thoughts upon are reaching for poll data—like the figures released this
week from CNN/ORC and Washington Post/ABC News, which show Hillary
Clinton’s “favorability” numbers crumbling to a 14-year-low of 46 percent.
“The honeymoon is over for Hillary Clinton, according to two new polls,”
reported the National Journal. “As revelations mount, Hillary Clinton’s
poll numbers plunge,” proclaimed the Atlantic Journal-Constitution. The
conservative press, including Breitbart and the Washington Examiner danced
on the new polls. “Is Hillary ‘Likeable Enough’?” asked National Review.

While glory awaits the journalist who buries Hillary Clinton, carves her
tombstone and tidies her grave, the makings of her demise cannot be read in
these poll results. Clinton rides a favorability rollercoaster, and has
been riding it hard for the past 23 years, as the American Enterprise
Institute’s Karlyn Bowman and her team demonstrate in a recent analysis of
Clinton polling data. As an infographic they produced indicates, Clinton
favorability numbers vary with the role she’s playing. Her numbers grew
steadily in the campaign year of 1992 and higher still when she became
First Lady in 1993. First ladies, notes Bowman, “generally receive positive
marks.”

But Clinton’s numbers suffered whenever she stepped outside of the
traditional First Lady function to join the policy and politics tussle (the
healthcare debate) or became attached to White House “scandals”
(Travelgate, Whitewater, Lewinsky, et al.). As a U.S. senator (2001-2009),
Clinton’s numbers varied much less, dropping some during her 2008 run for
president. Then came her secretary of state years (2009-2013), when she
exuded diplomacy and did her soaring best in the polls. Her numbers
descended again as she became identified with the Benghazi attack in 2013.

How to best interpret Clinton’s latest decline? When asked to rate Hillary
Clinton on a favorable-unfavorable continuum, it has usually mattered to
respondents what Clinton’s duties were. Now that she’s running for
president, it’s predictable that some of the respondents who liked Clinton
enough to give her a favorable rating when she was a self-effacing,
team-playing diplomat might not like her enough to give her a favorable
rating when they view her as a private citizen prepping a presidential
candidacy. (This timeline from the Pew Research Center ties Clinton career
“milestones” to her favorability ups and downs.)

Clinton’s numbers could easily go lower, of course, given the twin
backdrops of the email controversy and the Clinton Foundation coverage.
Also, in the coming months, as the Republican field winnows out, the
remaining candidates will increase the frequency of their attacks on
Clinton, their most credible opponent on the Democratic side, and lower her
favorability still more.

But it’s hard to imagine a favorability-ratings veteran like Hillary
Clinton panicking at this week’s or next week’s numbers. As the wise man
once said, Clinton operates in glacial time, and has the patience to build
support—and favorability—as the campaign throttles up. She has almost 30
years of hand-on experience handling political calamities and downturns.
Plus, as low as her favorability ratings have dropped, they’re still about
15-to-20 percentage points higher than several of her Republican opponents.

It’s always easier for a politician to survive a trough when she has so
much experience living on the crest.

*Hillary Clinton is Too Liberal for Bill Clinton
<http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2015/06/democrats-too-liberal-for-bill-clinton-118555.html?ml=m_pm#.VW8LklzBzGc>
// Politico // Alan Greenblatt – June 2, 2015*

The biggest irony of the 2016 campaign is Hillary Clinton running as the
sort of liberal Bill Clinton once ran against. The Democratic party has
moved too far left to accept the former president, or at least the version
of Bill Clinton that dominated Democratic politics back in the 1990s.

The overarching project of his political career was to pull the party back
toward the center. Barney Frank recalls, while Clinton was in office,
getting no response to a letter he'd sent to "The Democratic President of
the United States" because the post office classified it as "addressee
unknown." Within a few years of Clinton's reign, politicians such as Paul
Wellstone and Howard Dean began to refer to themselves as representatives
of the "Democratic wing" of the Democratic Party.

To succeed today, Hillary Clinton—like any national Democrat—must win over
that wing. But doing so will encourage Republicans to paint her as too
beholden to the party's liberal, urban, heavily minority base. If those
attacks succeed and she loses, it will be back to the future for the GOP.
That line of attack is why Bill Clinton self-consciously sought to ditch
the losing liberal policies of the party's previous presidential nominees,
such as Michael Dukakis and Walter Mondale. Democrats lost five out of the
six presidential elections between 1968 and 1988, going 0-for-3 by the time
Clinton ran in 1992. There was a lot of talk at the time about the GOP
holding a "lock" on the Electoral College. Clinton and other so-called New
Democrats thought they could regain voter trust by taking a tougher line on
social and spending issues. Hillary Clinton is doing the opposite.

She is being dragged left by younger voters and minority groups, who make
up essential elements of today's Democratic coalition and tend to favor
federal solutions more readily, according to polls, than older, whiter
voters. The party's votes now overwhelmingly come from big cities,
territory in which Democratic mayors such as Bill De Blasio in New York and
Eric Garcetti in Los Angeles have made addressing income inequality central
to their mission through measures such as lifting the minimum wage and
building more affordable housing. President Obama, having grown convinced
that Republicans intend to give him nothing, responded to the GOP's big
victory last fall by making deals with Cuba and Iran and moving left on
issues such as immigration, free community college and paid family leave.
(Unpaid family leave was one of President Clinton's earliest legislative
accomplishments.)

It all shows how far the party, and the Clintons, have come. The most
resonant phrases from Bill Clinton's day—aside from the sex stuff—were the
exact opposite of any progressive call to arms, such as "end welfare as we
know it" and "the era of big government is over." But the era of big
government being over—if that chime ever indeed did sound—is long since
done. Put aside the expansions of federal programs that took place under
Obama and George W. Bush. Although Obama and some other Democrats were
willing to entertain thoughts a few years ago of trimming Social Security
as part of a bigger budget deal, pledging to preserve or even expand the
program has once again become a litmus test for party officials.

As president, Bill Clinton not only signed the anti-gay Defense of Marriage
Act (an act for which he has since repented). He also signed a welfare law
that cut off immigrants from receiving many benefits. Legal immigrants.
Imagine any national Democrat agreeing to either of those things today.
"They've moved left partly because they've won," says Lara Brown, a
political scientist at George Washington University. "Parties typically go
as far toward their core ideology as they can, as long as they keep
winning."

President Clinton did champion many progressive causes, including universal
health care (a botched effort run by Hillary Clinton), gun control and
expansion of the earned-income tax credit, an anti-poverty program Clinton
himself wished had a zippier brand name. But Clinton also argued that by
melding liberal principles and conservative ideas, voters who had written
off the Democratic Party would again listen to its message, which remained
broadly populist on economic matters. Clinton believed Democrats had to
shed any lingering hippie image and talk tough on crime. When still the
governor of Arkansas, Clinton left the campaign trail in 1992 to preside
over the execution of a cop killer who was mentally impaired. He also went
out of his way to distance himself from civil rights leader Jesse
Jackson—his "Sister Souljah moment."

Triangulation (remember that?) wasn't just about Clinton positioning
himself to the left of old-line liberals. He picked the Republicans'
pockets on their most popular issues, forcing them out alone on a limb to
defend their most extreme positions. "Back when he ran in 1992, my party,
the Democratic Party, had lost three consecutive elections, one of them in
which we carried only one state," says Evan Bayh, a former governor and
senator from Indiana who, like Clinton, enjoyed success in the 1990s by
seeking the center. "Any time a party has lost three consecutive elections,
it becomes a bit more

willing to explore the notion of principled compromise so it's able to
pursue some of its objectives.”

Barney Frank, the liberal former congressman from Massachusetts, makes this
point explicitly in his recent memoir. "At the time, many on the left
believed he was 'too moderate,'" Frank writes. "In the political climate of
the times, I continued to believe that Bill Clinton was the most liberal
electable president."

*Concerns about Clinton records dates back to her tenure at State
<http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/03/politics/hillary-clinton-records-state-department/index.html>
// CNN // Laura Koran – June 3, 2015*

Officials at the National Archives and Records Administration -- the agency
tasked with managing official government records -- were in touch with the
State Department about plans to preserve former Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton's records shortly before she left that office, newly released
emails reveal.

The emails were obtained by CNN through a Freedom of Information Act
request submitted to NARA in March, shortly after it was revealed that the
former secretary exclusively used a personal email server while in office,
preventing many from being archived until she ultimately submitted them to
the Department.

One email in particular shows that concerns were raised two and a half
years ago that any retention of documents on Clinton's part could create
controversy.

"Before I forget," Chief Records Officer for U.S. Government Paul Wester
told two of his colleagues in December 2012, "when we meet later this week
we need to discuss what we know, and how we should delicately go about
learning more about, regarding the transition plans for Secretary Clinton's
departure from State."

Wester then refers to someone identified only as Tom who, "heard (or
thought he heard) from the Clinton Library Director that there are or may
be plans afoot for taking her records from State to Little Rock."

"Tom then got to asking questions about what we are doing to make sure
everyone leaving the Administration does not leave with Federal records,"
the email continues.

Ultimately, Wester says he spoke with Tom and explained how previous
administrations have handled records retention and how NARA is seeking to
clarify their guidance ahead of the upcoming inauguration when some high
level officials planned to leave the administration.

He also says he told Tom copies of records can sometimes be kept in an
approved way, citing the example of former Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill
used records to work on his memoir, "to illustrate how 'walking off with
the records' is sometimes not really 'walking off with the records.'"

Nevertheless, Tom (and another individual referred to only as Jay) appeared
concerned, Wester said.

"Tom seemed to understand all of this, but he and Jay continued to invoke
the specter of the Henry Kissinger experience vis-a-vis Hillary Clinton,"
Wester said, referring to a controversy surrounding former Secretary of
State Henry Kissinger's decision to hold on to his official records.

There are several redactions in this and other emails obtained by CNN.

Clinton ultimately retained her emails on a private server until they were
requested by the State Department late last year. She and her staff then
turned over 55,000 pages of emails, keeping those they deemed irrelevant to
her time in office.

The emails obtained by CNN also illustrate how officials at NARA came to
learn of the Clinton controversy after they were reached out to by staff on
a congressional committee, then a few days later by New York Times reporter
Michael Schmidt, who broke the story in March.

After speaking with Schmidt, NARA's General Counsel Gary Stern wrote to
other NARA officials to explain the details of the story and their
conversation.

"This case, if true, would present a concern," he writes, "although it may
be the case that the State Department has already taken appropriate action
to recover the records."

*Axelrod: Clinton “Hurt” By Only Doing “Sporadic” Events, Challenge Is For
Her To Take “Risks”
<http://www.buzzfeed.com/andrewkaczynski/axelrod-clinton-hurt-by-only-doing-sporadic-events-challenge#.obnKlXLeN>
// Buzzfeed // Andrew Kaczynski & Megan Apper – June 3, 2015 *

Former Obama strategist David Axelrod says Hillary Clinton’s “sporadic”
campaign appearances are hurting her candidacy. Axelrod added that Clinton
will have a problem unless she gets into the “routine of campaigning.”

“I thinks she’s being hurt right now by her sporadic appearances, you want
to be the regular routine of campaigning and it’s important that she gets
there and gets there quickly,” Axelrod told ABC Wisconsin-affiliate WISN
Tuesday. “If she does, I think all of this will be forgotten. I think if
she continues in this fashion it will be a problem.”

Axelrod was in Milwaukee to speak about his new book at a Marquette
University Law School forum.

Speaking the event, he said it was likely she would be the nominee,
although “inevitability” is a burden for her in 2016.

“The high likelihood is that Hillary will be the nominee but having said
that I think inevitability is not her friend,” Axelrod told a crowd at the
school. “I think it’s a real burden.”

Axelrod said he saw “two Hillary Clintons” during the 2008 race: one that
was cautious and one that was “a very effective candidate.”

“I saw two Hillary Clintons in 2007, 2008. In 2007 she was kind of
constrained in this straight jacket of inevitability and she carried that
inevitability around like a porcelain vase and she was very cautious,
unadventuresome, unrevealing,” Axelrod said.

“And then she lost the Iowa Caucuses and she became a different candidate.
She threw all that caution away. She was much more revealing of herself,
much more connecting with other people, much more of an advocate than she
had been. In my view, a very effective candidate. It was just too late.”

Axelrod questioned if Clinton was once again following the “temptation to
be cautious.”

“The question she’ll have to answer is which candidate is she going to be
in 2016 because once again there’s this veil of inevitability and there’s a
temptation to be cautious,” he said.

“You have to take some risks along the way,” added Axelrod. “I think that’s
the challenge for her if she’s gonna go all the way but I think she
certainly has a chance to do that.”

*Hillary Clinton’s honesty problem*
<http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/243844-hillary-clintons-honesty-problem>*
// The Hill // Niall Stanage – June 3, 2015*

Is it possible to win the White House if more than half the electorate
thinks you’re dishonest?

Hillary Clinton may yet put that question to the test. It’s not the kind of
challenge any candidate would relish, but two new polls released on Tuesday
underlined the presidential hopeful’s difficulty in persuading the public
of her integrity.

Both those polls found Clinton deep underwater when voters were asked
whether they viewed her as honest and trustworthy.

An ABC News/Washington Post poll found 52 percent of people answering “no”
to that question, compared to 41 percent who expressed trust in Clinton.

A CNN poll made even grimmer reading for the former secretary of State. It
found 57 percent of adults asserting that Clinton is not honest or
trustworthy, and only 42 percent saying that she is.

Those figures were enough to send a shiver down some Democrats’ spines.

“We’re about 30 to 60 days away from real nervousness, if not panic, in the
Democratic establishment,” said one strategist who declined to be named,
citing a fear of retribution by Clinton loyalists.

The strategist argued that Clinton’s campaign has consistently
underestimated the damage that has been wreaked by negative stories about
donations to the Clinton Foundation and the former secretary’s use of a
private email account while at State.

“There is this attitude that this is something that the media or the
right-wing are fixated on, and they are missing the bigger dynamic here,”
the strategist said of the Clinton campaign. “The bottom line here is that
there is this pervasive belief that the story is going to go away and they
can mitigate this with silence. And it ain’t working.”

The Clinton campaign contends that the candidate’s low numbers are
symptomatic of a general distrust of political figures. Campaign officials
believe the higher ratings Clinton enjoyed at the State Department were
bound to slide as she returned to partisan politics.

Further, they assert that her policies will, over time, foster a different,
more important kind of trust among voters.

Observers who follow every political twist and turn might imagine that
opinions of Clinton would be hard to change, for good or bad, given that
she has now been a top player on the national political stage for a
quarter-century.

The polling figures do not bear that out, however.

In the past year, the former first lady’s polling numbers on the “honesty”
question have flipped.

One year before Tuesday’s ABC News/Post poll showing her 11 points
underwater on the issue, the same organization found her with a net
positive of 11 points, with 53 percent of those polled thinking of her as
trustworthy versus 42 percent saying she was not.

When CNN/ORC asked the question in a March 2014 survey, 56 percent said
Clinton was honest, while 43 percent disagreed — a net positive of 13
points. Today her standing on the question in the equivalent poll is a net
negative of 15 points.

Republicans see those figures as little more than an increased public
acceptance of what they have long believed to be true.

“She is paranoid, she is ethically squirrelly and she believes there are
two sets of standards: one for the Clintons and one for everyone else,”
said GOP strategist Rick Wilson.

Wilson was buoyed by what he considered fresh evidence of the shallowness
of Clinton’s support.

“She is always ‘inevitable’ right up until the moment she is no longer
inevitable,” he said.

Independent observers don’t believe the situation is quite so dire for
Clinton. They note that she has often performed worse on questions of
honesty and likability than on other metrics such as having strong
leadership skills.

“It’s certainly not good news but these are not necessarily the kind of
numbers that make a candidate unelectable,” said Peter Brown, the assistant
director of the Quinnipiac University Polling Institute.

An April Quinnipiac poll in three swing states — Colorado, Iowa and
Virginia — showed the same weakness for Clinton on the honesty question,
most conspicuously in Colorado, where a startling 56 percent of voters
viewed Clinton as dishonest versus only 38 percent who saw her as honest.

But, Brown notes, “We have elected presidents who voters did not
necessarily like.”

Others, including journalist Ron Brownstein, have pointed out that exit
polls from the 1996 presidential election showed that 54 percent of voters
did not view President Clinton as honest or trustworthy. He won handily
regardless.

But a related question is whether a distrust of Hillary Clinton would
stymie her efforts to maximize Democratic turnout.

“Her husband transcended numbers like this and it’s not crazy to think that
she can as well, especially because American politics is so partisan now,”
said Kyle Kondik of the University of Virginia Center for Politics.
“Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents may not think Clinton is
very trustworthy, but they’re going to like her a heck of a lot more than
any Republican. Clinton’s main concern is getting those voters to show up.”

Still, right now, some Democrats just want to see evidence that the decline
in personal trust in Clinton can be stopped before it becomes a larger
problem.

“At some point they are going to have to address this head-on, publicly,”
the Democratic strategist said, “and the clock on that is beginning to tick
loudly.”

*Democrats Wage a National Fight Over Voter Rules
<http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/04/us/politics/democrats-voter-rights-lawsuit-hillary-clinton.html?ref=us>
// NYT // Maggie Haberman & Amy Chozick – June 3, 2015 *

Democrats allied with Hillary Rodham Clinton are mounting a nationwide
legal battle 17 months before the 2016 presidential election, seeking to
roll back Republican-enacted restrictions on voter access that Democrats
say could, if unchallenged, prove decisive in a close campaign.

The Democrats began last month with lawsuits filed in Ohio and Wisconsin,
presidential battleground states whose governors are likely to run for the
Republican nomination themselves. Now, they are most likely going to attack
a host of measures. They include voter identification requirements that
Democrats consider onerous, time restrictions imposed on early voting that
they say could make it difficult to cast ballots the weekend before
Election Day, and rules that could nullify ballots cast in the wrong
precinct.

The effort, which is being spearheaded by a lawyer whose clients include
Mrs. Clinton’s campaign, reflects an urgent practical need, Democrats say:
to get litigation underway early enough so that federal judges can be
persuaded to intervene in states where Republicans control legislatures and
governor’s offices.

A similar lawsuit was begun last year in North Carolina. Other potential
fronts in the pre-emptive legal offensive, Democrats say, could soon be
opened in Georgia, Nevada and the increasingly critical presidential
proving ground of Virginia.

Almost all of those states have growing African-American or Hispanic
populations, groups crucial to Mr. Obama in 2012 but whose voting rights
Democrats say could be impinged next year, damaging the party’s prospects.

Democrats seeking office at every level in 2016 could gain if lawsuits in
their states are successful. But Mrs. Clinton, who has a wide lead in
public polls, is certain to benefit if she is the party’s nominee.

On Thursday, Mrs. Clinton will tackle the issue of ballot access head-on in
an address at Texas Southern University, a historically black college in
Houston. She is expected to condemn the Supreme Court’s 2013 rulingstriking
down an important provision of the Voting Rights Act, which opened the way
for states to pass laws requiring voters to present government-issued photo
identification at the polls.

Mrs. Clinton is also expected to single out laws in Texas and in North
Carolina, Ohio and Wisconsin, which voting rights groups say limit
participation, especially among minorities, the poor and younger voters who
disproportionately cast their ballots for Democrats.

Her speech, which is expected to be similar in scope and tenor to her
remarks about overhauling the criminal justice system, will tie voting
rights into the broader civil rights strife that has erupted over the
recent deaths of several unarmed black men at the hands of white police
officers, aides said.

For Mrs. Clinton, such speeches can do much to reinforce her liberal
credentials while reassuring black voters who supported Mr. Obama that she
is on their side.

In the same way, even if the lawsuits are unsuccessful, Democratic
strategists say, they serve an important political purpose for Democrats by
highlighting Republicans’ responsibility for the statutes being challenged.
Democrats will also remind the party’s base that Republicans have tried to
mobilize their own core voters by warning, as Mitt Romney did in 2012,
against the possibility of widespread voter fraud by Democrats.

Both those points could help fire up minority leaders and voters,
Democratic strategists say.

Republicans, however, argue that the lawsuits are a transparent ruse aimed
at energizing minority voters, whom Mrs. Clinton badly needs to turn out in
numbers similar to those Mr. Obama drew in his 2012 re-election.

“I think it has been a growing trend in the last 10 years for campaigns to
use litigation like this as a campaign weapon,” said Hans von Spakovsky, a
Republican election law expert at the conservative Heritage Foundation.
“The claims that they keep making, that this is going to depress turnout,
just keep proving to be not true, and many of these issues have already
been litigated.”

According to the nonpartisan Brennan Center for Justice at New York
University School of Law, there are 14 states with new voter laws in place
for the first time in a national race.

The lawsuits filed in Ohio and Wisconsin, like the 2014 North Carolina
case, were brought by Marc Elias, a leading Democratic lawyer on voter
protection issues who represents four of the party’s national campaign
committees.

Mr. Elias is also the general counsel for Mrs. Clinton’s campaign, and her
aides have spoken favorably of the lawsuits.

The lawsuits are typically filed on behalf of people who say they have
been, or could be, disenfranchised. In the Ohio case, a black pastor is
among the plaintiffs.

Mrs. Clinton’s campaign is not a party to the lawsuits, although her aides
have said her team supports them. People involved in the actions have
refused to say who was paying for them.

But Mr. Elias suggested that the litigation was simply common sense. “We
should all want to ensure that all eligible voters can exercise their right
to vote and have their vote counted,” he said. “It’s unfortunate that some
Republicans see a benefit in making it harder for people to vote.”

Since the election fight in 2000 between George W. Bush and Al Gore, court
battles have become a routine and increasingly strategic component of
presidential campaigns. The new round of lawsuits is occurring relatively
early and is a more preventive effort than in past election cycles, experts
say.

More broadly, the legal campaign is shaping up as something of a delayed
Democratic response to the Republican takeovers of a number of
governorships and legislatures in the same states after the rise of the Tea
Party movement in 2009 and 2010, as well as to the Supreme Court’s ruling
on the Voting Rights Act in 2013.

As a result of both changes, a series of stringent state laws were enacted
in some of those states that Democrats say are intended to curtail voting
by important segments of Mr. Obama’s political coalition, African-American
and younger voters in particular.

Donna Brazile, the campaign manager for Mr. Gore in the 2000 presidential
race and a member of a Democratic National Committee task force that was
formed after the party’s disastrous losses in 2014, said she and Mr. Elias
had for months been sounding an alarm within the party about voting-rights
conditions in a number of states.

Instead of idling, she said, Democrats had to “proactively” seek changes in
states where voter protections might be changed, whether through litigation
or legislation.

Republicans have used such laws for mobilization purposes of their own,
denouncing voter fraud as they appeal to an increasingly conservative party
base. Gov. Scott Walker of Wisconsin, for example, has repeatedly boasted
to Republicans across the country about having enacted tougher voting laws
in his state.

“Any measure that protects our democracy by making it easier to vote and
harder to cheat is a step in the right direction,” said Kirsten Kukowski, a
spokeswoman for Mr. Walker. “This is a bipartisan issue, and Hillary
Clinton and the Democrats are on the wrong side.”

Rick Hasen, an election law expert at the University of California, Irvine,
called the Democratic lawsuits “long shots,” saying that so-called voter
protection lawsuits had often failed in the courts. “In terms of success,
some of these things are a stretch,” he said.

Mr. Elias emphasized that the seeds of the Ohio and Wisconsin suits had
been planted before Mrs. Clinton was a candidate. Mr. Elias and Robby Mook,
now Mrs. Clinton’s campaign manager, began collaborating on
voter-protection efforts last year, before it was clear she would run or
that they would be involved, people briefed on their work said.

But their efforts now — whether parallel or in concert — involve much
higher stakes. Unlike Mr. Obama, who could rely on a much wealthier
Democratic National Committee to pursue voter registration for several
years leading up to his re-election campaign, the party’s standard-bearer
this time will have no such backup: The national committee has struggled
financially of late and has largely outsourced its registration efforts to
nonprofit groups.

That means Mrs. Clinton, if she is nominated, may have to compensate for
underwhelming efforts to register voters by maximizing the ability of
existing Democratic voters to cast their ballots.

As Mrs. Clinton prepares to head to Texas Southern University, where she
will receive an award named for the former congresswoman and civil rights
leader Barbara Jordan, some Democrats see voter protections as a safe topic
for her to explore at this stage of the campaign, one that will not turn
off voters she needs in a general election.

But Michael Waldman, president of the Brennan Center and a former
speechwriter for President Bill Clinton, said the subject was riskier than
it might seem.

“There’s been such a hotly contested wave of new laws that it’s not such a
safe issue anymore,” said Mr. Waldman. “It’s not just something for Fourth
of July orations.”

*Clinton to propose at least 20 days of early voting in every
<http://onpolitics.usatoday.com/2015/06/03/hillary-clinton-early-voting/>
state // USA Today // David Jackson – June 3, 2015*

Hillary Clinton plans to use a voting rights speech Thursday in Texas to
call for an early voting period of at least 20 days in every state, her
presidential campaign says.

Clinton also plans to criticize what Democrats call Republican efforts to
restrict voting — especially for African Americans and Latinos — through
devices like voter identification laws.

“This is, I think, a moment when we should be expanding the franchise,”
Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta tells The Washington Post. “What we
see in state after state is this effort by conservatives to restrict the
right to vote.”

Clinton is slated to deliver her voting rights speech at Texas Southern
University in Houston.

*Hillary Clinton to Attack G.O.P. Rivals on Voting Rights
<http://www.nytimes.com/politics/first-draft/2015/06/03/hillary-clinton-to-attack-g-o-p-rivals-on-voting-rights/?_r=0>
// NYT // Amy Chozick – June 3, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton will accuse some of her Republican rivals on Thursday of
supporting a spate of new state voting laws that threatened the democratic
process merely for their own political gain, her campaign said Wednesday.

In a speech at the historically black Texas Southern University in Houston,
Mrs. Clinton will propose a series of voter-protection policies, including
ensuring greater access to online voter registration, reducing wait times
at voting precincts and setting a nationwide early voting standard of at
least 20 days before an election. She will also underscore her support for
allowing ex-felons to vote.

Mrs. Clinton will also call on Congress to reenact parts of the Voting
Rights Act that the Supreme Court struck down in 2013, according to an
outline of her speech provided to reporters on Wednesday.

It will be one of her most substantive and sharply political events since
Mrs. Clinton declared her candidacy for president in April. For the most
part, her campaign stops have included orchestrated round-table policy
discussions with a handful of voters in early nominating states — not
in-depth policy proposals or fiery political attacks.

In a sharpening of her partisan edge, Mrs. Clinton will also single out
some of her potential Republican rivals, including Gov. Scott Walker of
Wisconsin, former Gov. Jeb Bush of Florida, and former Gov. Rick Perry of
Texas, whose states have enacted laws that impose additional requirements
on voters.

Mrs. Clinton will present a state-by-state critique of new voting laws in
states across the country that require voters to present government-issued
identification, an effort that voting rights activists say
disproportionately hurts minority and young voters, groups that tend to
vote Democratic.

*Hillary Clinton Works For The Support Of An Old Ally: The Teachers Union
<http://www.buzzfeed.com/rubycramer/hillary-clinton-works-for-the-support-of-an-old-ally-the-tea#.xvJ6qzDk0>
// Buzzfeed // Ruby Cramer – June 3, 2015 *

Three Democratic candidates each traveled to Washington this week to court
the endorsement of the American Federation of Teachers — and after taking
part in the hour-long meetings, the thing that stood out most to Randi
Weingarten, the union, president, was this: Hillary Clinton knew what she
was doing.

The other two, Martin O’Malley and Bernie Sanders, maybe less so.

The AFT meetings, which took place over the course of Tuesday and
Wednesday, may offer Clinton the possibility of an early, influential
endorsement from the major teachers union that endorsed her in the 2008
presidential race. Weingarten herself is close to and has supported Clinton
for years. She sits on the board of Priorities USA Action, the super PAC
raising millions to support her candidacy.

On matters of education policy, according to Weingarten, Clinton engaged
the group with noticeably more depth and granular detail than her
competitors. It was, she said, the most striking difference between the
three candidates, particularly on the set of issues that have created
fissures inside the Democratic Party, including testing, teacher
evaluations in tenure decisions, and Common Core.

“Both in terms of the presentation as well as the questions, Secretary
Clinton was clearly understood and spoke in great depth,” said Weingarten.
“The members of the board did not ask Sen. Sanders or Gov. O’Malley as many
questions about public education. I don’t frankly…” Weingarten paused. “I
really don’t… Let me just observe that it was interesting. I don’t really
want to draw a conclusion about it.”

Weingarten said that all three candidates — Clinton; Sanders, the U.S.
senator from Vermont; and O’Malley, the former Maryland governor of
Maryland — voiced strong support for public school teachers. But Clinton
“talked so granularly about the issues that people felt a freedom to ask
follow-up questions,” she said.

The three meetings, hosted at AFT’s headquarters, were each attended by
about 150 union members, around one third of whom are on the group’s
executive council. Each of the candidates gave brief introductory remarks
before answering questions from the audience. The conversation with
Clinton, O’Malley, and Sanders touched on five key areas, said Weingarten:
the “imbalance in the economy,” public education, health care, retirement
security, and the democracy.

The AFT effort to engage the candidates marked the first formal endorsement
meeting of its kind by a union or interest group in the 2016 Democratic
primary.

The meetings were not open to the media. But in an interview on Wednesday
evening, Weingarten described AFT’s endorsement process and outlined in
broad strokes each candidate’s message. She declined to elaborate on any
shades of difference in policy or position between Clinton, O’Malley, and
Sanders.

Prior to the meetings, the candidates each completed a policy-focused
questionnaire, which AFT leadership began preparing in collaboration with
its members in February. The attendees on Tuesday and Wednesday formulated
their questions for the three Democrats — which were not prescreened —
having reviewed their responses to the questionnaire. AFT plans to use the
documents, as well as taped video from the three meetings this week, during
the election.

AFT also invited Republican candidates to participate in the same process.
None acknowledged receipt of the questionnaire, according to Weingarten.

Lincoln Chafee, the former Republican and Independent from Rhode Island who
announced his presidential campaign on Wednesday as a Democrat, declined to
participate, telling AFT officials his record could speak for itself,
Weingarten said.

Asked about her past support for Clinton in relation to AFT’s endorsement,
Weingarten said it wouldn’t be an issue, noting that some of her colleagues
had relationships with O’Malley and Sanders: “I’m one person on the board.”

Since she launched her campaign in April, Clinton has not discussed the
finer points of her positions on a number of policies important to teachers
unions. (She is expected to outline a more detailed agenda following her
formal campaign launch speech on June 13 on New York’s Roosevelt Island.)

The AFT backed Clinton over Barack Obama in October 2007. The largest
teachers union, National Education Association, did not endorse a candidate
in the 2008 Democratic primary, though the union did back Obama’s
re-election.

Eight years later, however, Clinton may face more pressure from a share of
the Democratic Party, and donor community, that has fought unions for more
charter schools, voucher programs, and measures that test teachers and link
tenure to achievement.

Wealthy Democrats who have made education their top priority have already
said that Clinton, despite her lead in early polling, should make her
beliefs known sooner rather than later. Ann O’Leary, the campaign’s top
policy adviser, told the New York Times earlier this year that Clinton
would be engaging with leaders on both sides of the debate more than Obama
administration has: “both the teachers union and the reformers will really
feel like they have her ear in a way they haven’t.”

But Weingarten said she wasn’t worried. The union leader was head of the
New York-based United Federation of Teachers when she first backed Clinton,
then the state’s junior senator. Weingarten dismissed the donors, saying
Clinton “follows the evidence, not ideology — that’s what she told our
members.”

Asked to detail Clinton’s stance on the issues discussed, Weingarten said
the candidate “addressed issues of testing, of standards, and she did it in
a very direct way. She basically said, which was the bottom line over and
over again, you cannot help students, virtually all students, if teachers
aren’t our partners.”

Weingarten said Clinton signaled a need for “a change in that direction.”

But she added that, when it comes to AFT’s endorsement, the union will take
into account characteristics such as “tenacity,” “openness,” and
“integrity.”

“As people are on the campaign trail, they’ll be more and more specific
about policies,” Weingarten said. “The different was, Secretary Clinton
spoke in a very extensive way about policies and practices that would help
more and more children be ready for life and career and college — and that
there was a depth there in terms of the conversation that she had. That was
the big difference.”

The topic of the Trans-Pacific Partnership, another issue dividing the
Democratic Party, also came up in each of the three meetings. Weingarten
said that Clinton’s comments to the AFT members were consistent with her
public remarks on the issue: that she would support a trade deal that
protects U.S. workers and wages, and strengthens national security, but
would not weigh in on this trade deal until the president finished the
negotiations that are still shaping its makeup.

*Democrats finally get a contest as Hillary Clinton draws challengers
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/democrats-finally-get-a-contest-as-hillary-clinton-draws-challengers/2015/06/03/95fefaea-0a12-11e5-95fd-d580f1c5d44e_story.html>
// WaPo // Philip Rucker, Robert Costa & Anne Gearan – June 3, 2015 *

A once-sleepy Democratic presidential primary contest is fast coming alive
as Hillary Rodham Clinton’s poll numbers fall and a diverse array of
long-shot opponents step forward to challenge her.

The recent developments mark a dramatic evolution in the 2016 sweepstakes,
which until now has been shaped by the large assortment of hopefuls on the
Republican side, where there is no front-runner.

The latest Democrat to enter the race is Lincoln Chafee, a onetime
Republican and former Rhode Island governor and senator, who launched his
campaign Wednesday in Northern Virginia. Though his candidacy is quixotic,
Chafee’s sharp attacks on Clinton’s hawkish foreign policy record — and in
particular her 2002 vote to authorize the war in Iraq — could nonetheless
complicate her march to the nomination.

Chafee joins an underfunded and jumbled field of Clinton rivals who see the
favorite’s coziness with Wall Street and political longevity as weaknesses
and who think she is vulnerable to a grass-roots contender who better
captures the party’s liberal soul.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a fiery populist who identifies as a
socialist, has been attracting some of the largest crowds of any candidate
from either party as he summons supporters to join his “political
revolution.”

Another foe, former Maryland governor Martin O’Malley, is making an overt
generational contrast: His campaign slogan is “New Leadership.” And former
senator Jim Webb of Virginia has echoed Chafee’s antiwar pitch as he
explores a candidacy.

The activity has brought fresh attention to the fault lines within the
Democratic coalition over economic fairness and foreign policy.

At Clinton’s Brooklyn headquarters, the mantra has been to prepare for a
difficult primary and compete for every vote in every state. Her team has
carefully crafted a summer rollout — a June 13 kickoff rally followed by
major policy speeches — to cast Clinton as a progressive champion.

On Thursday, for instance, Clinton will give a speech on voting rights at a
historically black college in Texas, where she will call for an early
voting period of at least 20 days in every state. Her address comes as
Democrats pursue legal challenges to voting restrictions ushered in by
Republican legislatures.

“We’ve always thought there would be challengers,” Clinton campaign
chairman John D. Podesta said in an interview Wednesday. “There were
always going to be people saying she wasn’t this enough, wasn’t that
enough, wasn’t populist enough.”

He added: “Our strategy at the moment is to welcome them into the race and
lay out our program versus theirs. . . . There will be debates. These
candidates will get their airtime. But what we’re focused on is telling her
story, what her vision for the country is.”

Polls show that Clinton’s popularity is foundering with her reemergence as
a political candidate, effectively erasing the bipartisan approval she
enjoyed as secretary of state.

More Americans said they held an unfavorable opinion of Clinton than a
favorable one, 49 percent to 45 percent, according to a Washington Post-ABC
News poll this week. Among independent voters, the figure is worse: 55
percent unfavorable to 39 percent favorable.

Republicans are pleased to see Clinton’s popularity coming down to earth.

“Clearly, whatever political capital that Hillary Clinton had previously
enjoyed as secretary of state has atrophied,” said pollster Neil Newhouse,
who is likely to work for Right to Rise, the pro-Jeb Bush super PAC.

Still, Clinton is trouncing the rest of the Democratic field by every
measure, including in money raised and in the depth of her organization.
Her campaign has opened nine field offices in Iowa, which hosts the first
presidential caucuses.

This week’s Post-ABC poll showed Clinton leading the Democratic pack at 62
percent. Vice President Biden, who has not formally ruled out a candidacy,
was second with 14 percent, followed by Sanders at 10 percent.

Paul Begala, an adviser to the pro-Clinton super PAC Priorities USA Action,
predicted that the race will tighten.

“The day she announced, the polls had her at like a million percent,”
Begala said. “She needed to print that out, put it in a scrapbook and give
it to baby Charlotte, because it will never be this good again.”

Clinton is showing political fragility in some areas, including on
character attributes. Fifty-two percent of those polled said she was not
honest and trustworthy.

Clinton’s advisers attribute this to intense media scrutiny. They argue
that a more accurate barometer of her standing is the question of empathy.
Asked whether she “understands the problems of people like you,” 49 percent
said she did and 46 percent said she did not.

Anastasia Rave, 26, a retail manager in Beaufort, N.C., was among those
polled. A Democratic-leaning independent, Rave said she would support
Clinton over any Republican candidate — but she remains uneasy.

“I don’t think that her attempts to act like she understands the everyday
working person are genuine,” Rave said. “I don’t really buy it.”

The Clinton response is to give speeches on issues such as college
affordability in an effort to show her as compassionate toward the middle
class.

“The real trust issue in the election will be who voters trust to look out
for them,” said pollster Geoff Garin of Priorities USA.

To Democrats who are fretting, Ed Rendell, a former Pennsylvania governor
and a Clinton booster, has a blunt message: “Man up.”

“No matter who the candidate was — if Moses or Jesus or Muhammad came back
— there would be time periods when they were considered untrustworthy by
the public,” Rendell said. “If you’re not convinced that Hillary’s a
lights-out candidate, tell me who is?”

A swelling number of liberal activists, however, see Sanders as the answer.
The boisterous crowds that have greeted his road show in the two weeks
since he launched his campaign have surprised even his longtime advisers.

With his Brooklyn-accented barbs about what he believes is the alarming
power of corporate America, Sanders sees a path to defeating Clinton. While
Clinton is flanked by aides and Secret Service agents at controlled events,
Sanders revels in rowdy town hall meetings and wanders through crowds
wearing a rumpled suit and with unruly white hair.

“I don’t want to get too socialist about it, but I’d describe it as
communal,” said Sanders political consultant Tad Devine.

Sanders has instructed his inner circle to concentrate on the economy
rather than Clinton’s Iraq vote, even though that is one front where their
records differ. “We don’t want a campaign about something that happened 12
or 13 years ago,” Devine said. “It’s got to be about the next 10.”

But Iraq is a centerpiece of Chafee’s appeal to Democrats.

“It’s heartbreaking that more of my colleagues failed to do their
homework,” Chafee said Wednesday as he announced his candidacy at George
Mason University. “And incredibly, the neocon proponents of the war who
sold us on the false premise of weapons of mass destruction are still key
advisers to a number of presidential candidates today.”

He added later: “Including the main Democratic candidate.”

Chafee’s approach is reminiscent of how then-Sen. Barack Obama used
Clinton’s Iraq vote to drive a wedge between her and antiwar Democrats in
2008. Clinton has since disavowed the vote, and some supporters believe the
war is no longer a central concern for voters.

“When I ran [in 2004], it was a different party and frightened about the
war,” said former Vermont governor Howard Dean, a Clinton backer.

O’Malley, 52, is offering himself as a youthful alternative to Clinton
palatable to all wings of the party, while also railing against “the
privileged and the powerful” as he said this past weekend.

O’Malley and his associates are targeting those who tried unsuccessfully to
draft Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) to run. A super PAC supporting
O’Malley said Wednesday that it will soon purchase a round of television
ads in Iowa highlighting his willingness to battle Wall Street, though a
spokesman said the initial buy is a modest $25,000.

“There is a real hunger for economic populism. O’Malley is speaking to
that,” said George Appleby, O’Malley’s state chairman in Iowa. He called
Sanders “honorable and interesting” but said that “I’d be very surprised if
Democrats nominated a 73-year-old man.”

*Clinton pollster downplays Hillary's sinking poll numbers
<http://www.politico.com/story/2015/06/hillary-clinton-joel-benenson-poll-numbers-118590.html#ixzz3c1edS5vH>
// Politico // Nick Gass – June 3, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton’s pollster, in a rare appearance on CNN Wednesday,
downplayed reports in POLITICO and elsewhere noting the candidate’s sinking
polling numbers.

“We think there’s been a minimal change,” said Joel Benenson, who also
worked as a senior strategist for President Barack Obama’s 2008 and 2012
campaigns.

Benenson said he takes all public polls with a grain of salt, reminding
host Wolf Blitzer that CNN’s poll put President Barack Obama in a dead heat
with Republican challenger Mitt Romney in the days leading up to the 2012
election. Blitzer said the polls carry a margin of error and show trends
and perspective at a particular time.

“We’re not going to get hung up on margin of error. It’s not a term I’ve
ever shared with a client,” Benenson responded.

In particular, Blitzer made reference to the CNN/ORC poll released Tuesday
that found a majority of American adults do not find the former secretary
of state honest or trustworthy. Additionally, just 47 percent of
respondents said Clinton “cares about people like me,” compared with 52
percent who said she does not.

Clinton still has the edge over her opponents on that score, the pollster
responded.

“I don’t want to debate you over your poll. You want to treat it as the
gold standard. I don’t think that’s what it is,” Benenson said.

“If you look at the metric for ‘who cares about people like me,’ Hillary
Clinton has a six-to-20-point advantage over all of her opponents, and
that’s going to be the way the voters are going to view this, through the
prism of ‘who’s going to be working harder for me?,’ ‘who can I trust to
get me and my family ahead?’ That’s what’s central to their lives,” he
added.

In her campaign materials and appearances, Clinton has said she wants to be
a “champion” for “everyday Americans.”

Benenson said “it remains to be seen” how much the campaign will make use
of Bill Clinton, expressing the desire that the former president would be
available as much as he could.

“He’s obviously very passionate” about his wife’s candidacy, Benenson told
Blitzer, calling the former president “a forceful and skillful advocate”
for Democrats and touting his ability to bring issues home to voters.

As for media gripes about Clinton’s lack of availability, Benenson said
there will be “ample time” for more face-to-face interactions in the coming
months as preparations ramp up in early-state primaries.

“I understand that people in the media want this to be a sprint every day,
but the truth is the presidential campaign is a marathon,” he said.

*The Beltway’s Clinton derangement syndrome: What I saw inside a Hillary
campaign briefing
<http://www.salon.com/2015/06/02/the_beltways_clinton_derangement_syndrome_what_i_saw_inside_a_hillary_campaign_briefing/>
// Salon // Joan Walsh – June 3, 2015 *

So I attended that now-infamous briefing with Clinton campaign officials in
Brooklyn last Thursday. I wasn’t going to write about it. No news was
broken. Still, I learned some things I could see myself using along the
way. It was a snapshot; here’s what senior officials thought about the race
six weeks in, and seven months from the first caucuses in Iowa. I knew it
was set up to give increasingly restless Clinton beat reporters time to ask
questions of campaign officials, to diffuse the obviously building tension.
I wasn’t sure it would work, but it seemed worth a try.

But it turns out news was broken, in a way. The briefing itself became
news; its structure, its ground rules, its very existence. CNBC’s John
Harwood wrote a withering take on it. It led to reporters from rival news
organizations gathering to formalize their complaints about access to the
Clinton campaign. They told other reporters about the meeting, but strictly
on background, an irony that wasn’t entirely lost on the reporters who then
covered it. (This Paul Farhi story about said reporters failing to
“practice what they preach,” trying to control his story about the flap, is
hilarious.)

Media covering the media’s complaints about the way media is treated; what
could be more Beltway-centric inside baseball? But as long as people are
writing about it, it’s clear the briefing scandal illuminates the
increasingly toxic relationship between the press and the Clintons. So I’ll
share what I saw, since now the event has become news in itself.

Let me shock you up front: I actually came away from it marginally more
sympathetic to the Clinton beat reporters than before I went in.
Essentially, they’re a bunch of people trying to do their jobs. Some are
well-paid and pampered; many are not. A lot of reporters had schlepped up
from a Clinton event in South Carolina earlier that day. They carried
luggage and laptop bags and looked tired and bedraggled, resentful at
having a command event scheduled that afternoon but unwilling to miss it.
What if it did break news?

So a lot of the bitching is just people trying to do a good job, who think
the Clinton folks are making it harder than necessary. There were lots of
questions about when Clinton might take a vacation (which means they can,
too) – we couldn’t get more specific than late August. That might seem
petty, unless you’ve been asking these questions going back to the first
Bush campaign, which some of those folks may be. Likewise, they peppered
officials with questions about Clinton’s June 13 kickoff rally, but
couldn’t get much detail, not even the location (three days later, we
learned it would be in New York.) That got tedious, but the beat reporters
have been surprised more than once with sudden scheduling (include the
briefing itself). The senior campaign officials promised they’d have plenty
of notice, and they did, they got 12 days.

I come at this from a completely different perspective. I took the B train
to Brooklyn, just kind of curious about the event and not on any kind of
deadline. And since I consider political media part of my beat, I got a
fascinating look at the culture. My comfort with the scheduling and the
ground rules partly reflects my very different job. I get that. But that
said, the briefing wasn’t as useless as it’s been depicted. I learned a lot
about the campaign I can share with readers. I could see the very different
styles of individual “senior campaign officials,” and learn who suffers
fools, or questions they consider foolish, better than others – although
Harwood’s right, I can’t tell you about them specifically, by name.

The Clinton folks, for their part, stayed relentlessly on message – which
is their job — but I learned some interesting things anyway. I saw the way
they’re determined to frame Clinton as laser-focused on the four early
primary and caucus states – Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina.
She doesn’t take anything for granted, they said many times. Sure, that’s
become a cliché. But there was a rueful joke about how, this time around,
they’re paying attention to the actual delegates who will pick the nominee.
It would be funnier if I could put it in direct quotes, but it was salty,
and it acknowledged the 2008 campaign’s many stumbles when it came to
actually winning delegates, especially in caucus states.

I also learned that campaign polling shows that stories about the Clinton
Foundation, and Clinton’s infamous personal email server, aren’t damaging
her – at least among Democratic primary voters, and they’re the focus for
now. I asked a question about how the campaign balances its need to
consolidate the Obama coalition with ideas about reaching working class
white voters, and heard them say those are questions more suited to the
general election than the primary. They emphasized their polling shows
Clinton doing very well with the Obama coalition, despite that spirited
2008 rivalry. I heard a lot of talk about millennials and women, who seem
to be the white voters the campaign is best suited to lure.

Finally, I learned that they consider this early period of the campaign a
success, on their terms. Clinton’s small-group “dialogues” — oh, it’s not a
listening tour, I learned that, too: she’s having dialogue with voters –
have performed several functions for the campaign. Yes, they provide kind
of a soft launch for a woman who hasn’t campaigned in seven years. They
also let her reach voters in a person to person way some of these same
reporters said she’d never pull off.  And finally, they let voters, not
reporters, dominate the campaign. You can mock it, you can wish it were
otherwise, but mostly it’s working, so far.

So I was just going to file all this away for some future post. But in the
wake of the controversy over the briefing, I find it surprising that so
many people thought the gathering useless. Again, I get that my job is
different, but it shocked me that this was the dastardly Clinton campaign
event that put some reporters over the edge.

I also saw, first-hand, how the journalists try to mask their own
complaints about access as being impartial, expert criticism of the
campaign’s strategy. The small “dialogues” made sense for a while, one
reporter allowed, but aren’t they becoming “counterproductive?” They were
said to lack “energy;” they’re becoming “static.” Why isn’t Clinton turning
out big crowds and giving big speeches? And are we really supposed to
believe she’s serious about focusing on Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and
South Carolina? C’mon now. Members of the Church of the Savvy know that
can’t be true.

Of course, if Clinton was going around giving big speeches in huge venues
and criss-crossing the country without paying special attention to the
early primary/caucus states, she’d be accused of arrogance, and running
another campaign about inevitability, just like 2008. One campaign official
(I can’t tell you who) essentially made that sarcastic observation:
remember how in 2008, Barack Obama was criticized for his speechifying
before large, adoring crowds?

It struck me that a sizeable share of the room seemed to work backward from
the conclusion that whatever campaign strategy Clinton adopts, it’s flawed.
As a colleague of mine (who wasn’t there) correctly observed later, they so
often use “voters” as sock puppets to voice their complaints. It’s not
enough for the pack, even though it’s early, to watch the campaign unfold,
and report on it. We will learn soon enough – from polling numbers, from
voters’ praise or grousing, ultimately, from results – whether it’s
working. No, these folks have to pre-emptively declare the campaign flawed
– largely because they don’t like their access to it.

Yes, the campaign’s secrecy about mundane logistics is silly, and so is the
notion of sending “embargoed” background information via email to hundreds
of reporters who haven’t agreed to keep the info embargoed. (So Adam
Nagourney tweeted it out anyway.)  Personally, I would like to hear Clinton
talk, whether to reporters or publicly to voters, about her views on the
Trans-Pacific Partnership trade agreement, or how to combat ISIS, or what
she thinks of the debt-free college movement. There were a couple of
questions about when Clinton will make a formal stand on the TPP, but
otherwise issues were largely missing from the discussion.

The whole thing seemed designed to improve campaign-media relations, to
clear the air and answer the frustrated reporters’ questions until there
were no more questions. Then they stayed and served us beer – I was peeved;
I prefer wine — and talked some more. Some “senior Clinton campaign
officials” stayed and schmoozed longer than I was able to. And it all
backfired, spectacularly, because this relationship cannot be saved. But on
some level, right now, the campaign doesn’t have to care.

I continue to be struck by the self-importance of the media. Campaigning
has changed, and the Clinton campaign has evolved an approach that its
leadership thinks serves the candidate. Maybe they’ve changed the rules of
coverage; but the rules change all the time. Instead of figuring out a way
to grapple with those changing rules and break stories anyway, journalists
are acting as though they have a sacred right to have dozens of them
covering Clinton’s every move. If they don’t like the campaign rules, they
shouldn’t play. They are entirely within their rights to refuse to attend
briefings where officials can’t be quoted, for instance. They could boycott
her events and talk to voters on their own, instead. They could pore over
records and donor lists (some people are doing that.)

After 30 years of wrangling, Clinton can’t win with the national media, but
I think the campaign has decided it doesn’t need to. It’s going to look for
ways to be cordial, and serve folks beer occasionally, but it’s not going
to be driven by irritated beat reporters. And let me use voters as sock
puppets here: I really don’t think voters will care.

*When it comes to the Clintons and Wall Street: Democratic opponents are
silent
<http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2015/06/03/268715/when-it-comes-to-the-clintons.html>
// McClatchy // Anita Kumar & Greg Gorden – June 3, 2015*

This year’s crop of Democratic candidates can’t seem to stop talking about
how they are going to fight Wall Street and help struggling Americans.

So we wondered just what those vying for president next year thought of the
close ties between Wall Street and their party’s front-runner, Hillary
Clinton, and her husband, Bill Clinton.

The former president earned millions of dollars in speaking fees and
donations for his global charity from big banks, some that paid billions of
dollars to resolve federal investigations, according to a McClatchy
analysis. Hillary Clinton also accepted speaking fees from at least one
bank.

What do Clinton’s opponents -- all of them way down in the polls -- say
about that? Not a thing.

Former Maryland Governor Martin O’Malley: No comment.

Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders: No comment.

Former Rhode Island governor Lincoln Chafee, who’s throwing his hat into
the ring later today: No comment.

It’s not too surprising that Chafee’s campaign declined to comment. His
criticism of Clinton has been focused on her vote to invade Iraq.

But O’Malley and Sanders have made income equality a centerpiece of their
campaigns.

Last week, Sanders said: “Wall Street cannot continue to be an island unto
itself, gambling trillions in risky financial instruments while expecting
the public to bail it out. If a bank is too big to fail it is too big to
exist.”

This week, O’Malley said this on Good Morning America: “I believe that the
presidency is a sacred trust and I believe that we are best served by
giving the choice of who our president should be to the people of the
United States and not to the big banks on Wall Street.”

We get it. They don’t like big banks. But when it comes to the Clintons and
Wall Street, they are silent.

*21 New ‘Clinton Cash’ Revelations That Have Imperiled Hillary Clinton’s
Campaign
<http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2015/06/03/21-new-clinton-cash-revelations-that-have-imperiled-hillary-clintons-campaign/>
// Breitbart – June 3, 2015 *

Prior to the release of the New York Times bestselling investigative exposé
Clinton Cash by Government Accountability Institute President and Breitbart
Senior Editor-at-Large Peter Schweizer, Hillary Clinton and her supporters
claimed she was among the most vetted political figures in America—a
candidate about whom everything was known.

Yet as media outlets across the ideological spectrum have confirmed and
verified the book’s explosive revelations about Clinton’s tenure as Sec. of
State and the influx of hundreds of millions of dollars from foreign
sources into the Clinton Foundation, the nation has learned much it did not
know. Subsequent reporting by national news outlets has expanded on the
book’s findings using its investigative methodology.

Indeed, the dizzying flurry of resulting Hillary Clinton Foundation
scandals has been difficult to keep up with. As CNN’s John King put it on
Sunday, “You can’t go 20 minutes in this town, it seems, without some sort
of a story about Clinton Foundation that gives you a little bit of the
creeps.”

Early on, as Clinton Cash bombshells began appearing in the New York Times,
Washington Post, New Yorker, Bloomberg, and elsewhere, Hillary Clinton’s
campaign sought to calm nervous campaign donors by announcing the creation
of a special “rapid response” War Room aimed at combating a book, an
unprecedented move in the annals of modern presidential campaigning. The
Clinton campaign team built a website called “The Briefing,” issued memos,
and tasked an eight-person team to create videos featuring embattled
Clinton spokesperson Brian Fallon as he awkwardly and unsuccessfully
attempted to smear Peter Schweizer. Team Clinton’s message: all of Clinton
Cash’s revelations are incorrect or merely “coincidences.”

Yet as the nation’s largest news organizations began to confirm finding
after finding, the Clinton campaign did the only thing it could: it gave up
in its attempts to refute the swelling avalanche of now well-established
facts. Indeed, the Clinton campaign’s last video response on its “The
Briefing” YouTube page is dated May 5th—Clinton Cash’s official launch date.

To date, Hillary Clinton has yet to substantively answer a single question
from the mountain of Clinton Cash questions that continue to pile up with
each passing day.

The result: according to Tuesday’s CNN poll, the “Clinton Cash Effect” has
rendered Hillary Clinton historic new lows in her favorability with
American voters.

Below we chronicle just 21 of the myriad Clinton Cash-related revelations
that have emerged since the book’s publication—all of which have been
confirmed and verified as accurate by national media organizations.

Huffington Post: Clintons Bagged at Least $3.4 Million for 18 Speeches
Funded by Keystone Pipeline Banks

Canadian Imperial Bank of Commerce and TD Bank—two of the Keystone XL
pipeline’s largest investors—fully or partially bankrolled eight Hillary
Clinton speeches that “put more than $1.6 million in the Democratic
candidate’s pocket,” reports the Huffington Post.

Moreover, according to Clinton Cash, during Hillary Clinton’s tenure as
Sec. of State, Bill Clinton delivered 10 speeches from Nov. 2008 to
mid-2011 totaling $1.8 million paid for by TD Bank, which held a $1.6
billion investment in the Keystone XL pipeline.

The Clintons’ speaking fees windfall, which has infuriated environmental
groups, have yet to be addressed by Hillary Clinton.

New York Times: Clinton Foundation Shook Down a Tiny Tsunami Relief
Nonprofit for a $500,000 Speaking Fee

Bill Clinton refused to give a speech for a tiny nonprofit seeking to raise
money for tsunami victims until the group agreed to pay a $500,000 speaking
fee to the Clinton Foundation. The Times reported that the Clinton
Foundation “sent the charity an invoice,” which “amounted to almost a
quarter of the evening’s net proceeds—enough to build 10 preschools in
Indonesia.”

New York Magazine: Clinton Foundation “Strong-Armed” Charity Watchdog Group

When “the Clinton Foundation wound up on a ‘watch list’ maintained by the
Charity Navigator, dubbed the ‘most prominent’ nonprofit watchdog,”
reported New York Magazine writer Gabriel Sherman, “the Foundation
attempted to strong-arm them by calling a Navigator board member.”

International Business Times: Hillary Clinton’s State Dept. Gave Clinton
Foundation Donors Weapons Deals

“Under Clinton’s leadership, the State Department approved $165 billion
worth of commercial arms sales to 20 nations whose governments have given
money to the Clinton Foundation, according to an IBTimes analysis of State
Department and foundation data,” reports IBT. “That figure—derived from the
three full fiscal years of Clinton’s term as Secretary of State (from
October 2010 to September 2012)—represented nearly double the value of
American arms sales made to the those countries and approved by the State
Department during the same period of President George W. Bush’s second
term.”

Salon, MotherJones, HuffingtonPost, Slate, and several other liberal
publications reported on IBT’s findings.

Washington Post: Clintons Hid 1,100 Foreign Donor Names in Violation of
Ethics Agreement with Obama Admin.

Clinton Cash revealed five hidden foreign donations. On the heels of the
book’s publication, the Washington Post uncovered another 1,100 foreign
donor names hidden in the Canada-based Clinton Giustra Enterprise
Partnership—a Clinton Foundation initiative Bill Clinton erected with
controversial billionaire mining executive Frank Giustra.

“A charity affiliated with the Clinton Foundation failed to reveal the
identities of its 1,100 donors, creating a broad exception to the
foundation’s promise to disclose funding sources as part of an ethics
agreement with the Obama administration,” reports the Washington Post. “The
number of undisclosed contributors to the charity, the Canada-based Clinton
Giustra Enterprise Partnership, signals a larger zone of secrecy around
foundation donors than was previously known.”

In a follow-up story, the Post reports that only 21 of Frank Giustra and
Bill Clinton’s secret 1,100 foreign donors have subsequently been revealed.
If and when the other 1,079 hidden donors names will be revealed is
presently unclear—and will be the subject of forthcoming investigative
reports by Breitbart News.

Vox: At Least 181 Clinton Foundation Donors Lobbied Hillary’s State Dept.

“Public records alone reveal a nearly limitless supply of cozy
relationships between the Clintons and companies with interests before the
government,” reports Vox. “There’s a household name at the nexus of the
foundation and the State Department for every letter of the alphabet but
“X” (often more than one): Anheuser-Busch, Boeing, Chevron, (John) Deere,
Eli Lilly, FedEx, Goldman Sachs, HBO, Intel, JP Morgan, Lockheed Martin,
Monsanto, NBC Universal, Oracle, Procter & Gamble, Qualcomm, Rotary
International, Siemens, Target, Unilever, Verizon, Walmart, Yahoo, and
Ze-gen.”

BuzzFeed: Two of Hillary Clinton’s Top Donors Were Major Felons

When Hillary Clinton ran for president in 2008, two of her biggest
fundraisers were conducting massive Ponzi schemes. One was Hsu, who posed
as a garment tycoon, and is now serving a 24-year sentence in federal
prison in Milan, Michigan. The other, Hassan Nemazee, is serving a 12-year
sentence in Otisville, New York, for bank fraud. He used fake documents and
nonexistent loans to trick bankers into extending him more credit,” reports
Ben Smith of BuzFeed. “Those two convictions cast light on a central
perplexity of the 2016 presidential cycle, and its ‘Clinton Cash‘ phase:
Why are shady people with murky interests always hanging around political
superstars, and particularly Bill and Hillary Clinton?”

Daily Beast: Clintons’ Charity Scored Millions from Qatar and Donations
from Corrupt FIFA Soccer Organization

“The Clinton global charity has received between $50,000 and $100,000 from
soccer’s governing body and has partnered with the Fédération
Internationale de Football Association on several occasions, according to
donor listings on the foundation’s website,” reports The Daily Beast.
“Qatar 2022 committee gave the foundation between $250,000 and $500,000 in
2014 and the State of Qatar gave between $1 million and $5 million in
previous, unspecified years.”

Associated Press: The Clintons’ Have a Secret “Pass-Through” Company—WJC,
LLC

“The newly released financial files on Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton’s
growing fortune omit a company with no apparent employees or assets that
the former president has legally used to provide consulting and other
services, but which demonstrates the complexity of the family’s finances,”
reported the AP. “The officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity
because they were not authorized to provide private details of the former
president’s finances on the record, said the entity was a ‘pass-through’
company designed to channel payments to the former president.”

Hillary Clinton has yet to release the names and amounts of the payments
that flowed through the hidden WJC, LLC, company.

New York Times: Hillary Funneled $10K Monthly Payments to Sidney Blumenthal
Through Clinton Foundation

“An examination by The Times suggests that Mr. Blumenthal’s involvement was
more wide-ranging and more complicated than previously known, embodying the
blurry lines between business, politics and philanthropy that have enriched
and vexed the Clintons and their inner circle for years,” reports the
Times. “While advising Mrs. Clinton on Libya, Mr. Blumenthal, who had been
barred from a State Department job by aides to President Obama, was also
employed by her family’s philanthropy, the Clinton Foundation…and worked on
and off as a paid consultant to Media Matters and American Bridge,
organizations that helped lay the groundwork for Mrs. Clinton’s 2016
campaign.”

New Yorker: Bill Clinton Scored a $500,000 Speech in Moscow Paid for by a
Kremlin-backed Bank

The New Yorker confirms Clinton Cash’s reporting that Bill Clinton bagged
$500,000 for a Moscow speech paid for by “a Russian investment bank that
had ties to the Kremlin.”

“Why was Bill Clinton taking any money from a bank linked to the Kremlin
while his wife was Secretary of State?” asks the New Yorker. To date,
Hillary Clinton nor her campaign have answered that question.

Washington Post: Hillary Clinton’s Brother Sits on the Board of a Mining
Co. that Received a Coveted Haitian “Gold Exploitation Permit” that Has
Only Twice Been Awarded in 50 Years. Rodham Met the Mining Executive in
Charge of the Company at a Clinton Foundation Event.

“In interviews with The Washington Post, both Rodham and the chief
executive of Delaware-based VCS Mining said they were introduced at a
meeting of the Clinton Global Initiative—an offshoot of the Clinton
Foundation that critics have long alleged invites a blurring of its
charitable mission with the business interests of Bill and Hillary Clinton
and their corporate donors.”

“Asked whether he attends CGI meetings to explore personal business
opportunities, Rodham responded, ‘No, I go to see old friends. But you
never know what can happen.’”

New York Times: Court Proceedings Reveal Hillary’s Brother Claimed Admits
Clinton Foundation and the Clintons Are Key to His Haiti Connections

“I deal through the Clinton Foundation,” Tony Rodham said according to a
transcript of his testimony obtained by The Times. “That gets me in touch
with the Haitian officials. I hound my brother-in-law [Bill Clinton],
because it’s his fund that we’re going to get our money from. And he can’t
do it until the Haitian government does it.”

Wall Street Journal: Clinton Foundation Violated Memorandum of
Understanding with the Obama Admin. By Keeping Secret a Foreign Donation of
Two Million Shares of Stock from a Foreign Executive with Business Before
Hillary’s State Dept.

Clinton Cash revealed that Canadian mining tycoon Stephen Dattels scored an
“open pit mining” concession at the Phulbari Mines in Bangladesh where his
Polo Resources had investments. The coveted perk came just two months after
Polo Resources gave the Clinton Foundation 2,000,000 shares of stock—a
donation the Clinton Foundation kept hidden.

New York Times: Hillary Clinton’s Campaign Claims She Had No Idea Her State
Dept.  Was Considering Approving the Transfer of 20% of U.S. Uranium to the
Russian Govt.—Even as the Clinton Foundation Bagged $145 Million in
Donations from Investors in the Deal

In a 4,000-word front-page New York Times investigation, the Times
confirmed in granular detail Clinton Cash’s reporting that Hillary’s State
Dept. was one of nine agencies approving the sale of Uranium One to the
Russian government. “The sale gave the Russians control of one-fifth of all
uranium production capacity in the United States,” reports the Times.

The Times then published a detailed table and infographic cataloging the
$145 million in donations to the Clinton Foundation made by uranium
executives involved in the Russian transfer of 20% of all U.S. uranium.

Bloomberg: A For-Profit University Put Bill Clinton on Its Payroll and
Scored a Jump in Funding from Hillary Clinton’s State Dept. When Clinton
Cash Revealed the Scheme, Bill Clinton Quickly Resigned.

Even as Hillary Clinton and Democrats continue to blast for-profit colleges
and universities, Hillary Clinton’s campaign continues to stonewall
questions about how much Bill Clinton was paid by Laureate International
Universities, one of the largest for-profit education companies in the
world—and an organization that has underwritten Clinton Foundation events.
As soon as Clinton Cash revealed Bill Clinton spent years on Laureate’s
payroll, the former president quickly resigned.

According to an analysis by Bloomberg: “in 2009, the year before Bill
Clinton joined Laureate, the nonprofit received 11 grants worth $9 million
from the State Department or the affiliated USAID. In 2010, the group
received 14 grants worth $15.1 million. In 2011, 13 grants added up to
$14.6 million. The following year, those numbers jumped: IYF received 21
grants worth $25.5 million, including a direct grant from the State
Department.”

Hillary Clinton has refused to answer questions about the Clintons’ income
from the for-profit education company.

New York Times: The Head of the Russian Govt’s Uranium Company Ian Telfer
Made Secret Donations Totaling $2.35 Million to the Clinton Foundation—as
Hillary Clinton’s State Dept. Approved the Transfer of 20% of All U.S.
Uranium to the Russians

Ian Telfer, the former head of the Russian-owned uranium company, Uranium
One, funneled $2.35 million to the Clinton Foundation—donations that were
never revealed until Clinton Cash reported them and the New York Times
confirmed them.

Hillary Clinton has yet to answer a single question about Uranium One.

Washington Post: Bill and Hillary Clinton Have Made at Least $26 Million in
Speaking Fees from Entities Who Are Top Clinton Foundation Donors

According to the Post’s independent analysis, “Bill Clinton was paid more
than $100 million for speeches between 2001 and 2013, according to federal
financial disclosure forms filed by Hillary Clinton during her years as a
senator and as secretary of state.”

The Post added: “Bill Clinton was paid at least $26 million in speaking
fees by companies and organizations that are also major donors to the
foundation he created after leaving the White House, according to a
Washington Post analysis of public records and foundation date.”

Washington Free Beacon: Former Clinton Campaign Operative-Turned-ABC News
Host George Stephanopoulos Failed to Disclose His $75,000 Donation and Deep
Involvement in the Clinton Foundation Before Launching an Attack Interview
Against Clinton Cash Author

Clinton political operative-turned-ABC News anchor George Stephanopoulos
infamously hid his $75,000 Clinton Foundation donation from ABC News
viewers before launching a partisan attack “interview” with Clinton Cash
author Peter Schweizer.

Roundly condemned by numerous journalists, Stephanopoulos apologized and
received zero punishment from ABC News. Hillary Clinton’s campaign then
used footage from the Stephanopoulos’ attack “interview” with Schweizer in
its political campaign videos.

“It was outrageous,” said former ABC News anchor Carole Simpson.

Hillary Clinton has yet to answer whether her  campaign coordinated with
Clinton Foundation donor George Stephanopoulos.

CNBC: Clinton Foundation Mega Donor Frank Holmes Claimed He Sold Uranium
One Before Hillary Clinton’s State Dept. Approved the Russian
Transfer—Despite His Company’s Own SEC Filings Proving Otherwise

In a highly embarrassing CNBC grilling, Clinton mega donor and uranium
executive Frank Holmes claimed he sold his Uranium One stock well before
Hillary Clinton’s State Dept. greenlit the transfer of 20% of all U.S.
uranium to the Russian government in 2010.

However, according to his company’s, U.S. Global Investors, own 2011 SEC
filing, Holmes’ company did, in fact, still hold Uranium One stock, a point
he later conceded.

Politico: Hillary’s Foundation Accepted $1 Million from Human Rights
Violator Morocco for a Lavish Event

“The event is being funded largely by a contribution of at least $1 million
from OCP, a phosphate exporter owned by Morocco’s constitutional monarchy,
according to multiple sources with direct knowledge of the event,” reports
Politico. “But in 2011, Clinton’s State Department had accused the Moroccan
government of ‘arbitrary arrests and corruption in all branches of
government.’”

ABC News similarly confirmed the Clinton Foundation’s acceptance of the
unseemly funds.

*Iowa Poll: Bill and George W. May Not Hurt Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush
<http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-06-03/iowa-poll-bill-and-george-w-may-not-hurt-hillary-clinton-and-jeb-bush>
// Bloomberg // David Knowles – June 3, 2015*

The nation's next president may well be advised by a former one. For the
most part, that prospect doesn't seem to trouble Iowa caucus-goers.

Fifty-seven percent of likely Republican caucus-goers in a new Bloomberg
Politics/Des Moines Register Iowa Poll said that it would be “mostly good”
for Jeb Bush's presidency if he were to tap his older brother, George, as a
close adviser. Thirty-three percent said such an arrangement would be
“mostly bad” for Jeb Bush's presidency.

As for Hillary Clinton, a whopping 83 percent of likely Democratic
caucus-goers approved of the idea of her using her husband, Bill, as a
close adviser, while just 9 percent said doing so was a “mostly bad”
suggestion for her presidency.

Interviewed on CBS's Face the Nation in May, Jeb Bush said that his older
brother “is not going to be a problem at all. I seek out his advice,”
adding that he had "learned from his successes and his mistakes."

Poll respondent Sarah Rynearson, an independent who plans to caucus with
Republicans, is similarly at ease with the idea of Bush being advised by
his brother.

“I think it would be a great idea, because I think his brother was a great
president,” said Rynearson, 36, who delivers meals to the elderly in
Waterloo, Iowa.

Republican respondent Thomas Stanley, 60, of Fairfield, Iowa, disagreed.

“I think that George W. Bush did a very poor job at trying to unify the
country around commonly held beliefs,” Stanley said, adding that the former
president's foreign policy decisions were “part of” what should preclude
him from serving as an adviser to his brother. “Dick Cheney is another
part. Donald Rumsfeld is another. He just had advisers that were pretty
extreme.”

When Bill Clinton ran for president in 1992, he told voters that if they
elected him, they would get “two for the price of one” in reference to his
wife. More than 20 years later, that prospect is sitting well with likely
Iowa Democratic caucus-goers.

“They've both already been there and done that before. They seem to be a
good team, and work together really well together,” said Democrat Mickie
Franklin, 33, a Transportation Security Administration worker who lives in
Nevada, Iowa. “She seems like a really strong-willed lady. And she seems
like if someone she knew felt very strongly about something, she might take
their opinion, but not necessarily go with what they want. I think there's
nothing wrong with getting advice from him.”

Ben Frazier, a 21-year-old Democrat and political science major at the
University of Iowa in Iowa City, voiced reservations.

“It's going to be important for her to think on her own and show that she
has the necessary experience to make her own decisions,” he said. “I feel
like he's going to want to be more involved than he should be. Politically
speaking, Bill Clinton is out of his prime.”

Bush has struggled with the question of how much to embrace his family
legacy on the campaign trail. He has repeatedly said “I'm my own man” when
asked how he would distinguish himself from his brother and the other
former president in his family, his father. At the same time, he has
assembled a team of foreign policy advisers that closely resembles his
brother's.

Bush has also stumbled over the question of whether, with the benefit of
hindsight, he would have sent U.S. troops into Iraq.

Clinton, meanwhile, has distanced herself from several of her husband's
former policies, including support for free trade agreements, support for
three-strikes legislation, and opposition to gay marriage. Like his wife,
Bill Clinton has changed many of his former positions, making for less of a
contrast between the two.

The survey of 437 likely Democratic caucus-goers has a margin of error of
plus or minus 4.7 percentage points, while the survey of 402 likely
Republican caucus-goers has a margin of error of plus or minus 4.9 percent.
The West Des Moines-based Selzer & Co. conducted the poll May 25-29.

*Clinton rivals pounce as her ratings fall
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/democrats-finally-get-a-contest-as-hillary-clinton-draws-challengers/2015/06/03/95fefaea-0a12-11e5-95fd-d580f1c5d44e_story.html>
// WaPo // Philip Rucker, Robert Costa and Anne Gearan - June 3, 2015*

A once-sleepy Democratic presidential primary contest is fast coming alive
as Hillary Rodham Clinton’s poll numbers fall and a diverse array of
long-shot opponents step forward to challenge her.

The recent developments mark a dramatic evolution in the 2016 sweepstakes,
which until now has been shaped by the large assortment of hopefuls on the
Republican side, where there is no front-runner.

The latest Democrat to enter the race is Lincoln Chafee, a onetime
Republican and former Rhode Island governor and senator, who launched his
campaign Wednesday in Northern Virginia. Though his candidacy is quixotic,
Chafee’s sharp attacks on Clinton’s hawkish foreign policy record — and in
particular her 2002 vote to authorize the war in Iraq — could nonetheless
complicate her march to the nomination.

Chafee joins an underfunded and jumbled field of Clinton rivals who see the
favorite’s coziness with Wall Street and political longevity as weaknesses
and who think she is vulnerable to a grass-roots contender who better
captures the party’s liberal soul.

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), a fiery populist who identifies as a
socialist, has been attracting some of the largest crowds of any candidate
from either party as he summons supporters to join his “political
revolution.”

Another foe, former Maryland governor Martin O’Malley, is making an overt
generational contrast: His campaign slogan is “New Leadership.” And former
senator Jim Webb of Virginia has echoed Chafee’s antiwar pitch as he
explores a candidacy.

The activity has brought fresh attention to the fault lines within the
Democratic coalition over economic fairness and foreign policy.

At Clinton’s Brooklyn headquarters, the mantra has been to prepare for a
difficult primary and compete for every vote in every state. Her team has
carefully crafted a summer rollout — a June 13 kickoff rally followed by
major policy speeches — to cast Clinton as a progressive champion.

On Thursday, for instance, Clinton will give a speech on voting rights at a
historically black college in Texas, where she will call for an early
voting period of at least 20 days in every state. Her address comes as
Democrats pursue legal challenges to voting restrictions ushered in by
Republican legislatures.

“We’ve always thought there would be challengers,” Clinton campaign
chairman John D. ¬Podesta said in an interview Wednesday. “There were
always going to be people saying she wasn’t this enough, wasn’t that
enough, wasn’t populist enough.”

He added: “Our strategy at the moment is to welcome them into the race and
lay out our program versus theirs. . . . There will be debates. These
candidates will get their airtime. But what we’re focused on is telling her
story, what her vision for the country is.”

Polls show that Clinton’s popularity is foundering with her reemergence as
a political candidate, effectively erasing the bipartisan approval she
enjoyed as secretary of state.

More Americans said they held an unfavorable opinion of Clinton than a
favorable one, 49 percent to 45 percent, according to a Washington Post-ABC
News poll this week. Among independent voters, the figure is worse: 55
percent unfavorable to 39 percent favorable.

Republicans are pleased to see Clinton’s popularity coming down to earth.

“Clearly, whatever political capital that Hillary Clinton had previously
enjoyed as secretary of state has atrophied,” said pollster Neil Newhouse,
who is likely to work for Right to Rise, the pro-Jeb Bush super PAC.

Still, Clinton is trouncing the rest of the Democratic field by every
measure, including in money raised and in the depth of her organization.
Her campaign has opened nine field offices in Iowa, which hosts the first
presidential caucuses.

This week’s Post-ABC poll showed Clinton leading the Democratic pack at 62
percent. Vice President Biden, who has not formally ruled out a candidacy,
was second with 14 percent, followed by Sanders at 10 percent.

Paul Begala, an adviser to the pro-Clinton super PAC Priorities USA Action,
predicted that the race will tighten.

“The day she announced, the polls had her at like a million percent,”
Begala said. “She needed to print that out, put it in a scrapbook and give
it to baby Charlotte, because it will never be this good again.”

Clinton is showing political fragility in some areas, including on
character attributes. Fifty-two percent of those polled said she was not
honest and trustworthy.

Clinton’s advisers attribute this to intense media scrutiny. They argue
that a more accurate barometer of her standing is the question of empathy.
Asked whether she “understands the problems of people like you,” 49 percent
said she did and 46 percent said she did not.

Anastasia Rave, 26, a retail manager in Beaufort, N.C., was among those
polled. A Democratic-leaning independent, Rave said she would support
Clinton over any Republican candidate — but she remains uneasy.

“I don’t think that her attempts to act like she understands the everyday
working person are genuine,” Rave said. “I don’t really buy it.”

The Clinton response is to give speeches on issues such as college
affordability in an effort to show her as compassionate toward the middle
class.

“The real trust issue in the election will be who voters trust to look out
for them,” said pollster Geoff Garin of Priorities USA.

To Democrats who are fretting, Ed Rendell, a former Pennsylvania governor
and a Clinton booster, has a blunt message: “Man up.”

“No matter who the candidate was — if Moses or Jesus or Muhammad came back
— there would be time periods when they were considered untrustworthy by
the public,” Rendell said. “If you’re not convinced that Hillary’s a
lights-out candidate, tell me who is?”

A swelling number of liberal activists, however, see Sanders as the answer.
The boisterous crowds that have greeted his road show in the two weeks
since he launched his campaign have surprised even his longtime advisers.

With his Brooklyn-accented barbs about what he believes is the alarming
power of corporate America, Sanders sees a path to defeating Clinton. While
Clinton is flanked by aides and Secret Service agents at controlled events,
Sanders revels in rowdy town hall meetings and wanders through crowds
wearing a rumpled suit and with unruly white hair.

“I don’t want to get too socialist about it, but I’d describe it as
communal,” said Sanders political consultant Tad Devine.

Sanders has instructed his inner circle to concentrate on the economy
rather than Clinton’s Iraq vote, even though that is one front where their
records differ. “We don’t want a campaign about something that happened 12
or 13 years ago,” Devine said. “It’s got to be about the next 10.”

But Iraq is a centerpiece of Chafee’s appeal to Democrats.

“It’s heartbreaking that more of my colleagues failed to do their
homework,” Chafee said Wednesday as he announced his candidacy at George
Mason University. “And incredibly, the neocon proponents of the war who
sold us on the false premise of weapons of mass destruction are still key
advisers to a number of presidential candidates today.”

He added later: “Including the main Democratic candidate.”

Chafee’s approach is reminiscent of how then-Sen. Barack Obama used
Clinton’s Iraq vote to drive a wedge between her and antiwar Democrats in
2008. Clinton has since disavowed the vote, and some supporters believe the
war is no longer a central concern for voters.

“When I ran [in 2004], it was a different party and frightened about the
war,” said former Vermont governor Howard Dean, a Clinton backer.

O’Malley, 52, is offering himself as a youthful alternative to Clinton
palatable to all wings of the party, while also railing against “the
privileged and the powerful” as he said this past weekend.

O’Malley and his associates are targeting those who tried unsuccessfully to
draft Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) to run. A super PAC supporting
O’Malley said Wednesday that it will soon purchase a round of television
ads in Iowa highlighting his willingness to battle Wall Street, though a
spokesman said the initial buy is a modest $25,000.

“There is a real hunger for economic populism. O’Malley is speaking to
that,” said George Appleby, O’Malley’s state chairman in Iowa. He called
Sanders “honorable and interesting” but said that “I’d be very surprised if
Democrats nominated a 73-year-old man.”

*Bush and Clinton seem inevitable. Except to voters
<https://www.yahoo.com/politics/bush-and-clinton-seem-inevitable-except-to-120642708751.html>.
// Yahoo News // Matt Bai - June 4, 2015*

According to new polls, Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush aren’t viewed very
favorably. (AP Photo)

Voters of America: What exactly is your problem?

For months, we in the media have been telling you, repeatedly and in very
small words, that Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush are going to be the nominees
in 2016. They’ve got big money, big names, the comforting ’90s vibe. Their
debates will feel like a rerun of “Friends,” before everyone started doing
drugs and sleeping with each other.

Just a few days ago, some guy wrote an entire op-ed in Politico titled
“Newsflash: It’s Going to Be Hillary vs. Jeb.” Since the writer wasn’t God
or Nostradamus, I didn’t really feel the need to keep reading, but clearly
you should have, because you’re just not getting the message.

According to a batch of brand-new polling, the number of voters who view
Clinton favorably has dropped below 50 percent for the first time since she
last ran for president in 2008; suddenly fewer people like her than don’t.
Ditto for Jeb, who, according to the results of an ABC/Washington Post
poll, would be the least liked Republican in the potential field were it
not for the beneficence of Donald Trump.

Why is it so hard to accept your fate already? Why do you insist on dating
bad boys like Scott Walker and Bernie Sanders when we’ve gone to such
trouble to arrange reliable marriages that benefit everyone?

Don’t tell me it’s because Americans are suspicious of dynastic rule —
whoever started that meme must have stopped reading his textbook after the
bit about King George. Take away the Roosevelts, Kennedys and Bushes, and
the last century of political history would read like some Mad Lib. We’re
just fine with dynasties, for better or worse.

No, the reason Clinton and Bush are having trouble keeping your affection
is less about who they are than where they’ve been. The reality is that
candidates returning from long absences are a little like distant
relatives; the idea of a reunion sounds great, but when they show up at
your door it’s another story.

If there’s one thing we all love in politics, it’s the idea of the
candidate who seems above the litany of daily disappointments in
Washington. Presidential narratives are often built around the idea that a
candidate has been away somewhere (other than prison, say) and is just now
coming back because he can’t stand what a mess all these lesser politicians
have made of things.

Richard Nixon and Ronald Reagan exploited that ideal, which Newt Gingrich
(quoting his favorite political philosopher, Arnold Toynbee) once described
to me as the doctrine of “departure and return.”

Clinton and Bush embody that idea, too. After four years as secretary of
state, followed by a few years of relative seclusion, Clinton was enjoying
the highest approval ratings of her political life; to most Americans who
weren’t hardened anti-Clinton conspiracists, she seemed to have entered the
realm of statesmanship.

Bush spent most of the last decade talking reasonably about education
reform and the environment, to the point where a lot of voters had almost
forgotten about his partisan role in the recount debacle of 2000.

The problem is that once you return to the arena, once you start giving
speeches that sound more or less like everybody else’s, then you’re no
longer departed, and we can’t quite remember why it was you seemed so
alluring in the first place. Suddenly you’re a politician again.

And running for office isn’t like the proverbial riding of a bike, where
you can leave off for a decade and then, on a whim, just climb onto some
rental and scale a mountain. Politics at this level is more like hitting a
baseball. It takes a while to get your timing back, and that’s only if your
clarity of vision and basic skills haven’t deteriorated.

In the case of both Bush and Clinton, this basic rustiness seems to have
been compounded by a certain arrogance — an inner voice that says, “I
already know how to hit a baseball, so I’ll be damned if I’m going to spend
every day at the cage practicing my swings.”

It’s almost unthinkable — and it shook a lot of the Republican operatives
who should be his supporters — that Bush didn’t have an answer for the
question about the Iraq invasion and whether he would have done the same
thing his brother did. What possible explanation is there for that, other
than that he’s decided he can pretty much wing this thing?

If he actually asked his aides to prepare him for the campaign trail and
they didn’t raise that question more than once, then he should probably
think about getting some new aides.

The other problem you have, when you’re the kind of candidate who’s been
off the scene for a while and who thus occupies an exalted place in the
minds of the electorate, is that your party’s operatives will tell you
almost anything to get you to return. So it might take a few months to
realize that the theory of the campaign to which you’re clinging, which
everyone around you said was totally brilliant and doable back in January,
is actually about as relevant this year as Ross Perot.

You can bet that all the Clinton whisperers made 2016 sound like a mere
formality and nothing like the grind of 2008. We’ll send your stunt double
to have lunch at a Chipotle in Ohio , and you can just hole up in Chappaqua
and watch “Downton Abbey” reruns. No worries — we’ll call when you clinch.

But then she won’t answer questions about her private emails or her
foundation’s foreign donors, and she refuses to tell anyone where she is on
a free-trade bill that’s dividing Washington, and suddenly the diving poll
numbers aren’t something you can ignore. Clinton remains the clear favorite
to win the nomination, but her persona as a stateswoman is already a
casualty, and it’s not even summer.

Bush started out his campaign spouting this stuff about how you had to be
willing to lose the primaries in order to win the general election, a
theory his eager advisers must have validated. And a pretty courageous one,
too, except that he has spent most of his time lately trying to mollify
conservative primary voters, who, it appears, might be just fine with
nominating Mike Huckabee or Ben Carson and watching him get pulverized in
November.

What the voters in both parties are telling us in these polls, more than
anything else, is that they’re not going to have their nominees dictated to
them. What you all seem to be saying is that Clinton and Bush are
formidable but also uninspiring, and you intend to weigh all your options
before making that decision for yourselves.

Well, OK, but you know the conventional wisdom in Washington seems to be
that this is all just preseason jitters, and by fall the inevitable
nominees will be exactly what they’re supposed to be, which is inevitable.

In other words: Trust us. You’ll learn to love them over time.

*Why Hillary Can't Run on Her State Department Record
<http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-06-03/why-hillary-can-t-run-on-her-state-department-record>
// Bloomberg // Josh Rogin – June 3, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton's record as secretary of state became a hot-button issue
this week after Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told Bloomberg
Television that the Barack Obama administration's failed "reset" policy
with Moscow was her "invention."

Here's why it matters: Her campaign chairman, John Podesta, gave an
interview to Bloomberg View's Al Hunt in April in which he said holding up
the “major accomplishments” from her State Department tenure would be a
centerpiece of her campaign. Podesta may want to reconsider that plan.
Running on Clinton's signature diplomatic initiatives is fraught with risks
because, on closer inspection, most that he mentioned don’t hold up to
scrutiny.

“She put together that sanctions package that’s led to at least the
possibility of having a deal on the Iran nuclear program,” Podesta told
Hunt in the interview, which was aired on PBS's "Charlie Rose" show. “That
took very careful and longtime careful diplomacy."

In fact, the State Department under Clinton vigorously opposed almost all
of the Iran sanctions passed by Congress while she was in office. Top
officials, including  Undersecretary of State Wendy Sherman, openly
advocated against many bills, including the sanctions on Iran’s central
bank, which dealt the true crippling blow to the Tehran regime. The Senate
passed that bill 100-0 and Obama reluctantly signed them into law. The
State Department did implement them, but was criticized by lawmakers and
advocacy groups for using waivers in the law to exempt several countries,
including China and our allies Japan and South Korea.

Clinton can also expect to be pressed during the campaign over her
involvement in the secret negotiations that led to the controversial Iran
nuclear negotiations now nearing completion. Her deputy, William Burns, and
her top foreign policy advisor, Jake Sullivan, held months of clandestine
meetings with Iranian officials to set up the talks. In the run-up to her
campaign announcement, Clinton was cautiously supportive of the nuclear
talks; leaving herself some wiggle room by saying she won’t render a final
judgment until the deal is done.

Podesta then went on to say that Clinton "restored America’s place in the
world, which had been very badly battered through the previous
administration.”

While it’s true that global opinion of the U.S. soared when Barack Obama
was first elected president, during Clinton's State Department tenure of
2009 to 2013 there was no measurable upswing in foreigners’ views of
America, according to the Pew Research Center’s polling on global
attitudes. In most major countries, approval of the U.S. actually went down
by the time Clinton left office, including by 11 percentage points in each
of France, Germany and the U.K.

A poll conducted in 33 countries by the BBC World Service just after
Clinton stepped down as secretary found that overall world opinion of the
U.S. by 2013 was the lowest since the presidency of George W. Bush. If
Clinton wants to run on having polished America’s image abroad, she’ll be
hard pressed to come up with data to back it up.

“She engineered the so-called 'pivot to Asia,’ ” Podesta continued. “Her
first trip was to China.”

Clinton did lead parts of what the White House now calls the “rebalance” to
Asia, but as Governor Scott Walker, a top Republican contender, pointed out
last week, that policy has fallen well short of expectations.  With China
building fake islands around the South China Sea and threatening to enforce
an air-exclusion zone in the area, the pivot policy now looks
inadequate.

Along with Treasury Department officials, Clinton initiated a new strategic
dialogue with China, but after several high-level summits, the effort has
produced few if any tangible results. The State Department did succeed in
creating an opening with Myanmar, an effort led by her top Asia official,
Kurt Campbell. Unfortunately, the military junta has not eased up its
brutal persecution of Muslim minorities, leading to a vast refugee crisis
in Southeast Asia, and political reform has now slowed to a crawl.

“She put some new issues on the table for American diplomacy," Podesta went
on, "including internet freedom, the importance of women’s rights as human
rights, of LGBT rights as human rights, as part of our diplomatic package,
which I think restored values to the way America projects its power around
the world.”

This is hard to square with the fact that, in her first visit to China,
Clinton insisted that human rights advocacy “can’t interfere with the
global economic crisis, the global climate change crisis, and the security
crisis." Clinton's State Department repeatedly waived laws that would have
cut aid to countries guilty of gross human rights violations, such as
Egypt. This record won't be helped by Clinton’s family foundation having
taken millions of dollars from foreign governments that systematically
abuse their citizens and deny basic liberties to women.

Clinton did have several significant public initiatives meant to respond to
the pressing social and economic issues of the new century. Her project on
Internet freedom had some early success. Yet it was ultimately undermined
by revelations from Edward Snowden and others, making her admonishment in
2011 of governments that “pry into the peaceful activities of their
citizens” seem hypocritical.

Podesta also stressed Clinton's record on the struggle against violent
religious extremism. “She was tough on terrorism, and participated in the
decision that led up to the decisions that led up to the killing of Osama
bin Laden,” he told Hunt.

While Clinton did support Obama's decision to launch the raid that killed
bin Laden, it's misleading to claim that the State Department was a
significant player in fighting terrorism. That effort was and is still led
by the Pentagon and intelligence agencies. And, of course, the worst
terrorism blow to U.S. interests since the Sept. 11 attacks happened at a
diplomatic facility in Benghazi, Libya, on her watch.

In addition, while the administration claimed in 2013 that terrorism was on
the decline, the spread of the Islamic State, Boko Haram (which Clinton
refused to put on the State Department’s terrorism list in 2011, despite
requests from the Justice Department and the CIA) and other groups since
then makes the victory laps of the first term look far too
self-congratulatory.

Podesta avoided mentioning several other diplomatic initiatives Clinton led
that turned out poorly. She was a major proponent of the U.S.-led
intervention in Libya in 2011, which has led to bloody chaos and a new
bridgehead for the Islamic State. Her State Department led a failed
diplomatic effort between Israel and the Palestinians. Her officials held
years of talks with the Taliban that never bore fruit. She tried to build a
moderate Syrian opposition. None of these are going to help her case that
she deserves the Oval Office.

Some Republicans are already looking to turn Clinton's tenure as the
nation's top diplomat into a liability.  "I think her time in the position
of secretary of state is demonstrably one that lacks accomplishment, but
that also has some real blemishes on it," said Carly Fiorina in April, just
before announcing her own candidacy.

Fiorina, of course, has no international experience at all, and neither do
most of the other Republican primary candidates. Still, if Clinton is going
to run on her foreign policy credentials, she will have to come up with a
better narrative than the one the campaign has been peddling.

*Americans split on whether Clinton cares about their needs
<http://m.apnews.com/ap/db_268798/contentdetail.htm?contentguid=RIZnXvFw>
// AP // Julie Pace & Ken Thomas – June 3, 2015 *

Hillary Rodham Clinton plans to spend the summer building a case that
Republicans are out of touch with the public. But many people aren't
convinced she empathizes with them, either, polls suggest, in a potential
early warning sign for the Democratic front-runner.

Yet average Americans appear to be split on whether Clinton can relate to
them, in the face of scrutiny about her family finances and the Republican
argument that she and husband Bill, the former president, play by different
rules and have amassed wealth in ways that are inconceivable for most
people.

About 47 percent of Americans said Clinton cares about people like them in
a CNN/ORC poll released Tuesday. That's down from 53 percent in the same
poll last summer. An ABC News/Washington Post poll released the same day
also found a slight decline in the past year on a similar question, with 49
percent saying Clinton "understands the problems of people like you" and 46
percent saying she doesn't.

The dip in Clinton's ratings on attributes like empathy coincides with a
decline in her overall favorability from the time she was Obama's secretary
of state. Her current levels mirror how the public viewed her during her
failed 2008 White House campaign.

Dan Pfeiffer, a longtime Obama adviser who left the White House this
spring, said it's too early for the numbers to cause anxiety in Clinton's
Brooklyn campaign headquarters. But he added that "if this trend doesn't
reverse itself over the next many months, it should be a cause of concern."

Empathy was a focus of Obama's re-election bid against Romney. The
Democratic incumbent relentlessly argued that Romney's policies and
personal wealth left him out of touch with most Americans. By Election Day,
81 percent of Americans who said they voted based on whether a candidate
cared for people like them backed Obama, according to exit polls.

Clinton campaign officials say they care less about how Clinton is viewed
in isolation on the question of empathy and more about how she is compared
with specific Republican challengers. While no major polls have done such a
head-to-head comparison, a Quinnipiac survey last week found large numbers
of Americans undecided on whether many Republican presidential hopefuls -
among them Marco Rubio and Scott Walker - care about their needs.

And the ABC News/Washington Post poll had worrying signs for former Florida
Gov. Jeb Bush, with 55 percent of Americans saying he doesn't understand
the problems of people like them.

Clinton will use a June 13 rally to argue that the GOP field as a whole is
out of touch on gay rights, immigration, climate change and more. She has
also been highlighting her differences with Republicans on economic issues,
financial reform and budget priorities.

While the GOP race is wide-open, with more than a dozen candidates expected
to vie for the nomination, the Clinton campaign plans to cast the field as
monolithic on policy.

Republicans, however, see an opportunity to turn the question of empathy
against Clinton. They've already started trying.

Republican pollster David Winston said the intense early focus on such
issues gives Republicans an opening to define the terms of the debate over
the direction each party wants to take the country.

"If she doesn't have a product on the shelf - her ideas - what's the
point?" Winston asked.

Since the start of the year, Clinton has faced questions about her family
foundation's fundraising practices and acceptance of money from foreign
governments, as well as her decision to use a private email server at the
State Department and destroy personal emails during her tenure in the Obama
administration.

Clinton's personal wealth has also created unwanted attention. The Clintons
reported last month that they earned more than $30 million in combined
speaking fees and book royalties since January 2014.

Clinton campaign officials argue that the individual issues have not
affected the way the public views Clinton but the cumulative effect of the
scrutiny has.

Her early campaign strategy suggests Clinton and her advisers are aware of
the need to present herself as more relatable to Americans. While her
failed 2008 White House bid emphasized her toughness and experience, the
first months of her second campaign have highlighted her family background
and her early work on women's and family issues.

During small round table events in Iowa, New Hampshire and elsewhere,
Clinton has frequently referenced her roots as the daughter of a father who
was a small business owner and a mother who overcame a difficult upbringing
and abandonment.

She's also centered policy discussions on pre-kindergarten and daycare
options for young children, as well as the plight of those with mental
health problems and addictions to heroin and prescription drugs - calling
it a "quiet epidemic" striking small towns and rural areas.

"I want to be the president who takes care of people," Clinton told voters
in New Hampshire last week. "I consider that my highest and most important
responsibility."

*Campaign Reporters Told There Will Be ‘NO Opportunities To Interview
Hillary Clinton’
<http://dailycaller.com/2015/06/03/campaign-reporters-told-there-will-be-no-opportunities-to-interview-hillary-clinton/>
// The Daily Caller // Chuck Ross – June 3, 2015 *

Reporters attending a Hillary Clinton speech in Houston on Thursday must
remain within the confines of barricade and will not have a chance to
interview the Democratic presidential nominee, they were informed in a note
with big, bold red letters.

“There will be NO opportunities to interview Hillary Clinton,” a press
blast from Texas Southern University reads. “Her speech will be her
interview.”

After attending fundraisers in Dallas and Austin, Clinton will head to
Texas Southern University in Houston to talk about voting rights and to
receive the first inaugural Barbara Jordan Public-Private Leadership Award,
named after the late Texas congresswoman.

The award goes to “a deserving woman anywhere in the world who shall have
made the highest achievement during the preceding year or years in any
honorable field of human endeavor in the public or private sector.”

The strict rules imposed on reporters attending the event are par for the
course so far for Clinton’s campaign. She has been criticized repeatedly
for choking off reporters’ access and refusing to take questions.

*Whoa, If True: Hillary Clinton Blows Off Autograph-Seeking Voter
<http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-06-03/whoa-if-true-hillary-clinton-blows-off-autograph-seeking-voter>
// Bloomberg // David Weigel – June 3, 2015 *

This is another installment of "Whoa, If True," an occasional look at the
wild and false tales that make it into the mainstream of presidential
campaign news.

On May 22, Democratic presidential frontrunner Hillary Clinton paid a visit
to New Hampshire's Smuttynose Brewery, and worked a line of voters outside.
The visit made almost no news, apart from a second-day story about angry
Republicans threatening to chug Really Old Brown Dog and Finestkind IPA no
more.

On June 1, the conservative opposition research shop America Rising tweeted
a Vine of Clinton interacting with a voter outside Smuttynose. Its clicky
summary: "Watch what happens when a@HillaryClinton supporter asks her to
sign something." Anyone who watched the Vine saw Clinton tell a woman to
"go to the end of the line" when asked for a signature.

“You think she said it in a nice way?”

Cue: Virality. The Weekly Standard posted the Vine, under the headline
"Hillary to Supporter: 'Go to the End of the Line." The Daily Caller posted
the Vine as proof of "Queen Hillary" being impatient with voters: "Every
once in a while, Her Majesty must put the rabble back where they belong."
Conservative talk radio host Laura Ingraham told Fox News viewers that
Clinton would never tell "influence peddlers" to "go to the back of the
line" as she had this voter. According to Breitbart News reporter Charlie
Spiering, the video's placement on the Drudge Report (headline: "She snaps
at adoring voter") got it 4 million loops. America Rising's Colin Reed
later bragged to a Salon writer that it was up to 5 million.

There were two small problems with the story.

One: The voter was not told to go to "the back" of the line, as if she'd
cut ahead. She was told to go to the end of the procession, to where
Clinton was pausing to sign notes, photographs, and books.

Two: Once the voter found the end of the line, she got the signature she
asked for.

The video, graciously provided to reporters by America Rising, is 17
minutes long. At 8:59, Clinton emerges from the brewery and offers a "Hey,
guys!" to the waiting crowd. For two minutes, she moves down the line,
shaking hands, and trading extremely light banter. ("You just graduated
from Penn State? My father and my brother went to Penn State.") At
roughly11:11, the Vine moment occurs.

After the "line" exchange, Clinton reassures the voter that she'll give
here a signature. "Yeah, we will," she says. "Definitely, yes. See these
guys over here? They'll take good care of you."

She was referring to sunglasses-wearing handlers, who... proceeded to help
her out, at the proverbial end of the line. At 12:16, the video clearly
shows the woman who asked Clinton for a signature and a photo—a woman with
a black-and-white striped shirt and grey hair tied back -- getting a
signature, then taking a photo.

Every news outlet that reported on Hillary snubbing the voter got it
wrong—and could have easily gotten it right. The story never passed a basic
B.S. test. Why would a tracker, with a perfect view of Clinton and the
crowd, drop the story after the voter was told to relocate? Why would he
not go up to the voter and ask how she felt about the snub? (She'd hardly
have been the first person swarmed by media after an awkward candidate
moment.) The answer was hinted at in the Vine itself, as a close listen
revealed Clinton's handlers promising to "take care" of the voter. To make
Clinton look rude, the video had to cut around the awkward fact that the
voter got what she came for.

"If you look at the whole video," Fox News commentator Greg Gutfeld said on
Tuesday, "she was saying, 'Oh I'm shaking these hands, if you meet me over
on the other side, you could sign it.' She wasn't being rude at all."

By the time Gutfeld said that, the bogosity of the "snub" was becoming
better known, and the story was already evolving into criticism of
Clinton's tone. "You think she said it in a nice way?" a shocked Kimberly
Guilfoyle asked Gutfeld.

"I don't think it was that bad," said Dana Perino, who as a veteran of
George W. Bush's administration actually knew how voter ropelines worked.

The "Clinton seemed rude" theory of the case didn't even mesh with America
Rising's original spin. As the Vine burned up Twitter, Colin Reed told
Business Insider that Clinton had blown off a regular American. "Maybe
these New Hampshire voters would have better luck getting Secretary
Clinton’s attention if they wrote a six-figure check to the Clinton
Foundation or were a highly-vetted political activist at one of her staged
campaign events," he said.

Asked by Bloomberg if he stood by that statement, Reed said that "the vine
(and its 7 million views so far) speaks for itself."

*Georgina Bloomberg is backing Hillary for President
<http://www.nydailynews.com/news/politics/georgina-bloomberg-backs-hillary-article-1.2137161>
//
NY Daily News // Annie Karni – June 3, 2015 *

It’s too soon to tell if dad’s on board, but Georgina Bloomberg is going
for Hillary.

“I would probably vote for her just to be able to say that I voted for the
first woman President,” Bloomberg, a professional equestrian, told the
Daily News in an email exchange.

Georgina Bloomberg, 32, said being a new mom makes her eager to support
Clinton’s expected run.

“I am all into doing things that will be cool stories to tell my
grandkids,” the younger of the city’s two former First Daughters said.

Bloomberg’s son, Jasper, is just over a year old.

Her support is a little piece of good news for Clinton, who has yet to
answer questions about why she relied solely on a homebrew email system
registered to her Chappaqua home during her tenure as secretary of state.

Last time Clinton ran for President, former Mayor Michael Bloomberg briefly
considered running against her as an independent.

But the two are said to have a solid working relationship.

In 2012, Bloomberg reportedly urged Clinton to run for mayor after he left
office.

Bloomberg has been a guest at Clinton Global Initiative conferences. And
the high-wattage officials most recently appeared together at an event at
the Bloomberg Foundation in December, where they  highlighted an initiative
that collects data on women in an effort to close gender gaps across the
globe.

But Bloomberg also has ties on the Republican side.

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush , who is exploring a presidential run, is a
Bloomberg Philanthropies board member.

*Bill Clinton to Give Secret Address to Health Insurers
<https://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/bill-clinton-give-secret-address-health-insurers_963917.html>
// The Weekly Standard // Michael Warren – June 3, 2015 *

Former president Bill Clinton will be the keynote speaker at a conference
of health-insurance executives this week. America's Health Insurance Plans,
the largest health-insurance provider trade group in the country, is
holding its Institute 2015 conference in Nashville this week. Clinton,
whose wife Hillary is running for president, will close out the conference
Friday afternoon with his address to attendees.

"The session is open to Institute attendees (who have registered and paid
for the entire Institute) and Friday only registrants," says the
conference's website. "No press allowed."

AHIP describes itself as a trade organization and advocacy group on behalf
of health insurers. Representatives of nearly 150 insurance providers are
attending the organization's conference.

*2016 Democratic White House hopefuls jockey for Hispanics’ support
<http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/jun/3/hillary-clinton-martin-omalley-bernie-sanders-jock/>
// The Washington Times // S.A. Miller – June 3, 2015 *

Putting a premium on Hispanic voters as the key to their party’s future,
Democratic presidential candidates this year are jockeying to outdo one
another with promises to halt even more deportations and grant citizenship
to every illegal immigrant — checking off the entire wish list of
pro-immigration activists.

Former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley became the latest Democratic contender
to go all in on immigration Wednesday when he vowed to block deportations
for all but the worst criminals and push comprehensive immigration reform
laws through Congress in his first 100 days in office.

“I would absolutely do everything in my power,” Mr. O'Malley said at a
question-and-answer forum in Washington hosted by the U.S. Hispanic Chamber
of Commerce. “I would not give up.”

He also took a swipe at President Obama, whom immigration rights activists
fault for breaking his promise to make immigration reform a top priority in
his first 100 days and not going far enough with the deportation amnesty he
eventually attempted with executive action after last year’s midterm
elections.

Mr. O'Malley said that to forge a consensus for comprehensive immigration
reform, America needs “not leadership that follows public opinion but
leadership that leads public opinion.”

“We need comprehensive immigration reform, and we need to engage with all
our members of Congress to make that happen. And that’s what I intend to
do,” he said. “There’s no magic wand, there’s no easy button for this. We
have to talk with one another.”

Hispanics voted for Mr. Obama en masse, helping carry him to victory in
2008 and especially in 2012, when they voted for him over Republican Mitt
Romney 71 percent to 27 percent. But Hispanic were left discouraged and
disappointed by Mr. Obama’s progress on the immigration issue.

Mr. Obama’s controversial move to unilaterally grant deportation amnesty to
more than 4 million illegal immigrants, which some pro-immigrant activists
said didn’t go far enough, was blocked by a federal judge and remains
snared in the courts.

Eager to shore up Hispanic support, Democratic front-runner Hillary Rodham
Clinton quickly moved to promise immigrant rights groups everything they
want. The other Democrats in the race, Mr. O'Malley and Sen. Bernard
Sanders of Vermont, then rushed to promise everything and more on
immigration.

“They are definitely feeling the pressure and the strength of the immigrant
rights movement, especially when it comes to motivating the Latino
electorate,” said Cesar Vargas, co-director of the Dream Action Coalition,
which had been advocating for most of the positions the candidates adopted.

He said that Hispanic voters will be looking for more details from the
candidates about how they will achieve the goals, and he said to expect the
Democrats to go even farther with immigration reform proposals.

“The reality for us that is going to matter is the record of the candidates
and how much they are willing to actually commit to the plans and timelines
rather than just campaign rhetoric that, right now, Hillary Clinton just
has,” said Mr. Vargas.

Democrats certainly don’t want to lose their edge with Hispanics, which are
already the largest minority in the U.S. — and their numbers are rapidly
growing.

The Hispanic population in 1990 was 22 million, or about 9 percent of the
population. By 2013, it reached 54 million, or 17 percent of the total
population, and about 1 million more Hispanics are added to the U.S.
population every year, according to the U.S. Census.

By comparison, blacks made up about 13 percent of the U.S. population in
2013, up from 12 percent in 1990, according to census data.

“Hispanic voters are the fastest-growing segment of the American electorate
— period, exclamation point, capital letters — and are therefore important
not just to the Democratic Party but to the entire country,” said
Democratic campaign strategist Craig Varoga, who worked on President Bill
Clinton’s 1996 re-election team and Mr. O'Malley gubernatorial campaign.

He said that the three Democratic candidates are making the smart moves by
aligning themselves with Hispanics and embracing an immigration reform
agenda, which he said Republicans shun to their own detriment.

“All three of these [Democratic] candidates clearly believe that America is
stronger if every single person in this country reaches their fullest
potential,” he said. “Some, but not all, Republicans recognize that their
party will continue to put themselves behind the eight ball and lose close
elections if they ignore the growing role of these new Americans in our
country.”

Republican presidential candidates have taken a more cautious approach to
immigration reform, such as offering some illegal immigrants a legal status
that stops short of citizenship.

Mrs. Clinton said that amounted to an offer of “second-class status.”

She first staked out an immigration position that went beyond Mr. Obama’s
at an event in Las Vegas in early May. She promised to use executive action
to grant deportation amnesty to potentially millions more illegal
immigrants despite the Department of Justice’s Office of Legal Counsel
previously advising that it would be illegal.

Mrs. Clinton also promised to make it easier for illegal immigrants to
plead for leniency in deportation proceedings and provide more legal
representation for young illegals in immigration courts, as well as fight
for comprehensive immigration reform that provides a path to citizenship
for most of the estimated 11 million to 12 million illegal immigrants
living in the United States.

More than the other candidates, Mrs. Clinton has broken with pro-immigrant
activists in the past, including opposing giving driver’s licenses to
illegal immigrants when she was a senator from New York.

Mr. Sanders, a self-described socialist, has long supported immigration
reform but had not made it a centerpiece of his agenda. After Mrs. Clinton
came out strongly on the issue, he enthusiastically took up the cause.

“We have 11 million people in this country living in the shadows, living in
fear. That’s got to end. We need a path toward citizenship for all of those
people,” he said on MSNBC.

Mr. Sanders said that he too would use executive action to halt
deportations and change immigration law, dismissing concerns that the
Office of Legal Counsel deemed it beyond the scope of presidential power.

“The courts are the people who determine what is legal or not. I think what
you need is an administration that fights for justice, fights for what’s
right, takes the case to the courts, and you do your best to win that
case,” said Mr. Sanders.

At the forum in Washington, Mr. O'Malley showed that he was ready to fight
Mrs. Clinton for the Hispanic vote, taking a veiled shot at her record on
immigration when he touted his own pro-immigration record.

Among many pro-immigrant actions by Mr. O'Malley, he signed legislation
giving driver’s licenses to undocumented residents in Maryland, supported
sanctuary cities for illegal immigrants in the state and signed into law
Maryland’s Dream Act that provided in-state tuition and other benefits to
young adult illegals who were brought into the U.S. as children.

“One of the greatest indicators of a person’s future actions would be how
they acted in the past when they had the power,” said Mr. O'Malley.

“I plan to run a campaign that offers new leadership with executive
experience, with progressive values and the fearlessness that I believe
will rally people to this candidacy,” he said. “I’ve listed the things that
I did when I was in power and when I was in office. I intend to offer that
same sort of leadership, and we’ll let the people decide.”

*Meet the woman who's guiding Hillary Clinton's stance on police reforms
<https://fortune.com/2015/06/03/maya-harris-hillary-clinton/>** // Fortune
// Nina Easton – June 3, 2015*

Maya Harris is Clinton’s senior policy adviser—and a major influence on how
the Democratic candidate talks about issues of crime and policing.

With many of the power players from Hillary Clinton’s 2008 presidential run
are sitting this one out, the big question is: Who’s in?

What follows is the latest installment of a Fortuneseries looking at the
the most influential women on Clinton’s 2016 team. When this series wraps,
we’ll turn our attention to the most powerful women on the GOP side of the
race.

Maya Harris hails from a family of female overachievers. Her late mother,
Shyamala Harris, immigrated from India in the 1950s to obtain her PhD in
endocrinology from UC Berkeley, and went on to make breakthrough
discoveries in breast cancer research. Her big sister, Kamala Harris, is
California’s attorney general, and is now running for U.S. Senate. At age
29, Maya herself became one of the nation’s youngest-ever law school deans
when she took the reins of the Lincoln Law School of San Jose, a night
school that prepares students for the California bar.

Then—as if choosing a spouse specially equipped to keep up with all this
hard-charging ambition—Harris married fellow Stanford Law student (and her
best friend) Tony West. West would go on to become the third-highest
ranking official in the Obama Justice Department. Their friendship
blossomed when Harris’ 4-year-old daughter Meena engaged West in games of
hide-and-seek while her then-single mom was registering for classes.
Following family tradition, Meena is now a Harvard law grad.

“It’s all justice all the time,” Harris laughs when asked about family
dinner talk.

Harris’ mother, who mostly raised her girls alone (Harris’ Jamaican-born
father was a Stanford economist), was swept up in the civil rights movement
in and around Berkeley, so Harris grew up imbued with a healthy dose of
activism. But the girls’ trailblazing mother also modeled a life of
mentorship—always supporting her graduate students while also demanding
high standards. “She was tough on them,” Harris recalls. “Until her dying
day she never lost sight of this notion that if you’ve been able to walk
through doors, you don’t just leave the doors open. You bring others along.”

The sisters spent their early childhood in Berkeley before moving to
Montreal, where their mother was a researcher at the Jewish General
Hospital—and Harris learned French. They returned to the Bay Area six years
later, where Harris attended U.C. Berkeley. Both she and Kamala inherited
their mother’s intense drive—Harris as a civil rights attorney; Kamala a
prosecutor—and her passion for cooking everything from soul food to Italian
cuisine.

Today, with inner cities exploding over police tactics, Harris’ appointment
as one of three senior Clinton policy advisers is timely: The one-time
private attorney has spent much of her professional life working on
criminal justice issues, particularly policing. Her influence was evident
in Clinton’s April 29 speech denouncing the “tough on crime” policies of
her husband in the 1990s and the “era of mass incarceration” it produced.
That’s an argument Harris has made over the years while working at the
ACLU, the Oakland-based group PolicyLink, and, most recently, liberal
Center for American Progress in Washington.

Harris talks about the “collateral consequences of conviction” on families
and communities, not just individuals, and tells me that the best police
reforms are those that “engage the community as partners and
problem-solvers, not just people to be policed.” Clinton’s speech gave
fodder to critics who accuse the candidate of being too soft on crime and
too hard on police officers assigned to work the front lines of dangerous
neighborhoods.

But, interestingly, Clinton’s calls for sentencing and prison reforms are
echoed by some powerful Republicans, including presidential candidate and
Senator Rand Paul. Koch Industries CEO Charles Koch, a well-known funder of
Republican candidates, also recently argued that “overcriminalization” has
led to “conflict between our citizens and law enforcement.” “I’m heartened
that we’ve arrived at a bipartisan moment where people on the left and on
the right are coming together,” says Harris.

Immigration is another issue that falls under Harris’ campaign purview, and
another spot where Clinton has rejected her husband’s policies and moved to
the left—further left than even President Barack Obama. In a May 6 speech
that Harris helped to craft, Clinton warned that if Congress doesn’t pass
immigration reform—and she is elected president—she would issue executive
orders beyond those issued by President Obama to provide legal protection
to undocumented workers living here. Look to see Harris’ influence again on
June 13, when Clinton delivers official “launch” speech on Manhattan’s
Roosevelt Island.

*The campaign to put Julian Castro on Hillary Clinton's VP shortlist
<http://www.politico.com/story/2015/06/clinton-campaign-julian-castro-hillary-vp-hispanic-118619.html>
// GABRIEL DEBENEDETTI and ANNIE KARNI // Politico – June 4, 2015*

It’s way too early, Clinton insiders say. But the Castro buzz is useful as
Democrats court Hispanics.

The Democratic National Convention isn’t for 13 months, and Hillary Clinton
isn’t the party’s nominee, but some Hispanic Democratic leaders are already
pushing hard for Julián Castro to be her running mate — or at least a top
contender for the job.

The former San Antonio mayor and current housing secretary was in
Washington while Clinton raised money in his hometown on Wednesday, but his
name is on the minds and lips of Democrats close to the Clinton camp as the
presidential front-runner crosses Texas for campaign fundraisers and a
Houston speech on Thursday.

The flashy trial balloon and Castro’s innate appeal have likely ensured the
Mexican-American Cabinet member a place on Clinton’s vice presidential long
list if she wins the nomination, Democrats close to Clinton said. But
Castro hardly has any relationship with the candidate herself, and the
effort has gotten a mixed reception at best.

Democrats say it’s far too early for this conversation — arguing that it’s
unproductive to talk about a general election ticket when Clinton is
battling three other declared Democratic candidates and the ever-present
perception of inevitability.

What’s more, several Democrats warned, Castro’s backers run the risk of
overplaying their strong hand.

“If I were Julián Castro I’d be worried,” said one Clinton ally with an eye
on Democrats’ efforts to woo Hispanic voters. “Others who are in his corner
need to dial down those effusive musings.”

Still, there’s a political logic in letting the pro-Castro drumbeat go on.

Clinton’s campaign sees Hispanic voters as crucial to her success, both in
swing states like Florida and early-voting states like Nevada, where the
candidate last month unveiled an immigration agenda that surprised even the
Obama White House with its scope and aggressiveness.

And Castro, an engaging speaker and a fresh young face at 40, would make it
somewhat harder for Republicans to paint the 67-year-old Clinton as the
candidate of the past.

Former HUD secretary and San Antonio mayor Henry Cisneros ratcheted up the
Castro speculation with a recent appearance on Univision, the
Spanish-language channel owned by close Clinton ally Haim Saban.

“What I am hearing in Washington, including from people in Hillary
Clinton’s campaign, is that the first person on their lists is Julián
Castro,” Cisneros, who was considered for the vice presidency in 1984,
said. “He is the superior candidate considering his record, personality,
demeanor and Latin heritage.”

Castro has largely played along, despite telling a Washington audience,
“I’m not holding my breath” on Wednesday. He called Republican questions
about Clinton’s private email address a “witch hunt” last month, and
Cisneros — who said he has spoken to Bill Clinton about Castro — laughed
when asked by POLITICO whether Castro wanted to be considered for the
position.

“Is he a red-blooded American male?” Cisneros asked rhetorically. “I would
be hard-pressed to imagine a scenario where a Latino, and particularly
Julián Castro, was not on that short list. It makes so much sense.”

Cisneros is just one of several prominent Hispanic leaders who are
promoting Castro. Democratic National Committee Finance Chairman Henry
Muñoz told BuzzFeed in May that Castro “deserves to be on the short list,”
and New York City Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito, who was born in
Puerto Rico, said the concerted effort from Hispanic leaders to promote
Castro reminded her of the united rally around Sonia Sotomayor when she was
under consideration for a Supreme Court nod.

Clinton and Castro haven’t spoken since they appeared together on a panel
in Washington in April, but people close to the campaign acknowledged that
it’s politically useful for the candidate to keep his name in the public
conversation, long before her operation formally starts vetting prospects.
That way she can implicitly emphasize to Hispanic voters that she is taking
their concerns about representation seriously.

“A lot of Latino Democrats are concerned about what happens if Marco Rubio
becomes the [Republican nominee], or Jeb Bush, or even if Scott Walker
becomes the nominee and he chooses Rubio to be the VP,” said a Democratic
strategist close to the Clinton camp, adding that many see Castro as an
easy solution to the dilemma.

And while the early pro-Castro campaign is risky, it effectively ensures he
will be considered seriously when it comes time for Clinton to choose a
running mate, assuming she wins the nomination.

“There’s an entire art to getting yourself on the list,” explained
California Democratic strategist Chris Lehane, a veteran of Bill Clinton’s
White House who helped to vet Al Gore. “There’s value to being talked
about.”

“But at the end of the day,” Lehane said, “there are really two factors:
How does the [candidate] really personally feel about the person who is
going to be the No. 2, and the single biggest factor is: Is the person
ready to be a heartbeat away from the presidency? That’s a ‘You know it
when you see it’ issue.”

The answer to the first question could change as Clinton travels the
country, especially if Castro emerges as a campaign surrogate, considering
that the two have met only a handful of times and that he is actually
closer to Bill Clinton than to Hillary.

But Lehane’s second question — and Castro’s inexperience — is giving some
Washington Democrats pause.

The HUD secretary has been in Washington for less than a year after running
San Antonio from 2009 to 2014, and Democratic staffers and lobbyists in the
capital arched eyebrows and whispered about Castro’s policy chops following
what they saw as his inelegant performances on “The Daily Show” and in
congressional budget hearings this year.

Some Democrats told POLITICO that Castro would be a better candidate four
years down the road and that Clinton might face serious trouble if she were
to put him on the ticket.

“Yes, he’s a rising star, and people even talk about him being the first
Latino president,” said the Democratic strategist allied with Clinton. “But
now is just not the time, in this day and age when people are looking for
real presidential experience. [President Barack] Obama was on the receiving
end of charges of not being prepared.”

“John McCain chose Sarah Palin and was bashed for that,” she added. “She
has more experience than [Castro] does.”

Castro, at least in public, coyly dismisses the veep buzz, telling CNN
recently, “If I had a dime for every amount of speculation that happens in
D.C., you know, I think all of us would be wealthy.”

But the public nature of the pro-Castro campaign has nonetheless rubbed
some Clinton allies and staffers the wrong way: One Democratic campaign
veteran who is in frequent contact with Clinton’s top donors said such a
high-profile effort all but ensures that Castro will have a harder time
getting through the eventual vetting process.

And it has also functioned to bring other vice presidential contenders to
the public eye. Colorado Governor John Hickenlooper recently announced he
has an autobiography coming out around the time the vice presidential
conversation may be heating up, and many Clinton loyalists are enamored of
Virginia Sen. Tim Kaine, widely considered the front-runner for the post.

But the fact remains that Clinton’s team views courting the Hispanic vote
as a top priority as she looks to replicate Obama’s electoral success with
minorities. Clinton’s decision to unveil her immigration policy in Nevada
was no mere happenstance, and when she returns to the state later this
month she will speak at conference of the National Association of Latino
Elected and Appointed Officials.

Even so, Castro’s ethnic background may not be as effective in appealing to
Hispanic voters as some believe. As one Clinton ally put it: “Tim Kaine
speaks Spanish much better than Julián Castro does.”

*Hillary Clinton Cannot Afford to Lose Black Voters
<http://www.nationaljournal.com/2016-elections/hillary-clinton-cannot-afford-to-lose-black-voters-20150603>
// National Jounal // EMILY SCHULTHEIS – June 3, 2015*

Turnout will drop compared to Obama's two elections, but she's about to
roll out a policy platform aimed directly at African-American voters.
Barack Obama didn't need to do much—almost anything—to win record turnout
from African-American voters. Hillary Clinton will need to pull out all the
stops to score just a fraction of that support.

An exaggeration? Black political leaders don't think so.

"Make no mistake, there will be some drop-off," said Rep. Emanuel Cleaver
of Missouri, a former chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, whose
comments echoed those of other influential African-American Democrats.

Indeed, black leaders concede it will be nearly impossible for Clinton to
replicate the level of turnout Obama's candidacy generated among this core
demographic—a group of voters central to the national coalition necessary
for a Democrat to win the White House. So she'll need to coax them to the
polls by honing specific messages about policies relevant to the black
community, something her team says she's preparing to unveil.

On Thursday, Clinton will call for expanded early voting in every state,
including weekend and evening hours over many days before Election
Day—positions supported by Democrats who say working-class voters need
greater access to the polls.

And she'll specifically criticize laws in North Carolina, Texas, and
Wisconsin that, she argues, reduced rather than expanded access to the
polls.

These are significant targets for Clinton. Democrats have their eyes on
changing demographics in counties in North Carolina, Texas, and elsewhere
that might begin to shift those states away from Republicans, perhaps as
soon as 2016.

Black voters, specifically, are growing as a share of the electorate in
many states. But while pollsters think Clinton will win them by similar
margins to Obama—95 percent of African-Americans voted for the president in
2012—her team should not underestimate the challenge she will have
motivating African-Americans to show up when the first black president
isn't at the top of the ticket.

In 2012, the U.S Census Bureau estimated that just more than 66 percent of
eligible black voters showed up at the polls—the highest turnout ever for
this demographic group, higher even than turnout among whites. Indeed,
Obama's support among black voters "went off the charts," said Brookings
demographer William Frey—enough so that minority turnout, especially black
turnout, was a deciding factor in the president winning a second term.

And in states like Virginia, North Carolina, and Florida, a difference in
turnout of even a few percentage points could have big repercussions, Frey
added.

"You could call it the excitement factor," he said. "At least in these
states … where blacks are a huge part of the minority population, she's
going to need that."

In other words, unlike Obama, Clinton will really have to work for high
black turnout.

"I can't in all honesty say that she will receive the same level of support
as an African-American president," said Rep. Marcia Fudge of Ohio, "but
clearly I do believe that if her message is strong she can get close."

Late last week, Clinton appointed LaDavia Drane, the former executive
director of the CBC, as her African-American-outreach director. Drane joins
a staff at Clinton's Brooklyn headquarters with several other high-profile
African Americans among its ranks, including Marlon Marshall, the director
of state campaigns; Maya Harris, a top policy adviser; and Karen Finney, a
senior spokeswoman.

Harris, sister of California Democratic Senate candidate Kamala Harris and
formerly of the Center for American Progress, has done research
specifically on encouraging greater turnout of minority women, and she
argued that they are a reliable voting bloc when they're given strong
policy reasons to vote. That's true of black voters overall, she noted, and
is part of the campaign's calculus.

"One thing we know is that issues matter—that at the end of the day,
whether [African-American] voters are going to turn out is going to depend
on whether they have been motivated to turn out," Harris told National
Journal. "Secretary Clinton is well-situated to do that, both in terms of
what she has already demonstrated in her life's work and in the issues
she's talking about."

That motivation will come partly from policy proposals and partly from
focusing on parts of Clinton's biography, the campaign says. Speaking in
South Carolina last week, she put deliberate focus on her early career
experiences at the Children's Defense Fund and her work for women and
children. The campaign is also talking about specific policy positions that
are relevant to the black community—health care, a minimum-wage increase,
substance-abuse issues, and perhaps most noticeably, criminal-justice
reform, which Clinton addressed in a speech at Columbia back in April.
Clinton aides are quick to note that it was her first policy speech as a
candidate—and with its proposals to provide body cameras for police
officers nationwide and end the "era of mass incarceration," it was a
direct response to unrest over police activity in Baltimore and other
cities.

"Her speech in New York was amazing," said Bakari Sellers, a former South
Carolina state legislator who backed Obama in 2008 but is now supporting
Clinton. "It's a serious plank in terms of African-American outreach, it's
one that can be developed, it's one that can help galvanize not just your
typical participants … but also a new generation of voices."

The other key piece of necessary strategy is the ground game. Cleaver said
African-American leaders are welcoming signs from Clinton that her team
will build a robust turnout operation in urban areas, which is something
Obama—whose candidacy was naturally a source of excitement to many black
voters—didn't need to do. Clinton's 2016 team, with campaign manager Robby
Mook at the helm, is placing heavy emphasis on grassroots strategy; it has
sizable field teams in the four early states.

"The president did not have to do a lot in the urban core, and didn't—he
used his resources elsewhere," Cleaver said. "So I think you're going to
find elected officials celebrating the fact that there's a great deal of
attention being paid to the ground game."

That starts in South Carolina, the only one of the four early states with a
large African-American population. Clinton's campaign has hired a team of
staffers and field organizers—including state director Clay Middleton and
state political director Jalisa Washington, both of whom are African
Americans with strong ties to the state's politics. A half-dozen field
organizers are already in place in the state, focusing on traditionally
African-American neighborhoods and gathering places as they start to
introduce themselves and the campaign to the state's voters."We are going
to where the voters are. So we are in faith-based communities, we are at
churches, we are at several social-justice organizations," Middleton said.
"We have field organizers that look like the community and understand the
community and can relate to those individuals."

*Emily’s List Focuses Its ‘Madam President’ Program on Clinton
<http://www.nytimes.com/politics/first-draft/2015/06/03/today-in-politics-welcome-to-the-party-lincoln-chafee/#post-mb-8>
// NYT // Jonathan Martin – June 3, 2015*

Emily’s List, the Democratic advocacy group for female candidates who
support abortion rights, is beginning an independent expenditure effort
dedicated entirely to *Mrs. Clinton.*

Emily’s List has been running a program, Madam President, for two years
that was dedicated to promoting the concept of electing a female president.
It was implicit that Mrs. Clinton would be that candidate, but now the
group is making their support official.

In a memo to donors, an official with the group noted that the project
would be aimed at persuading and turning out female voters in targeted
states and would feature extensive polling, voter contact, TV ads and
digital advocacy. The official, *Denise Feriozzi*, wrote that it would be
the most extensive independent expenditure program in the 30-year history
of the organization.

As part of the push, Emily’s List is taking over the social media platforms
that had been controlled by Ready for Hillary, the grass-roots organization
built around nudging Mrs. Clinton into the presidential race.

*Clinton campaign snares Box CEO in courting young tech millionaires
<http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/06/03/us-usa-election-siliconvalley-idUSKBN0OJ1Y220150603>
// Reuters // Sarah McBride – June 3, 2015 *

The last time Hillary Clinton ran for the White House in 2008, Aaron Levie
was too busy building his start-up company to pay much attention to
politics.

But earlier this year, the 30-year-old Levie led his company, Box, through
an initial public offering, helping free a small portion of his time to
support the frontrunner for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2016.
A few weeks ago, Levie, whose company is worth more than $2 billion, agreed
to host a fundraiser for Clinton.

He sees big stakes for the tech sector in this election, Levie told
Reuters, on issues ranging from improving the patent system to securing
visas for foreign workers and limiting government surveillance.

“There’s more intersection between the technology industry and policy than
ever before,” said Levie, whose trademark mad-scientist hair showed signs
of gray, countered by youthful bright orange sneakers. He said he was
backing Clinton because Democrats' social policies, for example on marriage
equality, resonated more with him than Republican ones.

The campaigns of various White House hopefuls are looking to reel in the
younger Silicon Valley influencers like Levie who could help raise some
money for their candidates and also bring along some of the tech sector’s
energy and cachet.

Levie, whose company helps store data remotely in the “cloud,” is among
several young Silicon Valley executives Clinton’s campaign has been
courting.

"Young, innovative entrepreneurs are key to growing and strengthening our
economy," said a Clinton campaign spokesman.

SILICON VALLEY A CHALLENGE

But recruiting tech entrepreneurs can prove a challenge. Many lack
enthusiasm for politics. For example, in April venture capitalist Marc
Andreessen told Fortune he was "struggling between the anti-science party
and the anti-economics party" and felt tempted to sit out the next election.

Fundraising officials who declined to be named said they hoped the
imprimatur of a few will make it easier to attract others, and Democrats
have a long list of prospects.

“The next crowd is Twitter, Facebook, Airbnb," said venture capitalist
Steve Westly, who served on President Barack Obama’s national finance
committee during the 2008 election. While some of those companies have been
around for years, many of their employees are relatively new to their
wealth.

Twitter and Airbnb representatives didn't respond to requests for comment.
A Facebook spokesman declined comment.

Many in Silicon Valley gravitate toward Democrats, because the party is
seen as more in sync with the tech community on social issues such as gay
marriage. But Republican 2016 hopefuls such as Kentucky Senator Rand Paul
are trying to woo the technorati on economic and regulatory issues. A
packed room of start-up workers at his San Francisco office opening last
month suggested he may be having some success.

Some big names in technology are already involved in politics. Twitter
chief executive Dick Costolo is a longstanding Democratic donor, while
Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg gives to candidates of both
parties.

COLLEGE DROPOUT

Levie said he has donated only once to a candidate, Senator Chuck Schumer,
a Democrat from New York. He still hasn’t registered to vote in California,
his home for almost a decade, relying instead on his parents to forward him
his ballot from Washington state.

A dropout from the University of Southern California, Levie founded Box
with some friends and ran it for a time out of his uncle’s garage near San
Francisco before landing hundreds of millions in venture capital backing.

Friends and business associates such as Emanuel Yekutiel, deputy finance
director for Clinton, helped spark his interest in her campaign, Levie said.

The clincher: a May 1 meeting in Palo Alto where Clinton campaign
officials, including chief technology officer and former Google executive
Stephanie Hannon, met with about 50 executives and venture capitalists and
highlighted the importance of building a cash reserve for the campaign.

Among the invitees: Palmer Luckey, the 22-year-old co-founder of Oculus
Rift, a virtual-reality company bought last year by Facebook for $2
billion, according to someone involved in the event.

Though Levie says campaign support will take a backseat to running Box, he
weighs in on election issues with vigor.

Last month, he criticized Rand Paul on Twitter over his comments at a
congressional hearing where he compared the “right to healthcare” to the
enslaving of doctors.

"Dude, you should be a script writer for `The Hunger Games`, not running
for President," Levie wrote on Twitter, referring to the movie about death
matches in a dystopian, ruthless society.

*Clinton campaign opens five more Iowa offices
<http://www.desmoinesregister.com/story/news/elections/presidential/caucus/2015/06/03/hillary-clinton-opens-campaign-offices-iowa/28417509/>
// The Des Moines Register // Tony Leys – June 3, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton's presidential campaign is demonstrating its commitment to
competing in Iowa by announcing the opening of five new offices in the
state.

The new locations are in Ames, Council Bluffs, Des Moines, Dubuque and Iowa
City, according to a press release Wednesday from spokeswoman Lily Adams.
The campaign already had opened offices in Cedar Rapids, Davenport, Sioux
City and Waterloo.

Such offices are used for recruiting and training volunteers, holding
meetings and holding phone-calling efforts.

The campaign also said it has six "regional organizing directors" and 21
organizers on the ground in Iowa. "Each day our organizers are out talking
to Iowans about why Hillary Clinton is the champion we need in the White
House and they will continue to have those conversations in these offices,
in homes, and online," state director Matt Paul said in the release.

Clinton finished a disappointing third in Iowa's 2008 Democratic caucuses.
She has stressed that she will compete hard for the state this time around,
even though she holds a commanding lead in polls.

*OTHER DEMOCRATS NATIONAL COVERAGE*

*Chafee to unveil presidential run, puzzling longtime allies
<http://bigstory.ap.org/article/f901b910949f41e4b2d3a368978b6087/chafee-unveil-presidential-run-puzzling-longtime-allies>
// AP – June 3, 2015 *

Former Rhode Island Gov. Lincoln Chafee plans to formally open his campaign
for the Democratic presidential nomination on Wednesday, setting off on a
quixotic political quest that has left even some of his closest allies
scratching their heads.

Chafee, a former Republican turned independent who joined the Democratic
Party two years ago, surprised many when he announced plans to explore a
presidential run in April. Since then, he's made little effort to set up a
competitive campaign operation, beyond a few visits and calls to activists
in the early voting states of New Hampshire, Iowa and South Carolina.

While his primary competitors travel the country raising money and wooing
supporters, longtime Chafee strategists and donors say they know little
about his intentions — or even his rationale for running.

"He's not done anything other than posture on some issues," said Mike
Trainor, a former Chafee aide. "The question he's going to have to answer
is what credible indications can he give that he is at all ready to run a
national campaign."

Hillary Rodham Clinton, the dominant Democratic candidate, has set a goal
of raising $100 million for her primary bid. Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders,
who entered the race last week, has said he's already raised at least $4
million. And allies of former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley have
established a super PAC to support his bid.

All three have begun building robust campaign operations with staff across
the country, a step Chafee has yet to take.

In previous campaigns, Chafee has spent significant sums from his family
fortune to further his political ambitious, for example, dropping $1.8
million on his 2010 gubernatorial bid. But running for president is
significantly more expensive than seeking statewide office, with some
pegging the estimated cost of a successful 2016 campaign at more than $1
billion.

"The time will come, but it's not now," Chafee said of his plans to raise
money, in an interview with The Associated Press last month. "Perhaps after
I announce."

Chafee also faces questions about his rationale for challenging Clinton.
Though most of the Democratic field has focused on pocketbook issues,
calculating that the falling unemployment rate masks a lingering feeling of
economic insecurity, Chafee says he's "alarmed" by international
instability, particularly in the Middle East and North Africa.

"I don't like where this is going," he said in a Web video announcing his
exploratory committee.

His opposition to Clinton, Chafee has said, is driven by the belief that
the next president should not be someone who supported the war in Iraq,
which he calls "one of the worst decisions in United States history." Then
a Republican, Chafee was the lone GOP senator to vote in 2002 against the
invasion.

Clinton, then a New York senator, voted to authorize the war, which became
a major issue during her 2008 campaign. Clinton now opposes putting
American soldiers on the ground in Iraq, other than as advisers to the
Iraqi forces. "This has to be fought by and won by the Iraqis," she said
after a campaign event in New Hampshire last month.

Chafee left the Republican Party in 2007 to become an independent and
supported President Barack Obama in both his campaigns. After winning
election as governor, Chafee became a Democrat in 2013, but he opted
against seeking re-election amid low approval ratings. Those decisions
attracted plenty of national media attention, which former aides say Chafee
was happy to encourage.

So far, his latest political maneuver has attracted far less notice, even
from his hometown paper — a fact that's frustrated at least one person very
close to the soon-to-be candidate.

"No one has contacted him," wrote his wife, Stephanie Chafee, on Facebook
nearly three weeks after his April announcement. "so SAD!"

*Lincoln Chafee expected to announce longshot presidential bid
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2015/06/03/lincoln-chafee-expected-to-announce-longshot-presidential-bid/>
// WaPo // Jose DelReal – June 3, 2015*

Former Rhode Island governor Lincoln Chafee (D), a one-time Republican U.S.
senator who notably broke with the GOP on the 2002 Iraq war authorization,
is expected to announce Wednesday that he will seek the 2016 Democratic
presidential nomination.

Chafee’s decision to run, which he plans to announce in an evening speech
at George Mason University, makes him the fourth Democratic hopeful to
officially enter the race. But he's already been the first to directly and
consistently attack frontrunner Hillary Clinton -- particularly over the
Iraq War vote that helped sink her first presidential bid.

"I don't think anybody should be president of the United States that made
that mistake" of voting for the Iraq War, Chafee told The Post in April.
"It's a huge mistake, and we live with broad, broad ramifications today —
of instability not only in the Middle East but far beyond and the loss of
American credibility. There were no weapons of mass destruction."

Chafee, the son of Rhode Island Sen. John Chafee (R), was appointed to U.S.
Senate after his father died in 1999, leaving the seat vacant. As a liberal
Republican, Chafee was re-elected to a full term in 2000, before losing in
2006. He officially left the Republican Party the following year. He was
elected governor as an independent in 2010 and joined the Democratic Party
in 2013. His announcement Wednesday comes less than two years after he
decided not to seek a second term as governor amid low approval ratings and
the prospect of a bruising primary.

Central to Chafee's presidential campaign: his 2002 Senate vote against
authorizing the use of military force in Iraq in 2002, when he was the only
Republican senator to oppose the measure.

Instability in Iraq has become an unexpected campaign issue in the GOP
presidential race. Chafee's hoping it will once again take center stage in
the Democratic contest too.

“Don't forget that probably the biggest reason that Senator Obama, at the
time, defeated Hillary Clinton in '08 was because of the Iraq war vote.
That was the issue,” Chafee told CNN in April. “And that's my big issue
here, because we are dealing with [the] ramifications of that huge mistake
that Senator Clinton made in 2002, which I did not make, and we live with
it today.”

[Lincoln Chafee accuses Hillary Clinton of diplomatic clumsiness, says
‘America loves an underdog’]

Clinton’s other rivals for the Democratic nomination have so far mostly
stopped short of direct attacks on the former secretary of state. Former
Maryland governor Martin O’Malley (D), who last week announced his
candidacy, has made subtle digs the frontrunner that focus on her perceived
coziness with Wall Street and her long history in Washington. Sen. Bernie
Sanders (I-Vt.) has staked out populist positions that sometimes fall far
to Clinton's left, but takes pains to avoid mentioning her explicitly.

Chafee does not appear concerned with subtlety.

Several weeks ago, he suggested that heightened tensions with Russia might
be traceable to a symbolic, incorrectly-labeled "reset button" Clinton
presented to that country's leadership several years ago.

“In the early days, they tried to restart with Russia and she presented the
Russian foreign minister with the restart button. And they got the Russian
word wrong. They said, 'This means over-charge,' and it was an insult,” he
said. “Look what is happening with Putin and with Russia – Ukraine, selling
arms to Iran – and it all could have started with the diplomatic mistake,
getting the word wrong.”

Chafee has said that he does not expect to raise nearly as much money as
Clinton, but that he takes comfort in knowing that “America loves an
underdog."

In a year when one of the candidates seeking the Democratic nomination
isn't even a member of the party, Chafee isn't concerned that his past
party allegiance will raise eyebrows in his relatively new partisan home.
"I have not changed. My old liberal Republican stand on the issues does
line up with the Democratic Party — women’s reproductive freedoms, support
for working families. I have a 30-year record,” he said in April. “Also
note that of the candidates here, [former Virginia senator] Jim Webb was a
Republican and Hillary Clinton was a Goldwater Girl."

A Washington Post/ABC News poll released Tuesday suggested Clinton has the
support of 63 percent of likely Democratic voters nationwide, with Sanders
at 10 percent and O’Malley at 3 percent. Chafee registered 1 percent
support.

*Launching '16 bid, Chafee refuses to rule out talks with IS
<http://m.apnews.com/ap/db_268743/contentdetail.htm?contentguid=bQB0P6jf>
// AP // Lisa Lerer – June 3, 2015*

Former Rhode Island Gov. Lincoln Chafee entered the race for president
Wednesday by calling for the U.S. to switch to the metric system, take an
"open-minded approach" to drug trafficking and consider negotiating with
Islamic State militants.

With his announcement, Chafee became the biggest longshot among Clinton's
rivals, who have a long way to go to avoid becoming historical footnotes in
the 2016 campaign.

He did so by casting himself as an anti-war candidate who opposed the
invasion of Iraq in 2003, but he quickly detoured into a list of policy
proposals that are likely to be non-starters on the campaign trail.

Among them was refusing to rule out talks with Islamic State militants, a
violent extremist group that has tortured and beheaded prisoners and
opposition fighters as it has overrun parts of Iraq and Syria.

A U.S.-led coalition has launched airstrikes against the extremist group
since last August, but Chafee pointed to what he said was the group's
protection of antiquities in some of the territory they've taken as a
reason to reconsider.

"It's early," he said. "We're coming to grips with who these people are and
what they want."

Chafee, a former Republican turned independent who joined the Democratic
Party two years ago, has made little effort to set up a competitive
campaign operation, beyond a few visits and calls to activists in the early
voting states of New Hampshire, Iowa and South Carolina. His launch
Wednesday was made during a subdued speech in suburban Washington before a
small group that consisted mainly of reporters.

"We must deliberately and carefully extricate ourselves from expensive
wars," Chafee told a half-full law school classroom at George Mason
University. "We need to be very smart in these voluble times overseas."

Along with moving to the metric system, the policy prescriptions in his
speech included ending capital punishment, allowing National Security
Agency leaker Edward Snowden back into the U.S. without punishment and
repairing relations with Venezuela. His priority would be to end all wars.

"Let's wage peace in this new American century," he said.

Longtime Chafee strategists and donors said earlier they know little about
his intentions - or even his rationale for running.

"He's not done anything other than posture on some issues," said Mike
Trainor, a former Chafee aide. "The question he's going to have to answer
is what credible indications can he give that he is at all ready to run a
national campaign."

Clinton has set a goal of raising $100 million for her primary bid. Vermont
Sen. Bernie Sanders, who entered the race last week, has said he's already
raised at least $4 million. And allies of former Maryland Gov. Martin
O'Malley have established a super PAC to support his efforts.

All three have begun building robust campaign operations with staff across
the country, a step Chafee has yet to take.

In previous campaigns, Chafee has spent significant sums from his family
fortune to further his political ambitions - for example, dropping $1.8
million on his 2010 governor's race. Running for president is significantly
more expensive than seeking statewide office, with some pegging the
estimated cost of a successful 2016 campaign at more than $1 billion.

Unlike the other Democratic challengers, who've focused on pocketbook
issues, Chafee has staked his campaign on growing international
instability. His opposition to Clinton, Chafee said, is driven by the
belief that the next president should not be someone who supported the war
in Iraq. Then a Republican, Chafee was the lone GOP senator to vote in 2002
against the invasion.

Clinton, then a New York senator, voted to authorize the war, which became
a major issue during her 2008 campaign. Clinton now opposes putting U.S.
soldiers on the ground in Iraq, other than as advisers to the Iraqi forces.

Though he never mentioned Clinton by name Wednesday, Chafee took several
veiled swipes at her candidacy, describing the controversies over her
family foundation, finances and use of a private email account and server
while secretary of state as "regrettable."

"We just can't have that," he said. "We need to just get back the respect
and admiration of the international community."

Chafee left the Republican Party in 2007 to become an independent and
supported President Barack Obama in both his campaigns. After winning
election as governor, Chafee became a Democrat in 2013, but opted against
seeking re-election.

*Iraq War focus for Lincoln Chafee campaign launch
<http://www.cnn.com/2015/06/03/politics/lincoln-chafee-2016-election-announcement/index.html>
// CNN // Dan Merica – June 3, 2015 *

Lincoln Chafee has been elected to office as a Republican senator and an
Independent governor. Now he's got his sights set on the White House as a
Democrat.

A defining issue for Chafee has been the war in Iraq; he was the lone
Republican to vote against authorizing the war as a senator in 2003.
Hillary Clinton was among the Democrats to vote in favor of giving
President George W. Bush the authority to invade.

When Chafee announces he is running for president on Wednesday evening in a
speech at George Mason Center for Politics & Foreign Relations in
Arlington, Virginia, expect him to focus on that vote he took as senator 13
years ago and how he differs on the issue than Clinton.

Chafee has told CNN that he feels Clinton's vote should disqualify her from
the presidency, even though it happened more than a dozen years ago.

"Considering the premise for invading Iraq was based on falsehoods and
considering the ramifications we live with now from that mistake, I would
argue that anybody who voted for the Iraq War should not be president and
certainly should not be leading the Democratic Party," he said in an
interview after he announced he was exploring a presidential run in April.

Clinton has said she regretted the Iraq vote, and told reporters last month
that she "made a mistake, plain and simple."

According to Debbie Rich, Chafee's spokeswoman, the former governor will
make his decision to vote against authorizing the war a key argument behind
his rationale for running. The speech, Rich said, will not be deeply
biographical, despite the fact few people know Chafee, but will instead
focus on his vision.

"I don't see a lot of 'rah rah, this is who I am' in the speech," Rich
said. "It is more about his vision and his record."

Chafee's strategy on the Iraq War is simple: Damage Clinton on an issue on
which he was diametrically opposed. Chafee has said he doesn't worry about
staking his campaign on a backward looking issue, and is proving that by
repeatedly returning to the Iraq War vote in interviews.

So far, however, the issue has failed to move the needle for Chafee. In a
May CNN/ORC poll, the former governor failed to get even 1% support from
self-identified Democrats and independents. In the same April poll, the
former senator received 1%.

He is more liberal than Clinton on other issues, too. He supported gay
marriage before she did, for instance. But he is more of a hawk on fiscal
matters.

Chafee, a former horseshoe specialist, told CNN in April that he wouldn't
bet on himself in the 2016 race, but added that he isn't concerned with his
abysmal polling.

The election is a "long, long way away. And any political historian can
give innumerable examples of 1 percenters who have gone on to success," he
said. "Maybe even Bill Clinton himself?"

From the start, Chafee has been a somewhat reluctant candidate. He
announced he was exploring a run with such an understated video and website
that nearly every political journalist and operative were blindsided by the
decision.

And, according to his spokesman, Chafee backed into his decision to
announce on Wednesday. After getting ahead of himself by telling reporters,
including CNN, that he was "running," Chafee and his team knew they had to
announce soon.

"All the media outlets kept asking," Rich said. "When this opportunity came
up that he was speaking on foreign policy, which is one of his passions, he
decided he would use that opportunity to make a decision."

After announcing his presidential run, Chafee will head straight to New
Hampshire, a state he and his advisers say he has to do well in to have any
chance at winning the presidency.

After visiting Keene, New Hampshire for a meet and greet with local
Democrats on Tuesday night, Chafee will hold a similar event in Lebanon,
New Hampshire.

"I am new at this. But I am a New Englander, so New Hampshire voters have
heard of me, read about me in the Boston Globe," Chafee said in an
interview last month. "I haven't campaigned in either state, so I don't
know what to answer."

*In Presidential Bid, Lincoln Chafee Calls For Metric System
<http://www.wsj.com/articles/in-presidential-bid-lincoln-chafee-calls-for-metric-system-1433373940>
// WSJ // Byron Tau & Reid Epstein – June 3, 2015 *

In a presidential campaign turning largely on stagnant incomes and national
security, Lincoln Chafee announced his bid for the White House on Wednesday
with an unusual policy stance: He called for adoption of the metric system.

Mr. Chafee, a former Republican and independent who is seeking the
Democratic nomination, cast the proposal as a step toward global comity.
“Here’s a bold embrace of internationalism: let’s join the rest of the
world and go metric,” Mr. Chafee said at his campaign kickoff in Virginia.

The policy raised questions about what American traditions might have to
change—football fields might be 91.44 meters, rather than 100 yards, and
the distance from home plate to first base measured as 27.432 meters,
rather than 90 feet.

Mr. Chafee, a former Rhode Island governor and senator, said that the
U.S.’s insistence on using inches, feet, quarts and gallons set the country
apart from the global community. He described the process of converting to
metric as “easy.”

As a model, Mr. Chafee pointed to Canada, where he also said that he has
lived.

“Only Myanmar, Liberia and the U.S. aren’t metric. And it will help our
economy,” he said.

His surprise embrace of the metric system caught even potential allies off
guard. The U.S. Congress passed the Metric Conversion Act in 1975 calling
the system the “preferred” one for trade and commerce. Still, widespread
adoption has been scant.

Paul Trusten, the vice president of the U.S. Metric Association, was
shocked Wednesday when told that Mr. Chafee called for the country to adopt
the metric system.

“Who?” he asked. He then added: “Oh, my gosh.”

Mr. Trusten, a pharmacist in Midland, Texas, said he wasn’t aware of any
presidential candidate ever advocating for “metricazation.” People in the
metric community, Mr. Trusten said, expected support from President Barack
Obama, though that never materialized. They were disappointed by the White
House’s response, in 2013, to a citizen petition calling for adopting the
metric system.

“I had very high hopes that Mr. Obama was going to be a leader in this
because of his discussion of science progress and science initiative…but it
never came up,’’ Mr. Trusten said.

The problem, Mr. Trusten said, is that no American politician has shown
sufficient leadership when it comes to the nation’s system of weights,
measurement and distances.

“Setting a standard of measurement should be a matter of national assent.
It’s something that should be raised, not be made a matter of tyranny but
as a matter of leadership,’’ he said.

Mr. Chafee, a long shot for the presidency, is perhaps best known as the
only Republican senator to vote in 2002 against the invasion of Iraq. He
won the governor’s office in Rhode Island in 2010 as an independent before
becoming a Democrat.

In seeking the Democratic presidential nomination, Mr. Chafee joins former
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont and
former Gov. Martin O’Malley as a candidate.

*Does Anybody Remember Lincoln Chafee's Facebook Password?
<http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-06-03/does-anybody-remember-lincoln-chafee-s-facebook-password->
// *

*Bloomberg // Ben Brody – June 3, 2015*

Getting ready to launch a presidential campaign is a lot of work. There's a
speech to write, staff to hire, and social-media profiles to touch up.

That last task is tripping up Lincoln Chafee, a former Rhode Island
governor who is set to announce Wednesday evening that he is setting out on
a long-shot quest for the Democratic presidential nomination.

In a public Facebook post on May 28, Chafee's wife, Stephanie, asked, “Does
anybody from my Husband's staff remember his FB page access?”

A spokeswoman for Lincoln Chafee, Debbie Rich, confirmed on Wednesday the
post was authentic. His campaign has lost track of the log-in credentials
to the Facebook page that staffers started and managed for Chafee as
governor, Rich said, and that page seems to be attracting more attention
than the page he has set up for 2016, so now they'd like to merge the two.

His gubernatorial page has about 6,100 likes and a verified checkmark, but
hasn't had anyone posting to it since October. Chafee left office in
January after serving one term. His 2016 Facebook page has fewer than 200
likes.

National Journal editor Scott Bland pointed out Stephanie Chafee's post on
Twitter on Wednesday. The contender's wife “just thought some of her people
who were her Facebook friends might have been the one that set it up,” Rich
said.

The former governor's wife has previously commented on Facebook about how
little media coverage her husband is getting, according to the Associated
Press. “No one has contacted him,” she wrote after he announced the
formation of an exploratory committee in April, according to AP (the post
no longer appeared to be available to the public on Wednesday). “so SAD!”

*President Obama’s popularity numbers are running well behind historic
norms
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2015/06/03/bad-news-for-dems-obamas-still-unpopular-good-news-people-think-hillary-is-different/?wprss=rss_the-fix&tid=sm_tw_pp>
// WaPo // Scott Clement – June 3, 2015 *

President Obama's job ratings have lost steam since a small early-2015
surge, but Democrats are positive about changes Hillary Rodham Clinton
might bring, according to a new Washington Post/ABC News poll.

With 18 months left in office, the poll depicts an unappealing legacy
taking shape for Obama. His job ratings are significantly below average for
presidents in the past 70 years, he receives sharply negative marks for
dealing with the Islamic State, and Republicans are far more passionate in
dislike of Obama than Democrats are in supporting him. Each factor poses
challenges for Democrats seeking to secure a third consecutive term for the
party.

Americans, though, expect Clinton to offer a different path; 58 percent
expect she will come up with new policies if elected president rather than
follow Obama's, and most who expect new ideas say this is a "good thing."
Among Democrats, two-thirds expect Clinton to follow her own path and the
vast majority see this as a positive move.

Overall, 54 percent say she'll either pursue new policies and that it's a
good thing (44 percent) or that she'll pursue the same policies and that's
a good thing (10 percent).

The Post/ABC poll finds 45 percent approve of the way Obama is handling his
job while 49 percent disapprove. Obama's approval marks are better than the
low 40s of late last year, but down from 50 percent approval in January and
47 percent in March. Other public polls showed an even more modest rise,
with current ratings also tilting negative.

Obama gained traction early this year after months of strong economic news,
and a January Post/ABC poll found 41 percent saying the economy was at
least "good" -- up from 24 percent in late 2013. The economy's shrinking
first quarter might have stalled Obama's gains, but the poll shows the
issue is not as much of a drag on his approval as before -- his economic
approval rating is two points above his overall job approval mark, a
positive gap that occurred in just five of 56 previous Post/ABC surveys.
Americans are still far from cheery on the issue, with 73 percent saying
they are very or somewhat worried about its direction over the next few
years.

One possible reason Obama's overall numbers lag behind his economic
numbers: Americans are increasingly upset with Obama's handling of the
Islamic State in Iraq and Syria. By a 24-point margin, more disapprove than
approve of Obama's handling of the situation (55-31) less than a month
after the terrorist group captured the major Iraqi city of Ramadi. The
negative judgment marks a flip from September, when 50 percent approved of
Obama's handling of the issue after he ordered airstrikes to combat
insurgents. The issue has highlighted Obama's often-weak support from
fellow Democrats for his performance on foreign affairs; fewer than half of
Democrats approve of how he has handled the issue (49 percent), 28 points
lower than his overall job rating among fellow partisans.

Historically, Obama's standing is below the 56 percent average of
presidential approval ratings in Washington Post/ABC News and Gallup polls
dating back to the 1930s. His 45 percent mark is also just below average
for other two-term presidents at this stage. He is significantly higher
than George W. Bush (35 percent) and Harry Truman (24 percent) but lower
than Ronald Reagan (52 percent), Bill Clinton (59 percent) and Dwight
Eisenhower (64 percent) at this point in their presidencies.

A bigger challenge for Obama's personal legacy is the sheer intensity of
disapproval, which was also seen under George W. Bush. Nearly four in 10
(38 percent) strongly disapprove of his job performance, while 22 percent
strongly approve.

At the root of this gap are vastly different levels of passion among
Democrats and Republicans. Fully 73 percent of Republicans strongly
disapprove of Obama, compared with 45 percent of Democrats who strongly
approve. In June 2007, partisans were flipped by almost identical numbers,
with 73 percent of Democrats strongly disapproving of Bush and 40 percent
of Republicans strongly approving.

*O’Malley’s Mangled Wage Statistic
<http://www.factcheck.org/2015/06/omalleys-mangled-wage-statistic/> //
FactCheck // Brooks Jackson – June 3, 2015 *

Democratic presidential contender Martin O’Malley claims that “70 percent
of us are earning the same or less than they were 12 years ago.” That’s not
correct. Actually, weekly paychecks for rank-and-file workers are 6.6
percent higher than they were a dozen years ago, even after adjusting for
inflation.

O’Malley was citing figures that don’t reflect a spike in real wages and
earnings that has taken place over the past year or so. Real hourly wages
are up 2.3 percent since the end of 2013, and they have risen faster for
rank-and-file workers than for supervisors. Real weekly earnings are up
even more, thanks partly to a slightly longer average work week.

O’Malley, a former governor of Maryland, made the claim in his May 30
speech formally announcing that he is running for his party’s nomination.
And he repeated it the following day when he appeared on ABC’s “This Week”
with George Stephanopoulos.

An Outdated Source

When we asked where O’Malley got his figure, a campaign spokeswoman told us
it came from a report by the Economic Policy Institute, released June 4
last year. But the figures in that report are now badly out of date, and
didn’t quite back up what O’Malley said anyway.

The EPI found that between 2000 and 2013, real hourly wages of the
lowest-earning 30 percent of workers did indeed fall, and those workers in
the range between 30 percent and 40 percent saw no increase at all. But
EPI’s figures (see table 1 on page 11) show wages for all but the bottom 40
percent increased at least a bit. For those between the bottom 40 percent
and the top 30 percent, the increase ranged from 0.1 percent to 0.2 percent
annually. EPI characterized this group’s wages as “essentially stagnant,”
and we would not disagree with that. But it’s not the same thing as
“earning the same,” as O’Malley claimed.

In a more recent report, released Feb. 19, EPI found that real wages fell
for nearly all groups between 2013 and 2014, rising only for the bottom 10
percent and those in the 40th percentile. (See Table 1.)

However, EPI’s figures are based on year-to-year comparisons, and thus fail
to reflect a remarkable and broad spike in real wages and earnings recorded
in more recent, month-to-month figures published by the U.S. Bureau of
Labor Statistics.

EPI’s research and policy director, Josh Bivens, said this rise will be
reflected in the group’s next annual report. “It’s true that real wages
over the past 12 months have been pushed up a lot by falling oil prices,
but, I think that’s clearly a temporary phenomenon and those gains will be
clawed back when oil prices rise in the future,” Bivens told us. “But they
have definitely provided a boost to purchasing power in the short-term,
it’s true.”

As we’ve noted before, falling prices for gasoline and other fuels have
actually pushed down the Consumer Price Index recently, which in turn has
helped push up the purchasing power of the dollar.

A Spike in Real Wages and Earnings

Temporary or not, the gains have been substantial and broad. “Real” hourly
wages, which the Bureau of Labor Statistics expresses in constant 1982-1984
dollars to adjust for inflation, haveincreased by 2.3 percent since
December 2013, after a long period of stagnation or decline since the end
of the Great Recession in 2009.

That figure is for all employees in the private workforce taken together.
(Both the EPI and BLS wage and earnings figures cover only private sector
employees, and exclude government workers.) BLS does not provide statistics
broken down by wage level percentiles, as the EPI report did. But it’s
clear the recent gains were not concentrated at the top.

BLS does provide a breakdown for “production and nonsupervisory” employees,
who make up 82 percent of all workers, and who are paid less on average
than their bosses. Those rank-and-file workers have seen their real hourly
wages go up 2.7 percent since the end of 2013, an even bigger increase than
the average for all workers.

It’s also worth noting that O’Malley used the word “earned,” and weekly
earnings have risen even faster than hourly wages recently. That’s because
workers are putting in slightly more hours than they did at the end of
2013. Since December 2013, weekly paychecks have gone up 2.9 percent for
all workers, and 3.1 percent for rank-and-file workers.

We also looked at how real earnings — the measure O’Malley used — stacked
up against those of “12 years ago” — the time period he specified. And it
turns out that as of April, weekly paychecks for rank-and-file,
nonsupervisory employees were 6.6 percent higher than they were in April
2003.

*Martin O’Malley counters Hillary Clinton: I’m not new to immigration
reform
<http://www.politico.com/story/2015/06/martin-omalley-counters-hillary-clinton-im-not-new-to-immigration-reform-118599.html#ixzz3c2L5W1gM>
// Politico // Jonathan Topaz – June 3, 2015 *

Martin O’Malley, struggling to emerge from the long shadow of Democratic
front-runner Hillary Clinton, is betting on immigration as a break-out
issue that can win him a strong share of the Latino vote.

He’s casting Clinton as a late-to-the-party figure on immigration reform,
and he’s likely got an edge on Sen. Bernie Sanders, who is enjoying a surge
of attention in the presidential race but is not prioritizing immigration
in his campaign.

“It’s central to our nation’s character and central to our nation’s economy
… For me, it’s a pretty essential part of what it’s going to take to get
things going in the right direction,” O’Malley said in a phone interview
with POLITICO Wednesday, ahead of a Q&A with Hispanic Chamber of Commerce
president Javier Palomarez.

And after Hillary staked out an aggressive, and relatively new, stance on
the issue last month, O’Malley delivered his own promise during the event:
he would pursue immigration reform in his first 100 days in office and
would use executive action, if needed.

In the interview earlier in the day, O’Malley said his record speaks for
itself and also says something about Clinton. He argued his leadership on
immigration while he was Maryland governor was an example of challenging
Washington orthodoxy — particularly in his fight against the White House
and Clinton when he spoke out last summer against the fast-track
deportation of the flood of Central American unaccompanied minors across
the border.

In many ways, he placed the issue as central in the larger narratives of
his campaign — a generational contrast with Clinton and his gubernatorial
record. While he declined to challenge Clinton or Sanders directly — he
never used their names — O’Malley alluded to politicians who failed to
speak up and declined to buck the party, apparent references to Clinton.

“When nobody else would speak up about the deplorable treatment of the
Central American refugee kids coming to our country for sanctuary, I stood
up and spoke very directly,” he said.

While Clinton impressed – and genuinely surprised – immigration activists
with her Nevada speech last month in which she called for a pathway to
citizenship and for more robust executive action on immigration, O’Malley
is arguing that he’s had their backs all along.

Not all activists are convinced, though, that O’Malley will get a
significant advantage over Clinton with Latino voters by portraying her as
a latecomer.

Ali Noorani, executive director of the National Immigration Forum, says
there’s little distinction between the three candidates on immigration. He
argued that Clinton pushed Obama to the left on immigration during their
2008 campaign, noting in particular a famous moment on the trail in Nevada
in which Clinton, meeting with immigrant families, said: “No woman is
illegal.”

“If Latino voters in the Democratic Party were to look over the timeline of
Hillary Clinton’s relationship with the Latino community, those roots are
pretty deep,” Noorani argued. “I guess O’Malley is trying to chip away at
those roots and find a lane.”

O’Malley’s doing a good deal of Hispanic outreach early in his campaign.
Since his announcement last Saturday in Baltimore, the former governor
conducted one of his first interviews with Univision and his appearance
with the Hispanic Chamber of Commerce Wednesday was one of his first public
engagements as a candidate. He has also hired Gabriela Domenzain, a
sought-after operative and former director of Hispanic media for President
Barack Obama’s 2012 campaign.

O’Malley’s also pointing to his tenure as Maryland governor from 2007
through early 2015, during which Maryland passed the DREAM Act, which
granted in-state tuition to undocumented immigrants, as well as a law to
provide driver’s licenses to undocumented immigrants. His team also touts a
big increase in contracts for Hispanic small businesses in Maryland.

In the afternoon Q&A on Wednesday, O’Malley pledged to scale down
deportations and take more executive actions. When asked about foreign
policy, he immediately began speaking about outreach to Latin America and
the border crisis this summer.

“You definitely see a day-and-night contrast with Gov. O’Malley and
Secretary Clinton … Hillary Clinton has a dismal record on the issue,” said
Cesar Vargas, co-director of the DREAM Action Coalition. “It’s nice the
Hillary is actually saying great words, but we’re not going to fall for it.”

Added Clarissa Martinez, deputy vice president at National Council of La
Raza: “In O’Malley’s case, his immigration record is not something that has
taken shape as a result of his wanting to run for president … O’Malley has
a stronger position among the Democrats. Because it’s not just words. It’s
deeds.”

And O’Malley is proudly pointing to that high-profile and heated
back-and-forth last summer with the White House and its connection to
Clinton. While Clinton backed the Obama administration’s push to fast-track
the deportation process, in order to try to stem the tide of unaccompanied
Central American children along the U.S.-Mexico border, O’Malley pushed
back.

“It is contrary to everything we stand for to try to summarily send
children back to death,” he said at the time, a statement that prompted a
phone call from White House Domestic Policy Director Cecilia Muñoz and
further criticism from the administration.

Some activists still bristle at Clinton’s backing of the White House. And
there are still wounds from the 2008 primary season in which Clinton
famously was vague on several occasions about whether she supported
driver’s licenses for undocumented immigrants.

Clinton’s campaign in April said she supports the policy, which quickly
prompted a sharp retort from O’Malley — “I’m glad Secretary Clinton’s come
around to the right positions on these issues.”

Asked during the interview on Wednesday whether Clinton has been late on
immigration issues, O’Malley took a long pause. “I’ve never hesitated on
these issues, even when some would say that it was politically risky,” he
said.

Sanders, meanwhile, hasn’t been emphasizing immigration.

While immigration was featured prominently in O’Malley’s announcement
address last weekend, with a DREAM-er originally born in Panama as one of
the opening speakers, Sanders was introduced by labor leaders, affordable
housing advocates and campaign finance activists.

He didn’t mention immigration in his speech, which had fourteen different
policy sections and lasted about a half hour. The senator rarely talks
about it on the stump; at a recent town hall in D.C., he said that while
immigration was an important issue, it wasn’t as central as the other
issues he discusses far more.

“If people are going to get to know him, they need to get to know him on
the basis on what he believes are the biggest issues facing our country,”
said top Sanders adviser Tad Devine — meaning campaign finance reform,
income inequality and climate change. He noted also that Vermont has a
relatively small immigrant population.

*Martin O'Malley: Makes No Sense To Keep 11 Million In Shadow Economy
<http://www.nbcnews.com/news/latino/martin-omalley-makes-no-sense-keep-11-million-shadow-economy-n369336>
// NBC News // Suzanne Gamboa – June 3, 2015 *

Attempting to further capitalize on his immigration record, 2016 Democratic
hopeful Martin O'Malley on Wednesday promoted immigration reform as a way
to improve wages for all Americans.

"How are you going to get wages to go up if you allow 11 million people to
live in a shadow economy?" O'Malley asked at an event sponsored by the U.S.
Hispanic Chamber of Commerce.

He further said immigration needs to be talked about as a national economic
and security priority "not for this group or that group, but for us" as a
country.

O'Malley committed to addressing immigration during his time in office if
elected, but only would go so far as to say he hoped to make it happen
within the first 100 days he is in the Oval Office.

Obama pledge in 2008 to take up a comprehensive immigration reform bill in
his first year, an unkept promise that was used against the president in
2012.

Immigration was one of a range of issues O'Malley addressed in his first
public event since declaring on Saturday that he is running for president.

In the almost one hourlong discussion, O'Malley also took subtle swipes at
the Obama administration and was evasive in answering a question about what
some see as a velvet gloved treatment of his chief rival Hillary Clinton in
the campaign.

Asked if he was "Ready for Hillary," O'Malley said he and other candidates
have reason for running and "now the public gets to decide."

Although the Obama administration often points to economic gains under
Obama, O'Malley said "we need to get our economy functioning again."

He was most animated in discussing the Trans Pacific Partnership trade deal
and "the secrecy with which it was thrust upon us." Obama has won fast
track authority for the agreement, giving him the authority to negotiate it
and holding Congress to only an up or down vote with no amendments or
filibustering of the agreement.

O'Malley said the North American Free Trade Agreement between the U.S.,
Mexico and Canada led to dislocation and loss of jobs and devastation in
Mexico and hurt small communities. A good trade deal "would level the
playing field without diminishing our standards for labor and workers and
our standards when it comes to the protection of the environment," he said.

Javier Palomarez, USHCC president, reminded O'Malley that his chamber
supports the trade pact and asked him to agree that it contains protections
for labor and the environment.

But O'Malley declined to go along, saying he'd let Palomarez know when he's
had a chance to read the agreement.

"'When you have a secret deal and the only people who get to see it are the
great captains of corporate America who have more cash than they've had in
a long time . . . and now we are told 'trust us' on the secret agreement
that we are not allowed to read as a people before our representatives have
to fast track it, it's not the way our country is supposed to work,"
O'Malley said raising his voice.

The Republican Party issued a statement saying O'Malley's policies while he
was governor of Maryland hurt families and small business.

The event was another example of the elevated struggle among the
presidential campaigns to win the increasingly valuable Latino vote that
voted 2-1 for Obama in 2012 and made up about 11 percent of people who went
to the polls.

Next week, Hillary Clinton plans to be in Las Vegas and speak to the
National Association of Elected and Appointed Officials conference, which
she announced earlier Wednesday.

*Martin O'Malley Wrongly Says That Wages Haven't Gotten Better For
Americans
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/03/martin-omalley-wages_n_7503198.html>
// HuffPo // Brooks Jackson – June 3, 2015 *

Democratic presidential contender Martin O’Malley claims that “70 percent
of us are earning the same or less than they were 12 years ago.” That’s not
correct. Actually, weekly paychecks for rank-and-file workers are 6.6
percent higher than they were a dozen years ago, even after adjusting for
inflation.

O’Malley was citing figures that don’t reflect a spike in real wages and
earnings that has taken place over the past year or so. Real hourly wages
are up 2.3 percent since the end of 2013, and they have risen faster for
rank-and-file workers than for supervisors. Real weekly earnings are up
even more, thanks partly to a slightly longer average work week.

O’Malley, a former governor of Maryland, made the claim in his May 30
speech formally announcing that he is running for his party’s nomination.
And he repeated it the following day when he appeared on ABC’s “This Week”
with George Stephanopoulos.

An Outdated Source

When we asked where O’Malley got his figure, a campaign spokeswoman told us
it came from a report by the Economic Policy Institute, released June 4
last year. But the figures in that report are now badly out of date, and
didn’t quite back up what O’Malley said anyway.

The EPI found that between 2000 and 2013, real hourly wages of the
lowest-earning 30 percent of workers did indeed fall, and those workers in
the range between 30 percent and 40 percent saw no increase at all. But
EPI’s figures (see table 1 on page 11) show wages for all but the bottom 40
percent increased at least a bit. For those between the bottom 40 percent
and the top 30 percent, the increase ranged from 0.1 percent to 0.2 percent
annually. EPI characterized this group’s wages as “essentially stagnant,”
and we would not disagree with that. But it’s not the same thing as
“earning the same,” as O’Malley claimed.

In a more recent report, released Feb. 19, EPI found that real wages fell
for nearly all groups between 2013 and 2014, rising only for the bottom 10
percent and those in the 40th percentile. (See Table 1.)

However, EPI’s figures are based on year-to-year comparisons, and thus fail
to reflect a remarkable and broad spike in real wages and earnings recorded
in more recent, month-to-month figures published by the U.S. Bureau of
Labor Statistics.

EPI’s research and policy director, Josh Bivens, said this rise will be
reflected in the group’s next annual report. “It’s true that real wages
over the past 12 months have been pushed up a lot by falling oil prices,
but, I think that’s clearly a temporary phenomenon and those gains will be
clawed back when oil prices rise in the future,” Bivens told us. “But they
have definitely provided a boost to purchasing power in the short-term,
it’s true.”

As we’ve noted before, falling prices for gasoline and other fuels have
actually pushed down the Consumer Price Index recently, which in turn has
helped push up the purchasing power of the dollar.

A Spike in Real Wages and Earnings

Temporary or not, the gains have been substantial and broad. “Real” hourly
wages, which the Bureau of Labor Statistics expresses in constant 1982-1984
dollars to adjust for inflation, have increased by 2.3 percent since
December 2013, after a long period of stagnation or decline since the end
of the Great Recession in 2009.

That figure is for all employees in the private workforce taken together.
(Both the EPI and BLS wage and earnings figures cover only private sector
employees, and exclude government workers.) BLS does not provide statistics
broken down by wage level percentiles, as the EPI report did. But it’s
clear the recent gains were not concentrated at the top.

BLS does provide a breakdown for “production and nonsupervisory” employees,
who make up 82 percent of all workers, and who are paid less on average
than their bosses. Those rank-and-file workers have seen their real hourly
wages go up 2.7 percent since the end of 2013, an even bigger increase than
the average for all workers.

It’s also worth noting that O’Malley used the word “earned,” and weekly
earnings have risen even faster than hourly wages recently. That’s because
workers are putting in slightly more hours than they did at the end of
2013. Since December 2013, weekly paychecks have gone up 2.9 percent for
all workers, and 3.1 percent for rank-and-file workers.

We also looked at how real earnings — the measure O’Malley used — stacked
up against those of “12 years ago” — the time period he specified. And it
turns out that as of April, weekly paychecks for rank-and-file,
nonsupervisory employees were 6.6 percent higher than they were in April
2003.

*O’Malley on the Stump
<http://www.nytimes.com/politics/first-draft/2015/06/03/first-draft-focus-omalley-on-the-stump/>
// NYT // June 3, 2015 *

Martin O’Malley, a Democratic presidential candidate, sought to seize on
the immigration reform debate on Wednesday, pledging to take on the issue
within the first 100 days of his administration.

Mr. O’Malley, a former Maryland governor, made the remarks at a United
States Hispanic Chamber of Commerce event in Washington, where he was
interviewed by the group’s president, Javier Palomarez.

“Absolutely,” he told Mr. Palomarez about addressing immigration as an
immediate priority. He said that addressing immigration had been so
difficult because politicians treated it like a niche issue affecting a
specific voting bloc as opposed to a critical economic policy.

Mr. O’Malley also tried to remind people of his executive experience, a
past-is-prelude approach he is certain to continue in an effort to stand
out from Hillary Rodham Clinton.

Struggling in the polls, Mr. O’Malley is trying to get a toehold in the
Democratic primary, in which Mrs. Clinton has a strong lead and Senator
Bernie Sanders of Vermont has gained early momentum.

Mr. O’Malley believes immigration provides him with that opportunity, and
he has tried to highlight actions on the issue he took in Maryland, such as
a law for in-state tuition for undocumented immigrants who came to the
United States as children.

He has also tried to paint Mrs. Clinton, who has told immigrant rights
advocates that she would go further than President Obama’s executive
actions halting some deportations, as new to the issue.

Separately, the “super PAC” supporting Mr. O’Malley, Generation Forward,
began placing television ad buys for two Iowa media markets, to air Friday
through Sunday, according to a person tracking the early ad spending.

*Martin O’Malley Calls For More Restrictions on NSA Surveillance
<http://time.com/3908016/martin-omalley-national-security-agency/> // TIME
// Sam Frizell – June 3, 2015 *

Former Gov. Martin O’Malley said that recent reforms to the Patriot Act did
not go far enough in curtailing the National Security Agency, arguing that
the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance court should include a public
advocate.

“The USA Freedom act was a step in the right direction, and I’m glad that
it passed and the president signed it,” said O’Malley, who is running for
the Democratic nomination for president.

“I would like to see us go further in terms of a role for a public advocate
in the FISA court,” he continued. “As a lawyer myself and by training, I
think our national security and our rights would be better served if we had
a bigger role for a public advocate in the FISA court.”

O’Malley’s remarks at the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce on Wednesday
afternoon marked the first time the two-term governor has laid out a
notable policy position on mass surveillance since becoming a presidential
candidate. He has thus far staked his candidacy on a progressive economic
platform, including regulating Wall Street and pushing for immigration
reform.

President Obama signed into law on Tuesday sweeping legislation that
dissolves the NSA’s authority to monitor data on millions of Americans’
phone calls, instead requiring that phone companies store the data
themselves. If the government wants to access call data, it has to first
acquire a court order with FISA.

Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul, who is running for the Republican nomination, has
made reforming surveillance a central platform of his presidency. But
O’Malley differed with Paul on how to do that.

Over the weekend in New Hampshire, O’Malley said he opposed Paul’s move on
Sunday to delay a vote on to extend the Patriot Act. Paul’s delay
ultimately led to the NSA surveillance authorities lapsing for nearly two
full days, but paved the way for the USA Freedom Act to pass on Tuesday. “I
think we could be less safe if we resort to obstructionism when it comes to
something as important as protecting our homeland from the threat of terror
attacks,” he said, BuzzFeed news reported.

*O’Malley super PAC to air early television ads in Iowa
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-politics/wp/2015/06/03/omalley-super-pac-to-air-early-television-ads-in-iowa/>
// WaPo // John Wagner – June 3, 2015 *

A super PAC supporting Democrat Martin O’Malley’s presidential bid is
preparing to air television ads in Iowa highlighting the former Maryland
governor’s willingness to stand up to Wall Street “bullies.”

The $25,000 ad buy by the Generation Forward PAC is relatively modest, but
it represents the first 2016 presidential advertising on television on the
Democratic side in Iowa, the nation’s first caucus state.

Ron Boehmer, a spokesman for the PAC, which is barred by law from
coordinating with O’Malley’s campaign, said it’s possible more money could
be put behind the ad, which he said will air on network affiliates around
the state.

O’Malley, considered a long shot against Hillary Rodham Clinton for the
Democratic nomination, announced his bid on Saturday.

The ad features footage from O’Malley’s announcement speech at Federal Hill
Park in Baltimore, where he noted that the chief executive of investment
bank Goldman Sachs recently said he would be fine with either Clinton or
Republican Jeb Bush as president.

“I bet he would,” O’Malley told the crowd. “Well, I’ve got news for the
bullies of Wall Street. The presidency is not a crown to be passed back and
forth by you between two royal families.”

Since then, O’Malley’s aides have sought to highlight the comments of Fox
Business Network correspondent Charles Gasparino, who reported this week
that O’Malley is “public enemy No. 1” at Goldman Sachs. The super PAC’s ad
closes with that quote from Gasparino.

In recent months, O’Malley has laced his speeches with calls for tougher
Wall Street regulations, an issue on which his advisers argue Clinton is
weak because of past support from the financial sector.

On Wednesday, at a forum hosted by the U.S. Hispanic Chamber of Commerce,
O’Malley was asked if he plans to take campaign contributions from Wall
Street banks and their executives. He said he probably already had done so
and plans to continue doing so.

“There’s a lot of good people who work in our financial industry,” O’Malley
said, adding that many of them are also “saddened” by bad behavior by some
of the big banks.

*Wall Street Execs Take Aim at O’Malley Campaign Hypocrisy
<http://www.foxbusiness.com/business-leaders/2015/06/03/wall-street-execs-take-aim-at-omalley-campaign-hypocrisy/>
// Fox News // Charlie Gasparino – June 3, 2015 *

Wall Street executives are fighting back against Martin O’Malley, branding
the former Maryland governor and 2016 Democratic presidential candidate a
hypocrite for attacking the big banks after what they say is a largely
unsuccessful attempt to collect fat-cat campaign contributions, the FOX
Business Network has learned.

O’Malley, who announced Saturday that he is challenging former Secretary of
State Hillary Clinton for the Democratic nomination, has made his
opponent’s ties to the big banks the center piece of his nascent campaign.
But since at least the beginning of the year, O’Malley himself has eyed
contributions from executives at several major Wall Street banks, according
to people with direct knowledge of O’Malley’s fundraising.

These people say in recent months, O’Malley met key officials from Morgan
Stanley (MS), and, according to O’Malley campaign officials, he is looking
for contributions from what he considers “reformed minded bankers” at other
firms such as JP Morgan (JPM) and even Goldman Sachs (GS), whose chief
executive Lloyd Blankfein was singled out by O’Malley in his announcement
speech for having too much influence with Clinton.

It’s unclear how much—if any money – O’Malley has or will receive from the
big banks; both his political action committee and his campaign have until
July 15 to file contribution disclosures. While governor of Maryland,
O’Malley received $559,000 from people and entities labeled “securities,
investments” and “commercial banks,” according to disclosure forms.

Many Wall Street executives have branded O’Malley as “public enemy No. 1”
for his recent spate of attacks on their influence on public policy. Some
of those execs are now calling him a hypocrite for  making class warfare
and bank bashing a central theme of his campaign against Clinton after
meeting with financiers.

“O’Malley has not been shy about meeting with the big banks for money,” one
senior Wall Street executive with direct knowledge of the matter said.
“That doesn’t mean he will be successful; in fact no one I know has given
him anything.”

Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs and JP Morgan had no comment.

"They can try to leak as many meaningless tidbits as they want, but
Governor O'Malley has shown he will stand up to his own party to call for
real structural and accountability reforms of Wall Street. His message is
the same everywhere - Wall Street must be held accountable once and for
all,” O’Malley spokeswoman Halley Morris said in a statement.

An O’Malley campaign official speaking on a not for attribution basis added
that a recent meeting between the candidate and Morgan Stanley Vice
Chairman Tom Nides  was a “political meeting,” and was not with the sole
purpose of benefiting the O’Malley campaign.

“Obviously [Nides is] a close confidante of the Clintons given his
relationship with the Clintons,” the source said. Nides served as deputy
secretary of state under Clinton before he took the post at Morgan Stanley.

Two Candidates Go Head-to-Head

Clinton, the former Obama Secretary of State and first lady, has received
millions of dollars in speaking fees from corporations, such as Goldman and
is expected to raise millions of dollars from the finance industry given
her close relationships with major player such as Blankfein and Larry Fink,
the chief executive of money-management powerhouse BlackRock (BLK). Cheryl
Mills, a key Clinton adviser and Clinton Foundation board member, is also a
board member of Blackrock. Wall Street executives say Fink is interested in
a cabinet spot – like Treasury Secretary -- in a Clinton Administration .

A Blackrock spokesman had no comment on the matter.

O’Malley ignited a firestorm among Clinton’s vast army of Wall Street
supporters on Saturday when he announced his candidacy by attacking her
ties and those of Republican presidential front runner and former Florida
Governor Jeb Bush to major players in the finance industry.

“Let's be honest, they were the ones who turned our economy upside-down in
the first place. And they are the only ones who are benefiting from it,”
O’Malley said in his speech. “Goldman Sachs is one of the biggest
repeat-offending investment banks in America. Recently, the CEO of Goldman
Sachs let his employees know that he'd be just fine with either Bush or
Clinton. Well, I've got news for the bullies of Wall Street --the
presidency is not a crown to be passed back and forth by you between two
royal families.”

FBN has previously reported that the heads of the big Wall Street firms
believe either a Clinton or Bush presidency would further their goals of
weakening recent financial regulations such as Dodd Frank.

Clinton leads O’Malley by wide margins in recent polls, but her operatives
are said to be worried about O’Malley’s line of attack and that her
relationships with Wall Street firms at the center of the 2008 financial
collapse could have resonance particularly among progressive Democratic
Party voters.

*Sanders Calls for 'Political Revolution'
<https://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/sanders-calls-political-revolution_963850.html>
// The Weekly Standard // Michael Warren – June 3, 2015*

“Is Finland crazy? I want somebody to comment on that.”

Bernie Sanders was speaking Wednesday morning in a basement classroom at
Johns Hopkins University’s Washington campus. The Vermont senator and
Democratic presidential candidate had been asking the group of 50 or so to
think about what sort of country they wanted to live in. During a short
Q&A, a Finnish graduate student named Hans spoke up to ask about student
loan debt. After some prodding by the senator, Hans revealed that not only
did he pay no tuition for his studies but he was actually being paid by the
government for living expenses. That sounded like the kind of country
Sanders wanted to live in.

“Are people in Finland—a beautiful country—are they crazy about saying, as
I understand it, that every young person in Finland should have the
opportunity to go to college fully and invest in their young people?”
Sanders said to the audience. “Well, raise your hands! And if they’re not
crazy, why isn’t it happening in America? What are you doing about it?”

A student asked what young people can do to fix the problems of the
country, and Sanders went into a stemwinder.

“If you are concerned about the future of this country, the patriotic thing
to do, the thing to do in respect to the founding fathers of this country,
those people who fought and died in Okinawa in World War II, and all the
wars that we have fought, is to get involved. And I know it’s not a cool
thing to get involved. Get involved in politics? Hey, there’s a party down
the street. Let’s get drunk. Let’s get high. That’s what being young and
alive is about. Well, if you really want to be patriotic and you really
want to be a hero, and you really want to show your concern a few miles
away from here who have no opportunity whatsoever, you know what? Have some
courage. Do what your friends are not doing,” he said.

If a Bernie Sanders campaign event sounds a bit like a lecture from your
grandfather, that’s because it kind of is—if your grandfather were an
avowed socialist with a funny, sarcastic streak. He touted the social
welfare paradises of places like Finland and Denmark, getting laughs from
the crowd when joked that free education and health care were the awful
consequences of “European socialism.” It was a friendly crowd at Johns
Hopkins, with questioners asking about paid maternity leave (he’s for it),
foreign policy (he was “one of the leaders of the opposition” to the Iraq
war in 2003), and the federal minimum wage (it ought to be $15 an hour, he
says). When one older man prefaced his question by saying it was an “honor”
to be in his presence, Sanders interrupted him.

“No, no, no. Hold it, hold it, hold it,” Sanders said. “That makes me
nervous. It’s not an honor to be in my presence. It’s an honor to be in
your presence. I’m just a person like you who happens to be a senator.”

Sanders’s socialism is less intellectual and more populist. “The major
issue facing our country,” he said, by way of introduction, “is the
grotesque level of income and wealth inequality.”

There’s a moral element, too. “In my view, there is something profoundly
wrong when the top one-tenth of one percent owns almost as much wealth as
the bottom ninety percent. There is something profoundly wrong when
ninety-nine percent of all new income generated in this country goes to the
top one percent today,” said Sanders. “Are you comfortable with that?"

For Sanders, the gross wealth inequality means the rich have not only
corrupted our culture and society but our government and politics as well.
We don’t talk about these inequality issues, he said, because “the folks
who essentially own the country would prefer us not to discuss” it. The
Supreme Court’s Citizens United decision, which removed limits on donations
to outside political groups and which Sanders calls “one of the worst” in
U.S. history, has opened the floodgates for moneyed interests in politics.
In fact, Sanders said, he would consider support for overturning Citizens
United as a “litmus test” for any Supreme Court nominees he would name as
president.

Sanders excoriated the libertarian and Republican-friendly Koch brothers
for their plans to spend nearly a billion dollars in the next election
cycle on campaigns and advocacy. But left unmentioned was one of his rivals
for the Democratic nomination, Hillary Clinton, who has and will continue
to raise money from Wall Street, Hollywood, and other centers of money and
influence. Sanders has been muted in directly criticized Clinton on wealth
and inequality issues, instead opting for a more general argument, as he
did Wednesday.

“What I’ve called for in this campaign is what I call a political
revolution,” he said. You have to go into your heart of hearts. I can’t do
that for you. And you gotta look around and say, you know, men and women
fought and died to preserve American democracy. Are you content with where
we are right now?”

*Bernie Sanders Calls for More and Earlier Debates
<http://www.nytimes.com/politics/first-draft/2015/06/03/bernie-sanders-calls-for-more-and-earlier-debates/?module=BlogPost-Title&version=Blog%20Main&contentCollection=Politics&action=Click&pgtype=Blogs&region=Body>
// NYT // Alan Rappeport – June 3, 2015*

Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont is employing a new strategy that he hopes
will help him stand out in the growing field of Democrats who are running
for president: He’s calling for more debates.

The Democratic National Committee has agreed to sanction six debates
starting this fall. But on Wednesday, Mr. Sanders circulated a petition
calling on the party to start the debates this summer.

Mr. Sanders has said that Democrats need more debates to cut through the
noise of attack ads and sound bites. He has even suggested that Republicans
could participate in early debates.

“I’d like to have myself and other Democratic candidates on stage with some
of the Republican candidates and let the American people hear from both
sides on the big issues,” Mr. Sanders said.

Leaders of both parties have been reluctant to allow too many debates out
of concern that primary fights could become too bruising. And Fox News,
sponsor of the Republican debates, has said that it will limit the number
of candidates who can participate to prevent the debates from becoming too
unwieldy.

For Mr. Sanders, considered a long-shot to beat Hillary Rodham Clinton for
the Democratic nomination, more debates would be one way to gain access to
a national audience without using up advertising funds.

“In the long haul of a presidential campaign, candidates like myself spend
a lot of time traveling to states with early primaries speaking directly to
voters,” Mr. Sanders said. “But we can only be in so many places at once,
and so the media ends up distilling these discussions down to sound bites
for evening newscasts. Debates change that.”

Former Gov. Martin O’Malley of Maryland announced his candidacy last week,
and Lincoln Chafee, the former senator and governor from Rhode Island, is
also expected to join the Democratic race on Wednesday.

*Sanders slams Jeb Bush over Social Security remarks
<http://thehill.com/policy/finance/243931-sanders-slams-jeb-over-social-security-remarks>
// The Hill // Rebecca Shabad – June 3, 2015 *

Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) on Wednesday slammed former Gov. Jeb Bush’s
(R-Fla.) recent comments about raising the retirement age for Social
Security.

Bush suggested the age to get Social Security should be raised from 65 to
68 to 70.

“At a time when more than half of the American people have less than
$10,000 in savings, it would be a disaster to cut Social Security benefits
by raising the retirement age,” the Democratic presidential candidate
replied in a statement.

“It is unacceptable to ask construction workers, truck drivers, nurses and
other working-class Americans to work until they are 68 to 70 years old
before qualifying for full Social Security benefits,” added Sanders, who
has pushed to expand Social Security benefits.

Bush called for a hike in the retirement age in an interview with CBS
News’s “Face the Nation.”

“I think it needs to be phased in over an extended period of time,” Bush
said. “We need to look over the horizon and begin to phase in, over an
extended period of time, going from 65 to 68 or 70. ... And that, by
itself, will help sustain the retirement system for anybody under the age
of 40.”

Bush, who is exploring a presidential bid, also said he would be open to
slashing benefits for wealthy people and their beneficiaries.

“I think it ought to be considered, for sure,” Bush said.

“I have a hard time understanding what world Gov. Bush and his billionaire
backers live in,” Sanders responded on Wednesday.

"Gov. Bush has made clear that he wants to protect Social Security for
those who have earned it. And yet, reform it so it's still around for
younger generations," Right to Rise PAC spokesman Matt Gorman told The Hill
in response to Sanders's comments.

Right to Rise PAC is Bush's leadership political action committee.

Hillary Clinton, considered the Democratic front-runner for president,
chastised Republicans in April for attempts to change Social Security.

“What do we do to make sure it is there? We don’t mess with it, and we do
not pretend that it is a luxury — because it is not a luxury. It is a
necessity for the majority of people who draw from Social Security,” she
said during a stop in New Hampshire.

Clinton is expected to hold a kick-off rally in New York this month, about
two months after officially jumping into the 2016 race. After that, she's
expected to roll out more specific policy platforms.

*GOP*

*Jeb Bush to announce presidential bid June 15 in Miami
<http://www.miamiherald.com/news/politics-government/elections-2016/jeb-bush/article23061837.html>
// Miami Herald // PATRICIA MAZZEI AND ALEX LEARY – June 4, 2015*

Nearly six months after saying he was “actively” exploring the idea of
running for president, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush will officially enter
the race June 15 in Miami.

“Governor Bush is thankful for the support and encouragement he has
received from so many Americans during the last several months and looks
forward to announcing his decision,” spokeswoman Kristy Campbell told the
Miami Herald and Tampa Bay Times.

Bush, 62, picked Miami Dade College, the largest institution of higher
education in the country, as his announcement location in a nod to his
passion for education policy and a campaign theme of expanding economic
opportunities for people who, in his words, want to “rise up.” The
college’s mission is to give every student who wants a college degree a
chance to get one.

More information about the 3 p.m. event at the college’s Kendall campus is
at jebannouncement.com.

The announcement will follow a weeklong trip for Bush to Europe that begins
Monday, giving him a close look at foreign policy issues that have been a
central focus of the presidential contest so far.

Despite having a famous last name and raising what is expected to be a
breathtaking amount of money, Bush has struggled to break out of a growing
pack of GOP contenders.

The group includes fellow Floridian Marco Rubio, who is pitching himself as
a fresh face against “outdated” politicians, a line seemingly directed at
Democrat Hillary Clinton but also at Bush, who was governor from 1999-2007.

Rubio ignored conventional thought that he would stand down for Bush, a
mentor, and jumped in the race April 13. In the weeks since, Rubio has
gained momentum in the polls and attracted the support of wealthy backers.

Bush startled the political world on Dec. 16 when he announced on Facebook
that he was “actively” considering a run for president. In recent months,
he has been traveling the country extensively, giving speeches focused on
improving educational and work opportunities for Americans.

But his all-but-official status has attracted growing criticism from
campaign finance watchdogs, newspaper editorial boards and other
candidates. It also has caused some clumsy moments.

On CBS News’ Face the Nation on Sunday, Bush said, “I would like to run,”
as if something was holding him back. A while before that, in Nevada, he
accidentally said he was running — then corrected himself.

The decision to wait so long has a major financial upside, as Bush has been
free to work directly with the Right to Rise Super PAC, started by his
allies, and raise unlimited money. Watchdogs have filed several complaints
with the Federal Election Commission and the Justice Department.

Asked on Face the Nation whether he was violating the law, Bush said: “I
would never do that.”

As a declared candidate, Bush’s interaction with the committee will be
limited. People giving directly to his presidential campaign are tapped out
at $2,700.

Still, the Super PAC has amassed tens of millions of dollars already, and
its staff has become deeply familiar with Bush’s objectives. He could push
some traditional functions of a campaign to the Super PAC, which will
continue to raise large sums.

On Monday, Bush departs for Germany, Estonia and Poland, key U.S. allies.
Bush likely will use the trip to draw a contrast to President Barack Obama,
whom many Republicans see as weak on foreign policy. Poland has been
pushing for the United States to get more involved in curbing Russia’s
meddling in Ukraine.

Bush also will “discuss policies to promote growth, innovation and
technologies to address the changing global economic environment and ways
to foster prosperity on both sides of the Atlantic,” according to a Reuters
story previewing the visit.

Back in Miami, the bilingual Bush will make his presidential announcement
at a diverse college that boasts more than 165,000 students and has gotten
used to hosting politicians. President George W. Bush delivered the Kendall
campus commencement in 2007. He introduced his younger brother, who was in
the audience, as always “mi hermano” — always my brother.

The Kendall campus is in the heart of Miami-Dade County’s largely
Cuban-American suburbs. It’s the university’s second-oldest campus, built
in 1967 on 185 acres of land and housing 13 buildings for a variety of
academic programs ranging from architecture to business to science.

Bush made K-12 education central to his tenure in Tallahassee, and he has
spent his years out of office pushing for higher standards — including the
contentious Common Core — and expanded access to charter schools across the
country.

Rubio chose to make his presidential announcement at a Miami Dade College
institution with Cuban significance, too — downtown Miami’s Freedom Tower.
The iconic Biscayne Boulevard building is where Cuban exiles were first
welcomed into the United States, beginning in 1964. Today, it houses the
school’s Museum of Art and Design.

For Bush, the choice strikes a far more populist tone than, say, the
Biltmore Hotel in Coral Gables, where he plays golf regularly and has had
his private business office for years.

His campaign headquarters also are in a decidedly unflashy part of town, a
sturdy West Miami-Dade County office building near the working-class and
largely Hispanic neighborhoods of Sweetwater and Fontainebleau.

After his announcement, Bush will embark on a tour of early primary states.

*Jeb Bush, Taking His Time, Tests the Legal Definition of Candidate
<http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/04/us/politics/jeb-bush-taking-his-time-tests-the-legal-definition-of-candidate.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=second-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news>
// NYT // Eric Lichtblau & Nick Corasaniti – June 3, 2015 *

Jeb Bush is under growing pressure to acknowledge what to some voters and a
number of campaign finance lawyers seems obvious: He is running for
president.

The lawyers say Mr. Bush, a former Florida governor, is stretching the
limits of election law by crisscrossing the country, hiring a political
team and raising tens of millions of dollars at fund-raisers, all without
declaring — except once, by mistake — that he is a candidate.

Some election experts say Mr. Bush passed the legal threshold to be
considered a candidate months ago, even if he has not formally acknowledged
it. Federal law makes anyone who raises or spends $5,000 in an effort to
become president a candidate and thus subject to the spending and
disclosure restrictions. Some limited activities are allowed for candidates
who are merely “testing the waters” for a run.

“When you look at the totality of the activities, could a reasonable person
conclude anything other than that he is seeking the presidency?” asked Karl
J. Sandstrom, a campaign finance lawyer who served on the Federal Election
Commission.

For a candidate to avoid restrictions by simply not declaring his
candidacy, he said, “makes a mockery of the law.”

The issue is not one of mere semantics. If Mr. Bush did declare that he is
running, it would bring a raft of election restrictions, including a limit
of $2,700 on contributions, and a ban on “coordinating” with a “super PAC”
he has used to raise money.

But much of campaign finance law is a subject of dispute, and defining who
is a candidate is no exception.

David M. Mason, a former F.E.C. commissioner, said a 1981 case involving
the possible presidential campaign of the former Florida governor Reubin
Askew gives politicians wide latitude to take steps to “explore” a run.

“You can’t enforce the law based on what everybody ‘knows’ because that
requires you to be a mind reader,” Mr. Mason said. “The broad impression —
‘oh yeah, he’s campaigning, he’s been in Iowa, he made a speech, then went
to New Hampshire’ — is not enough to make him a candidate.”

Mr. Bush, who announced in December that he would “actively explore” a
White House bid, has said repeatedly that he has not made a decision. But
he has faced rising skepticism in recent weeks.

In an appearance Sunday on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” the host, Bob
Schieffer, asked Mr. Bush bluntly whether he was violating the law by not
declaring himself a candidate for the White House.

“No, of course not,” Mr. Bush responded, appearing jarred by the question.
“I would never do that.”

Mr. Bush said he was “nearing the end of this journey of traveling and
listening to people, garnering, trying to get a sense of whether my
candidacy would be viable or not.”

He added, “We’re going to completely adhere to the law, for sure.”

Mr. Schieffer sounded incredulous. “Now you’re not telling me there’s a
possibility you may not run?” he asked.

Mr. Bush did not waver. “Look, I hope I — I hope I run, to be honest with
you,” he said. “I would like to run. But I haven’t made the decision.”

Last month, he slipped up for a moment, telling reporters in Nevada, “I am
running for president in 2016.” He quickly corrected himself, adding “if I
run.”

In his appearance at $25,000-a-head fund-raisers in Washington, New York
and elsewhere, Mr. Bush and his advisers are using what are technically
considered outside groups — two political action committees, both called
Right to Rise — to take in the money, rather than creating an official
campaign organization to do it.

Last week, two campaign watchdog groups, Democracy 21 and the Campaign
Legal Center, called on the Justice Department to appoint a special counsel
to investigate whether Mr. Bush had broken election law by evading
restrictions on candidates.

The groups called his noncandidacy “a charade” and called on prosecutors to
intervene because they said the F.E.C. — perpetually gridlocked — was
unlikely to do anything.

The groups filed an earlier complaint with the F.E.C. in March charging
that Mr. Bush and three other politicians — Martin O’Malley, a Democrat;
and Scott Walker and Rick Santorum, both Republicans — were evading
campaign finance restrictions by not declaring themselves candidates. (Mr.
O’Malley and Mr. Santorum have each declared their candidacy in the past
week.)

“You can say you haven’t decided,” said Trevor Potter, the president of the
Campaign Legal Center. “But if you go off and look like a candidate and act
like a candidate and amass funds, it doesn’t matter. You are a candidate in
the eyes of the law.”

As he travels through Iowa, New Hampshire, Michigan and other key states,
Mr. Bush has certainly seemed like a candidate. He arrives in a black sport
utility vehicle, talks about his vision for the country, shakes hands,
answers questions and poses for photographs with voters until aides drag
him to his next event.

“I really like campaigning,” Mr. Bush told businessmen in Portsmouth, N.H.,
last month, before quickly adding, “I’m not a candidate.”

By all accounts, Mr. Bush is enjoying what he calls the “journey” of a
possible candidate, but he has made sure in most appearances to throw in
the legal caveats.

“Let me be clear,” he said Tuesday at an event in Orlando, Fla. “If I run,
if I’m a candidate — and that decision is going to be coming real soon — my
intention is to run on my record and my ideas and try to win the
presidency. “

Amid the verbal jujitsu, reporters have begun to press Mr. Bush.

In Lansing, Mich., a reporter asked him, “How important is transparency in
a presidential candidate?”

Smiling, Mr. Bush asked if it was a trick question. “Where are you going
with it?” he asked.

The reporter then ticked off an account of Mr. Bush’s recent visits and
fund-raisers before asking, “Are you running for president?”

Chuckling, Mr. Bush said, “Not yet.” He quickly took another question —
this one on Senator Rand Paul, a declared Republican candidate.

The wait is making some voters anxious.

As Mr. Bush was leaving a Lincoln Day dinner in Bath Township, Mich., a
woman wearing a photograph of the former governor around her neck chased
him outside.

“Run, Jeb, run!” she chanted. “Run, Jeb run! We need you!”

Mr. Bush smiled and waved as he was driven away.

*With some donors doubting Jeb Bush, Marco Rubio seizes an opening
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/with-some-donors-doubting-jeb-bush-marco-rubio-seizes-an-opening/2015/06/03/bf18ab74-09a4-11e5-9e39-0db921c47b93_story.html>
// WaPo // Matea Gold & Sean Sullivan – June 3, 2015 *

Marco Rubio is benefiting from pockets of discontent in Jeb Bush’s
sprawling money network, winning over donors who believe the 44-year-old
freshman senator from Florida offers a more compelling persona and sharper
generational contrast against Democratic front-runner Hillary Rodham
Clinton.

Rubio is working to seize the moment by making an all-out push to lock down
financial backers in the coming month — hopscotching the country in a
nonstop series of fundraisers that are limiting his presence on the
campaign trail.

While he faces stiff competition in the money race from Bush and Wisconsin
Gov. Scott Walker in particular, Rubio’s in-person courting sessions are
starting to pay off. Longtime Bush loyalists and other big-money players on
the right have emerged from the meetings raving about his abilities,
according to people familiar with private gatherings he has had around the
country.

“After meeting Marco and listening to him — he is almost astounding, he is
so articulate and he has got such great vision,” said Anthony Gioia, a top
GOP fundraiser in Buffalo. Gioia raised more than $500,000 for George W.
Bush and then served as his ambassador to Malta but is supporting Rubio
this time. “I hate to overuse the word transformational, but I really feel
he is,” he said.

It is not just veteran bundlers coming aboard. Rubio has recently gained
the backing of heavyweight players such as Oracle founder and billionaire
Larry Ellison — who is hosting a campaign fundraiser in Silicon Valley next
Tuesday — and Randy Kendrick, an influential Arizona donor and the wife of
Arizona Diamondbacks owner Ken Kendrick, who hosted the senator at their
Phoenix home last month.

“I’m looking for someone who is an inspiration,” said Kendrick, who plans
to work her network to bring other donors aboard.

It remains to be seen whether the passion for Rubio will translate into
huge financial sums. He has the support of billionaire Miami auto dealer
Norman Braman, who has committed to putting as much as $10 million into a
pro-Rubio super PAC, but allies concede that their efforts are dwarfed by
Bush’s massive fundraising apparatus. The former Florida governor has been
amassing a record tens of millions in his allied super PAC, in part by
tapping into a national network of ambassadors and other senior appointees
who served in the previous two Bush administrations.

The Rubio strategy: target less prominent donors and bring new ones into
the fold.

“You’ve got the Bush family rolodex that is what, 50 years old or more,”
said J. Warren Tompkins, head of the pro-Rubio super PAC Conservative
Solutions. “The rest of these guys are small donors. You have to go and
grind it out and do a lot of meet-and-greets.”

As a result, Rubio is spending less time than some other declared
candidates in the early nominating states, making just one visit each to
Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada since launching his campaign
in April. Instead, his itinerary this spring includes stops in Oklahoma,
Illinois, Texas, Florida, Idaho, New York, California and Pennsylvania,
according to a person familiar with his schedule.

At every stop, the campaign is signing up new bundlers. And in some cases,
Rubio has also made side appearances before clutches of potential super PAC
donors.

His repeat visits to the nation’s biggest money centers are helping him
make inroads in places such as Texas, where Bush, Sen. Ted Cruz and former
governor Rick Perry all have claims on state donors.

“You look at that and think, ‘Gosh, how can anyone else break in?’ ” said
George Seay, a Dallas-based investor who is supporting Rubio. “But Marco
has been very successful in Texas and will continue to be. I think the more
people get exposed to him realize he’s not just a good background story —
he’s a very, very deep talent.”

Rubio is benefiting in part from a growing uncertainty among some top
fundraisers about Bush’s ability to resonate with the party base,
particularly in the wake of his stumbling answers last month about the Iraq
war and his brother, the 43rd president. A new Washington Post-ABC News
poll this week showed that Bush, who led the GOP field for months, has
slipped into a two-way tie for third place.

At a gathering of the Republican Governors Association’s top donors last
month in Dallas, one of the main topics of discussion was that Bush
appeared less formidable a candidate than he had a few months ago,
according to several participants.

“One consensus seemed to be that, ‘Wow, Jeb is really raising lot of money,
but he doesn’t seem to be striking a chord with voters,’ ” said one
well-connected Republican who participated in the meeting and requested
anonymity to detail private conversations.

Bush “has not come on as strong as I would have thought,” said Edwin
Phelps, a private-equity investor who is a major GOP donor. “I’m
disappointed in how he handled questions on something he knew would come
up. Jeb hurt himself, but it’s early enough in the cycle he can right the
ship.”

In the meantime, many donors are casting their support wide and giving to
multiple contenders, still weighing who has the best shot in a general
election.

“I don’t have conviction right now toward any candidate,” said Phelps, who
has donated to Bush and plans to contribute to Rubio as well. “I think
that’s how a lot of us feel who are mainstream Republicans. There is a
strong, deep-seated sentiment that we want someone who can get elected.”

Rubio still faces skepticism in some donor quarters, however, particularly
among those who are not eager for the party to field a first-term senator
as its nominee.

He must also navigate his own policy and personal land mines. At her
fundraiser last month, Kendrick said Rubio got some hard questions on
immigration, a fraught issue for the Florida senator. He was a co-sponsor
of a Senate immigration reform bill that provided a path to citizenship for
up to 11 million illegal immigrants, but he later backed away from the
legislation.

But Rubio acquitted himself well, Kendrick said.

“He’s threading the needle on immigration, and he got several questions
where he very honestly and skillfully answered those questions about the
things that needed to be done first,” she said.

Before she signed on to help Rubio, Kendrick said she “was open and
interested” in all the candidates, adding: “I just felt that Rubio rose
above the others in his depth and knowledge about policy.”

Other veteran fundraisers described their conversion into Rubio supporters
as more of a thunderbolt experience.

“I’ve been in politics a lot time, since Ronald Reagan, and he is really
unique,” Gioia said. “From my point of view, it’s like the movie ‘Jerry
Maguire’ — he got me on ‘hello.’ ”

*Why Jeb Bush Can't Bank On Faith Like His Brother Did
<http://www.npr.org/sections/itsallpolitics/2015/06/03/411569509/why-jeb-bush-cant-bank-on-faith-like-his-brother-did>
// NPR // Don Gonyea – June 3, 2015*

Evangelical voters are a major force in Iowa Republican politics. A force
that can tip the balance in the state's marquee event: the
first-in-the-nation Iowa caucuses.

And it's been that way for a long time. Sixteen years ago those voters
delivered in a big way for a Texas governor named George W. Bush. But it's
not likely that the younger brother of that successful presidential hopeful
will get that same kind of support in the 2016 election. Jeb Bush is
certainly a deeply religious man — and he shares his brother's conservative
views on key social issues. But despite that, many religious voters view
the former Florida governor with suspicion.

Last month Jeb Bush visited Iowa's Loras College, a small, Catholic liberal
arts school located in Dubuque.

It may have been an ideal place to talk about his faith in some detail, but
the comments he did make came more as an afterthought at the end of his
remarks.

"Gosh, what was it, twenty years ago I converted to Catholicism," Bush
said, "It was one of the smartest things I've done in my whole life."

He spoke to a small audience of just over a hundred. Seated in the front
row was his wife, Columba Bush, a lifelong Catholic whose religion he
joined when he was in his 40s. Bush went on to say, "I believe that it is
the architecture that gives me the serenity I need, not just as a public
leader or in life. It gives me peace. It allows me to have a closer
relationship with my creator."

It was a firm statement of belief. But it was considerably different than
the almost evangelical way George W. Bush spoke about his faith during his
first presidential campaign. At the Iowa Straw Poll in the summer of 1999,
the future president was cheered when he said, "America's strongest
foundation is not found in our wallets. It is found in our souls."

As a candidate, George W. Bush often talked about personal redemption.
Including how at age 40 he quit drinking, and how he embraced religion with
the help of none other than the Reverend Billy Graham. He often spoke of
protecting the unborn, as he did in a debate during the 2000 general
election campaign.

"I think what the next president ought to do is promote a culture of life
in America," he said.

That played very well with Iowa evanglicals and Bush coasted to victory in
the Iowa caucuses. But Christopher Budzisz, a political science professor
at Loras College, says George Bush got those voters with more than words.
He used organization as well.

"One thing the Bush campaign was very concerted about was reaching out to
the church networks and getting advocates for the candidacy oftentimes
outside the gaze of the media or public conversation," said Budzisz.

He says that's not happening in the same way for Jeb Bush.

Evangelical voters are more organized in Iowa than they were four
presidential elections ago. And they make up 60 percent of GOP Iowa caucus
participants.

Despite Jeb Bush's opposition to abortion — and same-sex marriage — many
voters here see him as moderate. This reaction, from Republican voter Byron
Carlson, a physician, is not unusual: "I would say I'm a Christian
conservative, but I think at this time it's a wide open field with lots of
options." After seeing this Bush speak recently, he added, "Jeb just wasn't
that impressive to me listening to him."

Bob Vander Plaats, who heads the state's top social conservative
organization The Family Leader, praised Bush's record in dealing with the
Terri Schiavo case when he was governor of Florida. Bush fought the removal
of the brain-damaged woman's feeding tube, even after she'd been
unconscious for more than a decade. Still, Vander Plaats acknowledges
ambivalence toward Bush. He points to Bush's saying he'd run a campaign to
win the general election and not just the primaries.

"That may be code for, 'Do you really want to champion conservative
values?'" Vander Plaats said.

And there's dislike of Jeb Bush's support for Common Core education
standards and his call for a path to legal status for immigrants in the
U.S. illegally.

This year's GOP field looks to be huge. It could grow to 15 or more. And
many of them are making a hard play for evangelicals. Vander Plaats says
that's good, and bad.

"And the reason it's bad is because it can divide its support quickly which
really weakens the impact we can have in the process," he said.

That could create an opening for Jeb Bush. It would also please Republicans
like 60-year-old Dave Richter who came to see the still
officially-undeclared candidate at the town hall in Dubuque.

Richter says, "I'm a little afraid of the Christian right, it's infiltrated
government to too big of a degree" adding "I think it's problematic."

But despite Richter's concerns, in Iowa those evangelical voters do matter,
a great deal. Especially in the caucuses. Four elections ago, George W.
Bush got them to pull together to give him an important first win in the
race for the nomination. For Jeb, his best bet may be if they don't.

*There will be blood: Prepare for nasty Jeb Bush — but don’t expect any
fingerprints
<http://www.salon.com/2015/06/03/there_will_be_blood_prepare_for_nasty_jeb_bush_but_dont_expect_any_fingerprints/>
// Salon // Jim Newell – June 3, 2015*

When is Jeb Bush going to stop being so boring and get mean? This is the
question on the minds of the political press corps. Sure, it’s nice that
he’s open to any and all questions from reporters and voters alike, but
does he have to answer them with his wishy-washy technocratic details?
When’s he going to start calling his opponents terrible names so reporters
can sex up their Jeb stories a bit?

Everyone wants to see some blood. The hope, now that Bush is tumbling from
presumed frontrunner status, is that he’ll be forced to mix it up a little
instead of responding to questions with, say, a critique of the wording in
subclause 2(b)(ii) of some education bill from 1995. The further you tumble
from contention, the more you have to resort to weird humiliating stunts to
get attention in this field of dozens of candidates.

And there’s no better place to start getting nasty than at Walt Disney
World. Florida Gov. Rick Scott, a malevolent ghoul straight out of the
German folk stories on which most classic Disney movies are based, held an
economic summit yesterday at the sweltering Orlando money-suck where dreams
come true. Bush, finally on some friendly turf, used the occasion “to more
forcefully attack opponents” than he’s previously been willing to do,
according to the Washington Post. ”Bush has mostly avoided sparring with
Republican contenders,” the Post writes, “saying that he’s not yet an
official candidate and is eager to be a ‘joyful’ alternative for voters
upset by partisan warfare. But that strategy doesn’t appear to be working.”

Alright, so give us the skinny: what did he say? Did he call Scott Walker a
dingdong? Did he throw a trash can at Ted Cruz? Did he literally murder
Mike Huckabee?

Ehh, not really. He made the bold decision — you’ll never believe this — to
criticize Rand Paul on national security. He said that Paul was “wrong
about the Patriot Act.” Bam! “He also delivered his most personal swipe yet
at Rubio,” the Post writes, “in response to the senator’s suggestions
earlier in the day that Republicans should elect younger leaders.” Okay,
let’s see this uppercut: “It’s kind of hard to imagine that my good friend
Marco would be critical of his good friend Jeb,” Bush said.

Oh. That’s it?

Yeah, so… I’m not quite sure that we saw the sharper, meaner, more
aggressive and debased Jeb Bush that we were all promised here. Seems more
like he simply said he disagreed with Rand Paul and made a light joke about
the media’s obsession with getting him and Marco Rubio to prematurely
destroy each other.

Bush’s refusal to engage in direct bloodsport against his opponents is no
fun, sure, but if everyone can just wait a few months, it will happen. Jeb
Bush may seem like a total boob now, but it’s never a good idea to get
between a Bush and an election. As Jeb said yesterday, “there are
motivations for every candidate. Mine would be to win.”

The Bushes are perfectly willing to set aside their WASPy sense of manners
and do what it takes to win elections. George H.W. Bush, an old-school
Connecticut Yankee, was willing to wear clownish cowboy clothes for a full
two years if that’s what it took to beat Michael Dukakis. More importantly:
he was willing to go hard after the Willie Horton issue — while leaving
outside groups to run the infamously nasty ad, keeping his hands clean.
George W. Bush, too, was able to win 2000 South Carolina primary when
certain mysterious outside forces launched a guerrilla smear campaign
against John McCain.

Now, thanks to our Supreme Court, campaign finance regulations are
structured to allow candidacies to get as nasty as they so desire while
offering the candidates themselves full deniability. Jeb Bush’s Right to
Rise super PAC is expected to have at least $100 million dollars with which
to work in trashing anyone who dare nip at Bush’s heels. Much like Mitt
Romney in 2012, Bush can simply blush and say “Who, me?” when asked about
some horrific ad that his super PAC unleashes Marco Rubio or Scott Walker.

Everyone can relax. “Jeb Bush,” in the amorphous sense of the whole
apparatus that exists to win Jeb Bush the presidency, will get quite nasty
at the precise moment that it becomes politically necessary, even if Jeb
Bush personally just keeps prattling on about some tweak he wants to make
to existing small business tax credits.

*Fox News Poll: Bush, Walker, Carson top GOP pack, support for Clinton down*
<http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2015/06/03/fox-news-poll-bush-walker-carson-top-gop-pack-support-for-clinton-down/www.foxnews.com/politics/interactive/2015/06/03/0603152016nsaweb/www.foxnews.com/politics/interactive/2015/06/03/0603152016nsaweb/>*
// Fox News // Dana Blanton – June 3, 2015*

National security is a much bigger issue for Republicans this time than
during the last primary.  And more GOP hopefuls make it official -- yet
they barely move the needle.  Bernie Sanders nearly doubles his numbers and
support for Hillary Clinton dips -- even as Democrats say they’re not
concerned about allegations of her dishonesty.

These are some of the findings from the latest Fox News poll on the 2016
presidential election.

There’s no true frontrunner in the race for the GOP nomination - and not
all the candidates in the poll have declared yet. The new poll, released
Wednesday, finds three Republicans receiving double-digit backing from GOP
primary voters:  former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and Wisconsin Gov. Scott
Walker each receive 12 percent and neurosurgeon Ben Carson gets 11
percent.

They are followed by Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul at 9 percent, Texas Sen. Ted
Cruz at 8 percent, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio at 7 percent, former Arkansas
Gov. Mike Huckabee at 6 percent and New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie at 5
percent.

Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, who will make his candidacy official
Thursday, and businessman Donald Trump get 4 percent each.

Three Republicans officially threw their hat in the ring recently. South
Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham announced June 1, former New York Gov. George
Pataki announced May 28 and former Pennsylvania Sen. Rick Santorum declared
May 27.  Each receives 2 percent.

Businesswoman Carly Fiorina and Ohio Gov. John Kasich also each garner 2
percent.

The top four favorites among the Tea Party movement are Walker (22
percent), Cruz (17 percent), Carson (12 percent) and Paul (11 percent).

It’s no wonder the GOP race is so splintered.  Of the candidates tested,
about one in five Republican primary voters say they would “definitely”
vote for six of them: Walker (22 percent), Carson (21 percent), Rubio (21
percent), Bush (20 percent), Cruz (19 percent) and Paul (19 percent).

More than half say they would “never” support Trump (59 percent).  That’s
the highest number saying they would never vote for a particular
candidate.  Christie comes next (37 percent), followed by Bush and Huckabee
(24 percent each) and Paul (20 percent).

Bush alone has the distinction of being in the top five of both the
“definitely” and the “never” vote for lists.

Walker, who is still unannounced, looks especially well-positioned among
GOP primary voters.  Not only does he have the highest number saying they
would “definitely” vote for him (22 percent), but he also has the lowest
“never” vote for number of those tested (eight percent).

GOP voters are most likely to “want more info about” Kasich (60 percent),
Fiorina (55 percent) and Walker (47 percent).

The priorities of Republican primary voters have changed significantly
since last time around.  Forty-six percent say economic issues will be most
important in deciding their vote for the GOP nomination.  That’s down 30
percentage points from the 76 percent who said the same in 2011.  And 36
percent now say national security will be their deciding issue -- more than
four times the 8 percent that said so four years ago. For 12 percent,
social issues will be most important, up from six percent.

On the Democratic side, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton remains
the clear frontrunner for the nomination with 57 percent support among
self-identified Democratic primary voters. Still, that’s down from 63
percent last month, and marks only the second time in more than a year that
support for Clinton is below 60 percent.  Her highest support was 69
percent in April 2014.

At the same time, support for Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders nearly doubled,
from six percent last month to 11 percent now.  He was at 4 percent in
April.

The most recent Democratic contender to jump in the race, former Maryland
Gov. Martin O’Malley, garners 4 percent.  That’s a nice bump from the less
than one percent support he got before his May 30 announcement.  Vice
President Joe Biden (8 percent) and Massachusetts Sen. Elizabeth Warren (7
percent) -- both are undeclared -- still best O’Malley.

Despite Clinton controlling the field, most Democratic voters -- 69 percent
-- say someone else could still win the nomination. That’s more than twice
the 28 percent who say the race is over.

Most Democratic primary voters, 68 percent, say they are not worried about
allegations of Clinton’s dishonesty and unethical behavior.  Thirty-one
percent are concerned, including 10 percent who feel “very concerned.”

For the broader electorate, however, recent allegations against Clinton may
be more problematic. A 61-percent majority of voters thinks it is at least
somewhat likely that the Clintons were “selling influence to foreign
contributors” who made donations to the Clinton Foundation while Hillary
Clinton was secretary of state.  A significant minority of Democrats (41
percent) feels that way, as do a majority of independents (66 percent) and
most Republicans (82 percent).

Pollpourri Would you rather the next president be a Democrat or a
Republican?  The poll asks voters that simple question and finds … a
split!  Forty percent prefer a Democrat and 39 percent a Republican.  The
results are also evenly divided among independents: 24 percent say
Democrat, 24 percent Republican and 35 percent “other.”

By a 51-39 percent margin, more voters say it would be “a bad thing for the
country” if a Democrat wins the presidential election and continues
President Obama’s policies.  That includes 88 percent of Republicans, 52
percent of independents and 20 percent of Democrats.

About the same number of voters says they would be “very” interested in
watching a presidential debate between Hillary Clinton and Jeb Bush (38
percent), as they would between Clinton and Fiorina, the other female
candidate (35 percent), or between Clinton and Paul (35 percent).

And women are as likely to want to watch Clinton debate Bush (37 percent)
as they are to want to see Clinton debate Fiorina (36 percent).

The Fox News poll is based on landline and cell phone interviews with 1,006
randomly chosen registered voters nationwide and was conducted under the
joint direction of Anderson Robbins Research (D) and Shaw & Company
Research (R) from May 31-June 2, 2015. The full poll has a margin of
sampling error of plus or minus three percentage points. The margin of
error is higher among the subgroups of Democratic and Republican primary
voters (+/-5%).

*Republican Conservative Base Shrinks
<http://www.gallup.com/poll/183491/republican-conservative-base-shrinks.aspx>
// Gallup // Frank Newport –June 3, 2015 *

The percentage of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents who
describe themselves as both social and economic conservatives has dropped
to 42%, the lowest level Gallup has measured since 2005. The second-largest
group of Republicans (24%) see themselves as moderate or liberal on both
social and economic issues, while 20% of all Republicans are moderate or
liberal on social issues but conservative on economic ones.

These data are from Gallup's Values and Beliefs poll, which since 2001 has
included questions asking Americans to rate themselves as conservative,
moderate or liberal on social and economic issues. These trends show not
only that Americans as a whole have become less likely to identify as
social or economic conservatives, but also that Republicans' views are
changing along the same lines.

This change in recent years has been significant. The percentage of
Republicans identifying as conservative on both dimensions has dropped 15
percentage points since 2012, largely offset by an increase in the
percentage who identify as moderate or liberal on both dimensions. Still,
the current ideological positioning of Republicans is not unprecedented;
the proportion of social and economic conservatives was as low or lower
from 2001 through 2005.

Republicans' Ideology Varies Significantly by Age

The percentage of Republicans and Republican-leaning independents who are
conservative on both social and economic issues rises steadily with age. An
analysis of aggregated surveys conducted since the 2012 election shows that
the size of the social and economic conservative group is twice as large
among Republicans aged 65 and older as it is among those aged 18 to 29.
This may be good news for GOP candidates who are running on a conservative
platform and can assume that older Republicans will constitute a sizable
portion of primary and caucus voters. But it would not be such good news
when it comes to the challenge of energizing a broader base of Republican
voters to come out to vote in the typically higher-turnout general election.

Implications

The recent shift in how Republicans view themselves ideologically may have
significant implications for the coming GOP presidential nomination fight,
particularly in terms of how the candidates will try to position themselves
to maximize their appeal. Republican candidates are dealing with a party
base that is today significantly more ideologically differentiated than it
has been over the past decade. A GOP candidate positioning himself or
herself as conservative on both social and economic issues theoretically
will appeal to less than half of the broad base of rank-and-file party
members. This opens the way for GOP candidates who may want to position
themselves as more moderate on some issues, given that more than half of
the party identifiers are moderate or liberal on social or economic
dimensions.

The caveat in these campaign decisions is that not all Republicans are
involved in the crucial early primary and caucus voting that helps winnow
the pack of presidential candidates down to a winner. Ideology on both
social and economic issues is strongly related to age, and primary voters
tend to skew older than the overall party membership. This could benefit a
more conservative candidate in the primary process, but that advantage
could dissipate in the general election.

Democratic candidates will be dealing with party identifiers who are mostly
moderate or liberal on social and economic issues, with a significant
divide between these two groups. A forthcoming story will look at the
Democratic ideological situation in detail.

Survey Methods

Results for the most recent Gallup poll are based on telephone interviews
conducted May 6-10, 2015, with a random sample of 1,024 adults, aged 18 and
older, living in all 50 U.S. states and the District of Columbia. For
results based on the total sample of national adults, the margin of
sampling error is ±4 percentage points at the 95% confidence level.

Results for the aggregated Gallup polls conducted in 2013-2015 are based on
telephone interviews with a random sample of 3,587 adults, aged 18 and
older. For results based on this sample, the margin of sampling error is ±2
percentage points at the 95% confidence level. All reported margins of
sampling error include computed design effects for weighting.

Each sample of national adults includes a minimum quota of 50% cellphone
respondents and 50% landline respondents, with additional minimum quotas by
time zone within region. Landline and cellular telephone numbers are
selected using random-digit-dial methods.

*Rick Santorum Wants Pope Francis To Stop Talking About Climate Change
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/02/rick-santorum-pope-climat_n_7498768.html?ncid=tweetlnkushpmg00000016>
// HuffPo // Ed Mazza – June 3, 2015*

Republican presidential hopeful Rick Santorum says he loves Pope Francis,
but he wants the pontiff to stop talking about climate change.

Santorum, a devout Catholic, told Philadelphia radio host Dom Giordano on
Monday that the pope should "leave science to the scientists."

His comments come as the pope, who earned a master's degree in chemistry
before turning to the priesthood, becomes increasingly vocal about climate
change. Pope Francis is preparing a groundbreaking encyclical to be
released in the coming weeks that's expected to make the case that taking
action to fight climate change is a moral and religious imperative.

Santorum described himself as a "huge fan" of the pope and said he
appreciates the pontiff's commitment to family issues, but he wants the
church to stay out of science.

“The church has gotten it wrong a few times on science, and I think that we
probably are better off leaving science to the scientists and focusing on
what we're really good at, which is theology and morality,” Santorum said.
"When we get involved with political and controversial scientific theories,
I think the church is not as forceful and credible."

His full comments from "The Dom Giordano Show" are included below. The
discussion of the pope starts at about the 10-minute mark.

Despite his pleas to the pope, Santorum has a history of rejecting
established science. He denies that climate change is man-made and has
dismissed global warming as a "hoax" despite the fact that 97 percent of
actively publishing climate scientists agree that "climate-warming trends
over the past century are very likely due to human activities," according
to NASA.

Santorum has also rejected evolution and instead believes in "intelligent
design,” according to Discover magazine.

Pope Francis says evolution does not contradict church doctrine.

*George W. Bush tops Obama on favorability in new poll
<http://thehill.com/blogs/blog-briefing-room/news/243858-george-w-bush-tops-obama-on-favorability-in-new-poll>
// The Hill // Mark Hensch – June 3, 2015 *

A new survey finds that more Americans view former President George W. Bush
favorably than President Obama.

The CNN/ORC poll reveals that 52 percent of Americans see Bush positively,
while 43 percent do not.

In contrast, U.S. voters are split on their views of Obama.

The new poll finds that 49 percent view Obama favorably, while 49 percent
do not.

Those ratings for Obama are down from a similar poll in March. During that
sampling, 52 percent of Americans viewed him positively, while another 46
percent did not.

Bush’s numbers, meanwhile, mark a major shift for the former president
since he departed office in early 2009, CNN said.

It noted that back then, Bush received a favorability rating from roughly
one third of those surveyed.

Bush’s favorability, CNN added, has remained below the 50-percent threshold
most of the time since his presidency.

Just one year ago, it said, the former president had a 46-percent
favorability rating. Another 51 percent, however, still viewed Bush
unfavorably.

Bush’s new score reflects more positive views of him across a wide variety
of groups.

CNN said that the former president has notched an 11-point favorability
increase among men, a 10-point increase among Republicans and an 8-point
increase among suburbanites.

He also saw his favorability increase 10 points among those with household
incomes under $50,000 and 9 points among young adults under age 50.

CNN said that Bush still remains the least popular among Democrats,
liberals, non-whites and those under age 35.

Despite this, its poll found increasing warmth for the former president
among some of those groups.

Approximately 70 percent of Democrats view Bush unfavorably, a decrease
from February, 2009, when 85 percent took a negative view of him.

In addition, 68 percent of liberals still view the former president
negatively, an improvement from the 90 percent who disliked his
administration in February 2009.

CNN/ORC surveyed 1,025 adults from May 29-31 via telephone for its latest
poll. It has a 3-percentage0point margin of error.

*Texas’ Economic Hiccup Complicates Rick Perry’s 2016 Pitch
<http://www.wsj.com/articles/texas-economic-hiccup-complicates-rick-perrys-2016-pitch-1433357991>
// WSJ // Nathan Koppel & Colleen Mccain Nelson – June 3, 2015 *

In his previous bid for the White House, former Texas Gov. Rick Perry
trumpeted his role as the leader of an economic juggernaut cranking out
jobs while much of the U.S. struggled.

But as Mr. Perry prepares to announce an anticipated second run for
president on Thursday, the “Texas Miracle” is looking less impressive amid
falling oil prices that have led to thousands of job cuts in his home
state. That has created an opening for challengers to say Mr. Perry’s jobs
record was attributable more to good timing—namely the hydraulic-fracturing
oil-and-gas boom—than to the business-friendly mix of low tax rates and
light regulations that he has frequently cited.

Texas lost more than 25,000 jobs in March according to state figures, its
first monthly net decline in more than four years, after adding nearly
458,000 jobs in 2014, more than any other state. It bounced back in April
but still only added 1,200 new jobs, far below other large states.

Mr. Perry is still talking up his economic record as he tours the country,
but he is also seeking to broaden his appeal by citing his agricultural
roots as a native of tiny Paint Creek and his military service as a former
Air Force transport pilot.

The 65-year-old Republican is also arguing that he is the most seasoned
executive in the crowded GOP field, having been governor of the nation’s
second most populous state for a record 14 years.

“I have faced my share of leadership tests,” Mr. Perry told a crowd last
month at the Southern Republican Leadership Conference in Oklahoma City. He
added that “there was no manual” to guide him when he faced such challenges
as housing Hurricane Katrina evacuees in Texas, or responding to the
nation’s first diagnosed case of Ebola in Dallas.

Mr. Perry’s allies and advisers say his fiscal conservatism and the jobs
created under his tenure would be a huge selling point in a second
presidential campaign.

“The Rick Perry jobs record has seeped into the mind-set of Republican
activists all over the country and will be a significant calling card,”
said Ray Sullivan, a former Perry chief of staff and co-chairman of a super
PAC created to boost a Perry presidential bid.

Abby McCloskey, policy director for Mr. Perry’s political-action committee,
said it was remarkable that Texas has a 4.2% unemployment rate even with an
oil and gas industry downturn and a surging dollar.

“Texas, contrary to popular image, is not all about oil,” she said.

As governor, Mr. Perry launched a campaign aimed at luring companies to
relocate to Texas, traveling the country and pitching the state as the best
in which to do business. He also endorsed the wide use of state incentive
payments to technology and health-care companies, among others. The Texas
legislature this year curtailed the use of such incentive payments.

Economic experts said Mr. Perry can lay claim to having helped diversify
the Texas economy, which is projected by economists and state officials to
continue to grow, albeit at a slower pace.

“Perry can still make the point that he oversaw tremendous growth and
diversification of the economy,” said Terry Clower, a professor at George
Mason University in Virginia who has studied the Texas economy.

Still, falling oil prices have shaken Texas’ claim on economic supremacy.
Kevin Hassett, the director of economic-policy studies at the American
Enterprise Institute think tank, said Texas’ economic success was
indisputable a year ago—when oil prices were higher.

Today, “the story is a little more complicated,” said Mr. Hassett, who
advised the presidential campaigns of Mitt Romney and John McCainbut hasn't
signed on to work for a 2016 candidate.

In an interview shortly before leaving office in January, Mr. Perry said he
had done everything possible to insulate the state against falling oil
prices. “We made tremendous progress in expanding and diversifying the
Texas economy,” he said.

The changing economic picture is just one challenge Mr. Perry faces as he
attempts to rebound from his unsuccessful first presidential bid nearly
four years ago. He continues to be weighed down by a felony indictment
related to a veto he issued as governor. He has denied wrongdoing and filed
a motion to dismiss the indictment, which is pending before an appellate
court in Austin.

The former governor also is in the single digits in a field expected to
include more than a dozen Republicans, and he is working to overcome any
lingering negative impressions by primary voters. The last time around,
after briefly claiming front-runner status, he stumbled with a couple of
debate answers and ultimately dropped out.

Mr. Perry, who has conceded he was ill-prepared in his last race, has
underscored the preparation he has undertaken the second time around,
immersing himself in the intricacies of policy. As Mr. Perry said in a
recent radio interview, “just being the governor of the state of Texas was
not enough.”

Brandon Rottinghaus, a political-science professor at the University of
Houston, believes Mr. Perry can likely counter any attacks on his economic
record. But other challenges, like the indictment and the famous “oops”
moment during a debate in his earlier campaign, may be tougher to overcome,
he said.

“The one-two strike of the indictment and communication failures of the
2012 race will make it hard for him to get his footing” Mr. Rottinghaus
said.

*Scott Walker Says 2016 Announcement Coming After Budget Wrap at End of
June
<http://www.bloomberg.com/politics/articles/2015-06-03/scott-walker-says-2016-announcement-coming-after-budget-wrap-at-end-of-june>
// Ali Elkin – June 3, 2015 *

Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker said Wednesday he will announce whether or
not he plans to run for president after the state budget is passed, which
he says will happen in short order.

“I haven't made an announcement yet and won't until after the budget's done
at the end of this month,” the Republican said, appearing on Fox News's Fox
and Friends.

Walker had wanted to finish the budget process in record-early time, but
that goal now appears to be out of reach, the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel
reported Tuesday.

“We do have a lot of stuff that we need to get ironed out,” said Wisconsin
state Senate Majority Leader Scott Fitzgerald. Sticking points–including
among some legislators of Walker's own party—are funding for roads and a
new basketball arena, according to the newspaper.

The current budget expires June 30. “Past legislatures and governors have
sometimes even gone past the July 1 deadline. That forces the state
government to run on the provisions of the old budget until the new one
passes,” the newspaper said.

*Wisconsin Abortion Ban Would Allow Father To Sue For Emotional Distress
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/03/wisconsin-abortion_n_7502558.html?1433347480>
// HuffPo // Laura Bassett – June 3, 2015 *

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) said this week that he would sign a ban on
abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy that does not contain exceptions for
rape and incest victims, if the bill reaches his desk. The measure also
contains a less-discussed provision that would allow the father to sue the
doctor for "emotional and psychological distress" if he disagrees with the
abortion, regardless of his relationship with the woman having the
procedure.

Wisconsin Assembly Bill 237 would ban abortions after 20 weeks
"postfertilization," which doctors would measure as 22 weeks of pregnancy
since pregnancies are usually measured from the woman's last menstrual
period. If the bill becomes law, doctors who perform an abortion after this
time could be charged with a felony and fined up to $10,000, or face up to
three and a half years in prison.

In addition to those penalties, the bill would allow the father to sue the
doctor for damages, "including damages for personal injury and emotional
and psychological distress," if the doctor performs or attempts to perform
an abortion after the 20-week limit. The man does not need to be married to
the woman or even in a relationship with her to sue her doctor, as long as
the pregnancy is not a result of sexual assault or incest. The bill also
says the woman can sue.

Walker and the co-authors of the bill, state Rep. Jesse Kremer (R) and
Senate President Mary Lazich (R), did not respond to requests for comment.
The Wisconsin House and Senate are expected to vote on the bill next week.

According to the Guttmacher Institute, a research organization that
supports reproductive rights, 6 of the 11 states that currently ban
abortion at 20 weeks postfertilization -- Alabama, Arkansas, Idaho, Kansas,
Nebraska and Oklahoma -- have similar language tucked into their respective
laws that allow the parents to sue a doctor who performs an abortion after
that point. In Kansas, the provision applies to the father only if he is
married to the woman who had the abortion.

So far, the 20-week ban is not standing up well in court. The 9th U.S.
Circuit Court of Appeals struck down Idaho's law last week, ruling it
"unconstitutional because it categorically bans some abortions before
viability." The Supreme Court decided in Roe v. Wade in 1973 that states
cannot ban abortions before the fetus would be viable outside the womb,
which is estimated to occur between 22 and 24 weeks of pregnancy.

Republican supporters of the bill argue that abortions should be banned
after 20 weeks because fetuses can feel pain at that point -- a theory that
has been refuted by the mainstream medical community.

"Whether you're pro-life or not, that's a good time to say that shouldn't
be legal after a time when an unborn child can literally feel pain," Walker
told reporters this week.

Opponents of the bill point out that less than 1 percent of abortions occur
after 20 weeks, and the women who seek them have often discovered severe
medical problemswith the fetus that were not clear in earlier tests. Marcy
Stech, a spokeswoman for the progressive women's PAC EMILY's List, said the
Wisconsin bill is "extreme, outrageous and profoundly wrong."

"A woman’s right to choose is hers and hers alone," Stech said. "Scott
Walker is the last person on earth who should be telling women how to make
their deeply personal decisions."

*Scott Walker dead set against path to citizenship but has no answer for
what to do with 11 million undocumented residents
<http://www.tampabay.com/blogs/the-buzz-florida-politics/scott-walker-dead-set-against-path-to-citizenship-but-has-no-answer-for/2232154>
// Tampa Bay Times // Alex Leary – June 3, 2015*

Scott Walker said he adamantly opposes a path to citizenship for illegal
immigrants, but was vague in an interview with the Tampa Bay Times about
what should be done with the 11 million people already in the U.S.

“My belief is that because the system is so broken, we need to do the other
things I mention before we can even begin to start talking about what the
president and the next congress can do,” Walker said, referring to his call
for more border security and enforcement of existing law.

“Until we deal with those other issues, any potential solution is largely
irrelevant.”

Walker’s comments continued an uneven response to the vexing issue of
immigration since he emerged as a presidential hopeful. The Wisconsin
governor once supported a path to citizenship, but earlier this year veered
to the right, then backed off a bit.

The shifting positions have left many wonder what exactly does he think
should be done.

“I said I was opposed to the Gang of 8, so I never said I supported that,”
Walker said in an interview Tuesday afternoon at the Disney hotel where
Gov. Rick Scott held his presidential forum. In 2013, Sen. Marco Rubio and
seven other senators worked out a comprehensive bill, which would have
added billions in more security spending while providing an eventual
pathway to citizenship. (Rubio has famously backed away from his own
legislation but still supports citizenship.)

Walker said his new view has been shaped by President Obama’s executive
actions and by taking with border-state governors and voters across the
country.

“Certainly we’re a nation of immigrants,” he said. “There’s a number of
things that have to be done, starting with securing the border, enforcing
the laws that are on the books. I’ve made it clear that I don’t support
amnesty for citizenship.

But you’re not ready to say what should happen to the 11 million, whether
they should eventually given some legal status, which is kind of Jeb Bush
position, or citizenship, which is what the Rubio bill would have granted?

“It’s left up to the next president and congress,” Walker replied.

“Specifically when it comes to citizenship, I don’t believe there should be
any amnesty regardless of the circumstances. There is a current process by
which anyone in the world can seek citizenship and that’s the path people
should use.”

He said depending on what is done with security and other reforms, “Things
and circumstances will changes, conditions will be different depending on
how effectively we do (those first steps).”

In April, Walker went farther than other Republican hopefuls when he
suggested legal immigration should be scaled back. That brought
condemnations from immigration activists and some Republicans, who are
worried the fight for the presidential nomination is putting the party back
in a nativist mode that hurt “self-deport” Mitt Romney. (Allies say his
remarks were misinterpreted and he just wants to control flow as workers
are needed or not.)

“I’ve only said that legal immigration should be focused on American
workers, their wages, as the top priority,” Walker said.

Bush, appearing at the same forum on Tuesday, said immigration reform needs
to be tackled, “for crying out loud,” to grow the economy. Walker
disagrees, though his argument overlooks Bush’s point that the labor pool
is getting older and more workers will be needed.

“There’s too high a number of American – both citizens and legal residents
--- who are not in the workforce today who could and should be,” Walker
said. “Before we start talking about anything else we need to figure out
ways to make sure that everyone who is here who is able to work is getting
the skills and the education, the qualifications and the encouragement to
get into the workforce.”

*Rand Paul calls out Jeb Bush for defending NSA
<http://www.politico.com/story/2015/06/rand-paul-criticizes-jeb-bush-nsa-spying-iraq-war-118597.html>
// Politico // Katie Glueck – June 3, 2015 *

Rand Paul is slamming Jeb Bush over the former Florida governor’s defense
of National Security Agency data collection, the latest round in the
Kentucky senator’s battles with his own party on the issue.

“Just like he was confused for weeks about his position on the Iraq war,
Gov. Bush appears completely unaware of the facts about the government’s
illegal and unnecessary spying [on] the American people and made it clear
his position is based on politics, not policy and the Constitution,” Paul
spokesman Sergio Gor said in a statement on Wednesday, jabbing a likely
2016 rival over Bush’s previous equivocating about whether he would have
invaded Iraq given the intelligence available now.

The Paul presidential campaign’s pushback follows an interview Bush gave to
Fox News a day earlier, when Bush said that most of the criticism of the
NSA stems from Democrats. His comments come after a heated debate in
Congress over the reauthorization of the PATRIOT Act, during which Paul
raised strenuous objections about data collection allowed under the law.

“While Rand Paul and a few others have expressed concerns about civil
liberties — and I respect that although I don’t see any shred of evidence
that anybody’s civil liberties are being violated — the great preponderance
of people that want to overturn the Patriot Act are on the left,” Bush said
on Fox, when asked whether there was a divide between the “Rand Paul wing
and pretty much everyone else.” Bush continued, “And we need to … give
people some room in the Democratic Party to be strong supporters of
defending the homeland again. I think we need to restore a bipartisan
consensus on this. The great majority of Republicans are supportive of the
NSA.”

On Tuesday, Congress passed the USA Freedom Act, which sought to balance
security measures with more privacy protections. Paul, who did not vote for
the measure, has spent the better part of a week tearing into bulk data
collection and forced the expiration of elements of the PATRIOT Act, a move
that played well with his libertarian-leaning base but sparked outrage from
more hawkish corners of his party.

Gor’s statement, an effort to fire back at that GOP criticism, referenced a
bad week for Bush last month, when it took him days to say he wouldn’t have
gone to war in Iraq given today’s knowledge of intelligence failures in the
lead-up to the war.

*When Rand Paul steps in it
<http://www.politico.com/story/2015/06/rand-paul-2016-interview-118612.html>
// Politico // MANU RAJU – June 4, 2015*

The 2016 contender says he’s no programmed pol. But straight talk can be a
dangerous thing

After Rand Paul said GOP defense hawks had “created” ISIS, he told Sean
Hannity: “I think I could have stated it better.” When he claimed some of
his adversaries were “secretly” hoping for a terrorist attack so they could
blame him for shutting down the PATRIOT Act, the next day he admitted that
“hyperbole” got the better of him “in the heat of battle.”

And when Paul quipped that he was “glad” his train didn’t stop in Baltimore
in the wake of riots there, he later offered “regret” that his comments
were “misinterpreted.”

As Paul has sought to stand out from the clustered GOP presidential field,
he’s finding that his freewheeling, off-the-cuff speaking style can cut
both ways. His supporters say it’s what’s refreshing about him: He’s not a
typical programmed pol who spews the same talking points over and over;
there’s an authenticity that’s rare in today’s poll-driven politics, they
say. But his critics say it betrays a lack of discipline that should
concern Republicans in a general election — when any rhetorical blunder can
trigger a media circus lasting days — let alone in the White House.

In an interview, Paul spurned advice he often receives to “say the same
thing over and over again,” even as he acknowledged his comments are “not
always perfect.”

“People have to choose what they want,” he told POLITICO this week. “If
they want robots, who say the same thing over and over again, there are
plenty of them. If they want something more genuine, where everything is
not always perfect — we’ll see what people want. I am who I am.”

The 52-year-old ophthalmologist may seem like a political neophyte, given
that his 2010 Senate victory was his first foray into elective politics.
But he has spent a good portion of his life around the spotlight, learning
the political ropes from his father, former Rep. Ron Paul, whose brand of
libertarianism set him apart from much of his party.

And, like his father, he has methodically worked to portray himself as a
different type of candidate, including speaking to an array of different
audiences and not shying away from the press. It’s in stark contrast to
other candidates who fear unscripted moments and adopt a more disciplined
approach to the media when running for higher office.

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, for one, has not participated in
a formal sit-down interview and has sharply limited press availability
since announcing her presidential run in April. Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.),
who was known for his willingness to engage with reporters in the Capitol,
is now limiting — if not avoiding — interactions with Hill media. Sen. Ted
Cruz (R-Texas) takes questions from reporters and often gives long-winded
answers, but he rarely deviates from the precise point he’s trying to make.

Paul said Clinton’s press avoidance strategy may have spared her some bad
headlines in the short term, but he asserted it’s backfired on her lately.
“She’s had a bad month. I think I like my month better than her month,” he
said.

Of course, Paul isn’t the front-runner for his party’s nomination, so he
has a lot more to gain than Clinton does by mixing it up with the press.

In the past month, Paul became the scourge of his caucus for his defiant
stand against the PATRIOT Act, forcing a two-day lapse in the law by
refusing to allow a temporary extension to pass. As GOP hawks slammed the
libertarian-minded Paul over his view that the anti-terrorism law invaded
privacy rights, the Kentucky Republican took to the floor in a rare Sunday
night session and made a rather incendiary claim.

“People here in town think I’m making a huge mistake,” Paul said. “Some of
them, I think, secretly want there to be an attack on the United States so
they can blame it on me.”

A day later, Paul was walking it back. “I think hyperbole can sometimes get
the better of us,” he told reporters outside the Capitol.

Last week, Paul was on MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” when he was asked about Sen.
Lindsey Graham’s position that a more restrained foreign policy empowered
Islamic State militants.

“ISIS exists and grew stronger because of the hawks in our party who gave
arms indiscriminately and most of those arms were snatched up by ISIS,”
Paul said. “These hawks also wanted to bomb [Syrian leader Bashar] Assad,
which would have made ISIS’ job even easier. They created these people.”

After an uproar, Paul was confronted about the comments on Hannity’s Fox
News show. “Ultimately, I think I could have stated it better,” Paul said.
“The ultimate people who are responsible for terrorism are obviously the
terrorists.”

In the POLITICO interview, Paul said the backlash was an instance of him
saying something “1,000 times” and then changing his wording once,
prompting criticism. He said he should have also pinned blame on Clinton
and President Barack Obama for backing policies that created ISIS. But he
stood by the essence of his remarks that Republican hawks are culprits, as
well.

“The comments I said about ISIS, I’ve said 1,000 times,” Paul said. “I used
one different word — which is probably not the correct word — the ‘created’
word. I probably should have said, ‘enabled’ or ‘make worse.’ And all
things I’ve said, a million times, and I still believe that.”

Such comments have already given fodder to Paul’s foes.

“I think it really shows how little understanding he has on both the
conflict and the challenges and the threat it presents to the security of
the United States,” said Arizona Sen. John McCain, a leading GOP hawk who
backs Graham (R-S.C.) for president.

Unlike some candidates who tend to hew closer to their scripts, Paul, at
times, grows weary of giving the same defense of a policy position. So he
is prone to veer off topic and offer a new argument publicly. Doing that,
however, has its risks. His advisers have tried to impress upon Paul the
need to hash out his line of thinking privately before speaking publicly
about it for the first time.

For instance, when he said on Fox Business Network in 2013, “I don’t care”
if a drone were to kill a man robbing a liquor store, it seemed incongruent
with his 13-hour filibuster the month earlier against U.S. policies on
unmanned drones. And after contending in February during a testy CNBC
interview there were cases of vaccinations causing “mental disorders” in
some children, he later stressed he believes all kids should be inoculated,
even tweeting a picture of himself getting a booster shot.

Paul’s supporters believe voters will cut some slack to a candidate who’s
unafraid to speak his mind.

“It’s a two-edged sword, yet his greatest strength,” said Brian Darling, a
former senior aide to Paul. “It’s a risk at times when comments get him in
trouble. But it’s a huge upside in the sense that people know he’s a
genuine guy.”

Darling added: “Rand Paul may be the new ‘Straight-talk Express’ from the
Senate,” a riff on McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign slogan.

While Paul comes across as a no-nonsense senator, he occasionally likes to
flash his sense of humor. Yet, his timing can sometimes fall flat, as it
did when he quipped on Laura Ingraham’s radio program about moving quickly
through Baltimore amid riots there in April. “I’m glad the train didn’t
stop,” he said.

The remark undercut his long-running effort to reach out to communities of
color, and Paul and his team moved quickly to contain the fallout.

Missteps aside, Jesse Benton, a longtime political adviser to Paul who is
married to the senator’s niece, said the senator has improved vastly as a
communicator during his short time in public office.

“I think he’s a master at it, but even a master is not always perfect,”
said Benton, who now runs Paul’s super PAC. “Sometimes, he makes news in a
way that is not exactly in the way he wants it. However, the vast majority
of the news he makes is extremely positive for him.”

*Scott Walker: Women Mostly Worry About Rape Pregnancies 'In The Initial
Months'
<http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/scott-walker-abortions-rape-incest>
// Talking Points Memos // Ahiza Garcia – June 3, 2015*

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) said Monday that he’d be willing to sign a
20-week abortion ban without exceptions for rape or incest, adding that
women were mostly concerned about those issues "in the initial months" of
pregnancy, television station WKOW reported.

“I mean, I think for most people who are concerned about that, it’s in the
initial months where they’re most concerned about it,” Walker said of
pregnancies caused by rape and incest.

“In this case, again, it’s an unborn life, it’s an unborn child and that’s
why we feel strongly about it,” Walker said. “I’m prepared to sign it
either way that they send it to us.”

On Tuesday, a public hearing on the bill featured testimony from women who
have had abortions and medical experts. While the Wisconsin State Assembly
and Senate are expected to vote on the bill soon, none is scheduled.

Walker, a potential 2016 Republican presidential candidate, made news last
week when he said ultrasounds were “pretty cool” while discussing
Wisconsin’s mandatory ultrasounds for women seeking abortions.

*Rand Paul: GOP Isn't Entirely Responsible For Creating ISIS
<http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2015/06/02/rand-paul-isis_n_7492994.html?ncid=tweetlnkushpmg00000067>
// HuffPo // Sam Levine – June 3, 2015 *

Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) backtracked on his recent comments that hawkish
Republicans were responsible for creating the Islamic State group, also
known as ISIS.

Last week, Paul said the Islamic State "exists and grows stronger" because
of Republican hawks who were too eager to arm Syrian rebels. Pressed on
those comments by Fox News Host Sean Hannity on Monday, Paul took some of
the blame off Republicans.

"I think ultimately I could have maybe stated it a little bit better," said
Paul, who is seeking the Republican nomination for president. "The ultimate
people who are responsible for terrorism are obviously the terrorists. So
ISIS is responsible for the mayhem, the murders, the brutality, the
beheadings, that's ISIS."

Paul linked the rise of ISIS to the policies of President Barack Obama, but
stopped short of saying his party was not responsible at all.

"This was the policy of President Obama, it was the policy of Hillary
Clinton and it was also the policy of some in my party who wanted to arm
the Islamic rebels," he said. "And I warned at the time that the great
irony is that you arm these people, one day we'll have to go back and fight
against these weapons ourselves."

Paul, who is seeking the Republican nomination for president, faced
criticism from conservatives for the comments.

"Rand Paul does not belong in the Republican party when he carries that
message," Rep. Peter King (R-N.Y.) told MSNBC's Andrea Mitchell last week.
"You can have honest differences over what should be done in Iraq, what
should be done in Syria, but to say that it was Republicans or Republican
policies or Lindsey Graham or John McCain, that caused the growth of ISIS.
That's totally untrue ... For him to so misread ISIS to me shows that he's
totally unqualified to be commander-in-chief."

On Monday, Paul said the rise of ISIS was an "unintended consequence" of
arming Syrian rebels.

"I would say that we can have a valid discussion over whether or not ISIS
has grown stronger by pouring arms into the Islamic rebels in the Syrian
civil war," Paul said. "It is objective truth that ISIS grew stronger the
more weapons that went into the Syrian civil war. So I think it was an
unintended consequence that ISIS grew stronger because of weaponizing these
Islamic rebels in Syria."

*'I use them, they use me': Local politicians profit from presidential
hopefuls in early-voting states
<http://www.latimes.com/nation/politics/la-na-presidential-hopefuls-court-earlystate-politicians-20150602-story.html#page=1>
// LA Times // Seema Mehta – June 3, 2015*

Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker entered a fundraiser in a cavernous barn here
on a recent sunny Saturday afternoon to the flashes of cellphone cameras
and throngs of people seeking a handshake and a selfie.

The front-runner in Iowa among those seeking the GOP nomination was the
guest of honor, but he wasn’t raising money for a White House bid. The haul
would go to Chad Airhart, the recorder for Dallas County in central Iowa.

“Thanks for letting us come by and join with you; thanks for your
leadership,” Walker told Airhart, as the recorder’s supporters dined on
bratwurst and baked beans, surrounded by hanging cow hides and saddles.
“I’m honored to be here today.”

In much of the nation, a top presidential prospect wouldn’t bother showing
up to raise money for a local official who handles paperwork for a county
of 66,000 people.

But in Iowa, local politicians are showered in love for one important
reason: They are gate-keepers to voters and party activists who will
provide access to their networks and commit time to White House candidates
hoping to make a splash in the state that holds the first presidential
nominating contest.

“I don’t know if spoiled is the right word,” said Airhart, who has endorsed
Walker, even though the governor has not formally announced his candidacy.
“I would say we’re blessed in Iowa to have this opportunity.”

Republican Rep. David Young, a freshman Iowa congressman, was blunter.

“I use them, they use me,” Young said.

This year, he has raised thousands of dollars for his reelection campaign
at a dessert reception headlined by former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, a pizza
parlor fundraiser with former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, and a gathering at a
farm-themed restaurant with Walker. In turn, the prospective candidates got
to meet hundreds of Young’s supporters.

Republican Rep. David Young, a freshman Iowa congressman, was blunter.

“I use them, they use me,” Young said.

This year, he has raised thousands of dollars for his reelection campaign
at a dessert reception headlined by former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, a pizza
parlor fundraiser with former Texas Gov. Rick Perry, and a gathering at a
farm-themed restaurant with Walker. In turn, the prospective candidates got
to meet hundreds of Young’s supporters.

“It’s mutually understood and it’s accepted,” Young said. “It’s all OK
because we’re unique here in Iowa because we’re first in the nation.”

In the lead-up to the 2012 Iowa caucuses, candidates like eventual GOP
nominee Mitt Romney announced dozens of new supporters who ranged from
statehouse leaders to the mayor of De Soto, a town of 1,050 people.
Courting of local leaders also happens in the other early-voting  states of
New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada.

Another way White House hopefuls curry favor is through political action
committees. Bush’s Right to Rise leadership PAC, for example, has announced
contributions of more than $240,000 since being formed in January.
Candidates and parties in the four early states have received one-third of
the amount.

California, which is unlikely to play a role in the nominating contest
because of its late primary date, has Republican candidates swarming the
state raising money, but they rarely hold public events or court small-town
mayors.

“We are fortunate! Put as many exclamation points after that as possible,”
said Jeff Kaufmann, chairman of the Iowa GOP. “I can’t express how
fortunate Iowa is to be a carve-out state … but with that comes some pretty
significant responsibility.”

Airhart, a 7th-generation Iowan, grew up poor; his parents were teenagers
when he was born, and his father spent time in jail. He said his upbringing
on the East Side of Des Moines never suggested he would become an elected
official who mingles with presidential candidates.

“It’s mutually understood and it’s accepted,” Young said. “It’s all OK
because we’re unique here in Iowa because we’re first in the nation.”

In the lead-up to the 2012 Iowa caucuses, candidates like eventual GOP
nominee Mitt Romney announced dozens of new supporters who ranged from
statehouse leaders to the mayor of De Soto, a town of 1,050 people.
Courting of local leaders also happens in the other early-voting  states of
New Hampshire, South Carolina and Nevada.

Another way White House hopefuls curry favor is through political action
committees. Bush’s Right to Rise leadership PAC, for example, has announced
contributions of more than $240,000 since being formed in January.
Candidates and parties in the four early states have received one-third of
the amount.

California, which is unlikely to play a role in the nominating contest
because of its late primary date, has Republican candidates swarming the
state raising money, but they rarely hold public events or court small-town
mayors.

“We are fortunate! Put as many exclamation points after that as possible,”
said Jeff Kaufmann, chairman of the Iowa GOP. “I can’t express how
fortunate Iowa is to be a carve-out state … but with that comes some pretty
significant responsibility.”

Airhart, a 7th-generation Iowan, grew up poor; his parents were teenagers
when he was born, and his father spent time in jail. He said his upbringing
on the East Side of Des Moines never suggested he would become an elected
official who mingles with presidential candidates.

“We’re really fortunate. We have an opportunity to meet all the candidates,
to go through the vetting process and hopefully pick the next president of
the United States, whether you’re a Republican or a Democrat,” Airhart said
shortly after Walker spoke at the annual “Blue Jean Bash” fundraiser. “We
have that opportunity in Iowa that really no one else in the country has.”

Democrats aren’t as aggressive this cycle in wooing Iowa’s politicians
because their field of candidates is less competitive than the Republicans’.

There is a long tradition of the state’s most influential politicians
staging events that attract national candidates. Former Democratic Sen. Tom
Harkin’s annual steak fry, which ran for 37 years and ended in 2014, was
one that presidential hopefuls didn’t dare pass up.

Republican Gov. Terry Branstad started holding an annual birthday
fundraiser during his first term in the 1980s. The parties — including
cupcakes decorated with images of the governor’s trademark mustache — are
must-stops for White House candidates.

olitical observers say the practice is getting increasingly common among
lower-profile politicians, like Young and fellow first-term Rep. Rod Blum,
neither of whom has endorsed in the 2016 contest.

“It is a fascinating way for a first-term freshman member of Congress to
get in front of a bunch of people who might not show up at any campaign
event they might hold on their own,” said Craig Robinson, publisher of the
influential Iowa Republican blog.

Robinson said it was unclear whether neophyte politicians such as Young or
Blum would emerge as “kingmakers.” “This is kind of new territory,” he said.

Blum has held events with nearly every 2016 GOP presidential prospect.

“For a freshman congressman like myself, obviously the crowds that a
presidential candidate attracts are good-size crowds for me. It lets me
dive into the crowds, and I’m reconnecting with supporters and also meeting
new people,” he said. “Sometimes if it works out, we have a private event
before or after the public event; we try to raise some money.”

Such courtships are not without risks. Bush, Perry, former Hewlett-Packard
chief Carly Fiorina and businessman Donald Trump have faced questions about
their support of Rep. Frank Guinta of New Hampshire, who is embroiled in a
fundraising scandal that has prompted fellow Republicans to call for his
resignation.

And sometimes, the courting crosses the line. Former Iowa state legislator
Kent Sorenson pleaded guilty in a pay-to-play scheme in federal court last
year, admitting that he accepted $73,000 from then-Rep. Ron Paul’s 2012
presidential campaign after dropping his endorsement of then-Rep. Michele
Bachmann in favor of Paul shortly before the caucuses.

But for the most part, the relationships are positive, and Iowa’s leaders
sometimes marvel at the experience.

Kaufmann recalled the 2008 nominating contest, when he was a state lawmaker
and Tennessee Sen. Fred Thompson — better known for being a “Law and Order”
star — came for a visit. Thompson wanted to campaign in Kaufmann’s home
county.

“We walked up and down the streets of Tipton and talked to business owners
I’ve known all my life,” Kaufmann said. “Here I am, little old me, in
Tipton, Iowa, and I get to go around and introduce Fred Thompson. It was
neat for me…. It enhances a local legislator’s image.”

*TOP NEWS*

*DOMESTIC*

*Inequality a Major Issue for Americans, Times/CBS Poll Finds
<http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/04/business/inequality-a-major-issue-for-americans-times-cbs-poll-finds.html?src=twr>
// NYT // Noam Scheiber & Dalia Sussman – June 3, 2015 *

The poll found that a strong majority say that wealth should be more evenly
divided and that it is a problem that should be addressed urgently. Nearly
six in 10 Americans said government should do more to reduce the gap
between the rich and the poor, but they split sharply along partisan lines.
Only one-third of Republicans supported a more active government role,
versus eight in 10 of Democrats.

These findings help explain the populist appeals from politicians of both
parties, but particularly Democrats, who are seeking to capitalize on the
sense among Americans that the fruits of the economic recovery are
benefiting only a handful at the very top.

Far from a strictly partisan issue, inequality looms large in the minds of
almost half of Republicans and two-thirds of independents, suggesting that
it will outlive the presidential primary contests and become a central
theme in next year’s general election campaign.

“There is a small group of people in our country who own or control a vast
majority of the wealth,” Stephanie Alteneder, 28, a high school teacher
from Los Angeles, said in a follow-up interview. “There are a lot of
systems set up so that the people who have money get to make more of it.”

The percentage of Americans who say everyone has a fair chance to get ahead
in today’s economy has fallen 17 percentage points since early 2014. Six in
10 Americans now say that only a few people at the top have an opportunity
to advance.

The nationwide telephone poll, conducted on landlines and cellphones May
28-31 with 1,022 adults, has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus
three percentage points.

The survey touched on several issues relating to the economy and the
workplace, showing that four in five Americans support requiring employers
to offer paid parental leave, and even more support paid sick leave. A
majority also favors requiring chain stores and fast-food restaurants to
inform workers of scheduling changes two weeks in advance or to compensate
them with additional pay if they fail to do so.

Seven in 10 Americans support an increase in the federal minimum wage to
$10.10 from $7.25 an hour, although Republicans are about evenly divided on
the question.

Americans were also skeptical of free trade. Nearly two-thirds favored some
form of trade restrictions, and more than half opposed giving the president
authority to negotiate trade agreements that Congress could only vote up or
down without amending, a White House priority.

Still, it was Americans’ views on the distribution of money and opportunity
in the country that were most striking. More than half of higher-income
Americans said that money and wealth should be more evenly distributed.
Across party lines, Americans said the chance to get ahead was mainly a
luxury for those at the top.

“People have to get a high school education and they have to go to college
as well, and then they go out there and can only get a low-paying job,”
said Betty Burgess, 70, a retired textile worker from Lincolnton, N.C.

Almost three-quarters of respondents say they believe that large
corporations have too much influence in the country, about double the
amount that said the same of unions. However, a majority of Americans said
that workers who did not want to join a union at their workplace should be
able to opt out of paying union fees, even as they benefit from the union’s
protection and bargaining efforts. Unions generally oppose these so-called
right-to-work measures.

The phenomenon of public frustration about inequality rising several years
into a recovery is not unprecedented. According to data that Leslie McCall,
a professor at Northwestern University, has culled from the General Social
Survey, a biennual survey by the National Opinion Research Center at the
University of Chicago, some measures of concern about inequality rose
steadily after the 1990-91 recession and did not peak until 1996, after
which they fell for several years.

The source of the resentment, Professor McCall said, was that “people think
the returns to economic growth should be going to people like them as much
as they should be going to people at the top.”

The poll also included a variety of intriguing findings about what
Americans think should be done to reduce inequality.

Six in 10 Americans opposed requiring fast-food chains and other employers
of hourly workers to raise wages to at least $15 an hour, the aim of a
two-and-a-half year nationwide campaign led in part by a major union. (On
Tuesday, Francis Slay, the mayor of St. Louis, threw his weight behind an
effort to gradually raise the minimum wage there to $15 an hour by 2020,
following similar moves in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Seattle in recent
years.)

When asked about the other end of the income spectrum, two-thirds of
Americans favored raising taxes on people with annual salaries exceeding $1
million. By a 50-45 margin, they favored capping the income of top
executives at large corporations, a measure that more than one-third of
Republicans supported as well.

Inequality Troubles Americans Across Party Lines, Times/CBS Poll Finds //
NYT // Noam Scheiber & Dalia Sussman – June 3, 2015

Americans are broadly concerned about inequality of wealth and income
despite an economy that has improved by most measures, a sentiment that is
already driving the 2016 presidential contest, according to a New York
Times/CBS News poll.

The poll found that a strong majority say that wealth should be more evenly
divided and that it is a problem that should be addressed urgently. Nearly
six in 10 Americans said government should do more to reduce the gap
between the rich and the poor, but they split sharply along partisan lines.
Only one-third of Republicans supported a more active government role,
versus eight in 10 of Democrats.

These findings help explain the populist appeals from politicians of both
parties, but particularly Democrats, who are seeking to capitalize on the
sense among Americans that the economic recovery is benefiting only a
handful at the very top.

Far from a strictly partisan issue, inequality looms large in the minds of
almost half of Republicans and two-thirds of independents, suggesting that
it will outlive the presidential primary contests and become a central
theme in next year’s general election campaign.

“There is a small group of people in our country who own or control a vast
majority of the wealth,” Stephanie Alteneder, 28, a Democrat and a high
school teacher from Los Angeles, said in a follow-up interview. “There are
a lot of systems set up so that the people who have money get to make more
of it.”

The percentage of Americans who say everyone has a fair chance to get ahead
in today’s economy has fallen 17 percentage points since early 2014. Six in
10 Americans now say that only a few people at the top have an opportunity
to advance.

The nationwide telephone poll, conducted on landlines and cellphones May
28-31 with 1,022 adults, has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus
three percentage points.

The survey touched on several issues relating to the economy and the
workplace, showing that four in five Americans support requiring employers
to offer paid parental leave, and even more support paid sick leave. A
majority also favors requiring chain stores and fast-food restaurants to
inform workers of scheduling changes two weeks in advance or to compensate
them with additional pay if they fail to do so.

Seven in 10 Americans support an increase in the federal minimum wage to
$10.10 from $7.25 an hour, although Republicans are about evenly divided on
the question.

Americans were also skeptical of free trade. Nearly two-thirds favored some
form of trade restrictions, and more than half opposed giving the president
authority to negotiate trade agreements that Congress could only vote up or
down without amending, a White House priority.

Still, it was Americans’ views on the distribution of money and opportunity
in the country that were most striking. More than half of higher-income
Americans said that money and wealth should be more evenly distributed.
Across party lines, most Americans said the chance to get ahead was mainly
a luxury for those at the top.

Still, it was Americans’ views on the distribution of money and opportunity
in the country that were most striking. More than half of higher-income
Americans said that money and wealth should be more evenly distributed.
Across party lines, most Americans said the chance to get ahead was mainly
a luxury for those at the top.

“People have to get a high school education and they have to go to college
as well, and then they go out there and can only get a low-paying job,”
said Betty Burgess, 70, a retired textile worker from Lincolnton, N.C., who
is a Republican.

Almost three-quarters of respondents say that large corporations have too
much influence in the country, about double the amount that said the same
of unions. However, a majority of Americans said that workers who did not
want to join a union at their workplace should be able to opt out of paying
union fees, even as they benefit from the union’s protection and bargaining
efforts. Unions generally oppose these right-to-work measures.

The phenomenon of public frustration about inequality rising several years
into a recovery is not unprecedented. According to data that Leslie McCall,
a professor at Northwestern University, has culled from the General Social
Survey, a biennial survey by the National Opinion Research Center at the
University of Chicago, some measures of concern about inequality rose
steadily after the 1990-91 recession and did not peak until 1996, after
which they fell for several years.

The source of the resentment, Professor McCall said, was that “people think
the returns to economic growth should be going to people like them as much
as they should be going to people at the top.”

The poll also included a variety of intriguing findings about what
Americans think should be done to reduce inequality.

Six in 10 Americans opposed requiring fast-food chains and other employers
of hourly workers to raise wages to at least $15 an hour, the aim of a
two-and-a-half year nationwide campaign led in part by a major union. (On
Tuesday, Francis Slay, the mayor of St. Louis, threw his weight behind an
effort to gradually raise the minimum wage there to $15 an hour by 2020,
following similar moves in Los Angeles, San Francisco and Seattle in recent
years.)

When asked about the other end of the income spectrum, two-thirds of
Americans favored raising taxes on people with annual salaries exceeding $1
million. By 50 to 45 percent, they favored capping the income of top
executives at large corporations, a measure that more than one-third of
Republicans supported as well.

*Working dads make more money than working moms in every state
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/06/03/working-dads-make-more-money-than-working-moms-in-every-state/>
// WaPo // Danielle Paquette – June 3, 2015*

By now, after two zany Amy Schumer skits crashed this economic research Web
site, you may have realized America’s gender wage gap is more of a maternal
wage gap.

Women, on average, make about 78 cents for every dollar paid to men. But at
the start of their careers, the difference is much smaller. Consider
millennial ladies, the slowest generation to have babies in U.S. history:
They bag about93 cents for every guy-earned dollar.

That average falls dismally, however, when kids enter the work-life
balance. American mothers who work full-time earn 30 cents less than
working fathers, according to an analysis by the National Women’s Law
Center released today.

“Stereotypes about mothers and fathers contribute to this disparity,” the
researchers wrote. “Mothers are recommended for significantly lower
starting salaries, perceived as less competent, and are less likely to be
recommended for hire than non-mothers.”

Beyond the obvious financial blow to families -- poverty touches half of
kids living with single mothers, for example -- the psychological impact of
receiving less pay for equal work can be devastating. Expectant mothers,
anticipating judgment amid an otherwise joyful time, sometimes hide their
bellies for as long as possible -- or plunge into overdrive at work to
combat the stereotype, often at the expense of their health.

Working moms make less than working dads in every state, according to the
National Women's Law Center analysis. The maternal wage gap is smallest in
Washington, D.C., where mothers typically make ten cents less than fathers,
and highest Louisiana, where the difference is a whopping 42 cents.

In seven states, dads make more than $20,000 annually than moms: Alaska
($21,000), Utah ($21,000), Wyoming ($22,000), Massachusetts ($23,000),
Louisiana ($23,000), Connecticut ($25,000) and New Jersey ($25,000).

*Republican Senators Will Sponsor A Bill To Protect Pregnant Workers For
The First Time Ever
<http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2015/06/03/3665919/pwfa-republicans/> //
Think Progress // Bryce Covert – June 3, 2015 *

On Thursday, Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA) will reintroduce the Pregnant Workers
Fairness Act (PWFA), a bill aimed at helping pregnant employees stay safely
on the job. For the first time ever, however, it will get Republican
sponsorship from Sens. Kelly Ayotte (NH) and Dean Heller (NV), a
Congressional staffer told ThinkProgress.

The PWFA requires employers to offer their pregnant workers small changes
so that they can keep working safely unless they can prove it would impose
undue hardship on their businesses. Those accommodations could include
switching from heavy lifting to light duty, more frequent bathroom breaks,
or simply a stool to sit on.

Today, two-thirds of first-time mothers work during their pregnancies, 80
percent of whom stay until their last month. Yet an estimated quarter
million women are denied these changes every year, while even more say they
don’t ask because they’re afraid of risking their jobs. Some women have
ended up miscarrying, while others have been forced onto unpaid leave or
fired when they asked for and were denied an accommodation. The Supreme
Court recently sided with Peggy Young, a former UPS employee who was put on
unpaid leave instead of being given light duty during her pregnancy.

The Republican support comes after the PWFA was included in a vote-o-rama
of budget amendments in March and got unanimous support. The bill has been
introduced as its own piece of legislation multiple times in past years but
only had Democratic sponsorship and didn’t advance.

Meanwhile, states have advanced their own versions of the bill: 14 and
Washington, D.C. require employers to give pregnant employees reasonable
accommodations.

*House GOP votes to block administration on immigration
<http://bigstory.ap.org/urn:publicid:ap.org:5d09dfe837474b7a8b7929ad96c6b1af>
// AP // Erica Werner – June 3, 2015 *

House Republicans have voted to block the Obama administration from
spending any money against a lawsuit over the president's immigration
policies.

The 222-204 vote Wednesday came on an amendment by leading immigration
hardliner Rep. Steve King of Iowa to a spending bill for the Commerce and
Justice Departments.

House Republicans spent weeks earlier this year trying to overturn
President Barack Obama's executive actions from last fall that granted work
permits and stays of deportation to millions of immigrants living in this
country illegally.

The House efforts were unsuccessful, but Republicans have claimed success
anyway, noting that the policies have been put on hold by a federal judge
in a lawsuit by a group of states seeking to overturn the actions.

*INTERNATIONAL*

*ISIS Making Political Gains
<http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/04/world/isis-making-political-gains.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&module=first-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news>
// NYT // Anne Barnard & Tim Arango – June 3, 2015 *

Days after seizing the Syrian desert city of Palmyra, Islamic State
militants blew up a notorious prison there, long used by the Syrian
government to detain and torture political prisoners.

The demolition was part of the extremist group’s strategy to position
itself as the champion of Sunni Muslims who feel besieged by the
Shiite-backed governments in Syria and Iraq.

The Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, has managed to advance in
the face of American-led airstrikes by employing a mix of persuasion and
violence. That has allowed it to present itself as the sole guardian of
Sunni interests in a vast territory cutting across Iraq and Syria.

Ideologically unified, the Islamic State is emerging as a social and
political movement in many Sunni areas, filling a void in the absence of
solid national identity and security. At the same time, it responds
brutally to any other Sunni group, militant or civilian, that poses a
challenge to its supremacy.

That dual strategy, purporting to represent Sunni interests and attacking
any group that vies to play the same role, has allowed it to grow in the
face of withering airstrikes.

While the Obama administration has focused on confronting the Islamic State
militarily, experts say the group’s recent victories point to the need for
a political component in the strategy to counter the group — even after
nearly 4,000 airstrikes by the American-led coalition and what United
States officials say are the deaths of 10,000 ISIS militants.

“They are hijacking legitimate demands,” Ibrahim Hamidi, a journalist and
political analyst from the restive Syrian province of Idlib, said of the
Islamic State. He has long argued that without more forceful international
action against the Syrian president, Bashar al-Assad, and a political
program to empower Sunnis, support for the extremists will grow.

“This is part of what makes them so dangerous,” he said. “Defeating them
needs a comprehensive approach.”

Sunnis form an aggrieved majority in Syria, where repression of a mostly
Sunni uprising by Mr. Assad’s government, backed by Shiite-led Iran,
exploded into war. And they are an aggrieved minority in Iraq, where
Shiites are more numerous, after years of sectarian violence between Sunni
and Shiite militias.

But little has been done to give Sunnis a greater role in their own
governance. Mr. Assad remains in power, backed by Iran and the militant
group Hezbollah. And American officials are fighting an uphill battle to
persuade Sunnis in Iraq to fight ISIS alongside the Shiite-led central
government and Iranian-backed militias.

That, Mr. Hamidi and other analysts said, has left some Sunnis willing to
tolerate the Islamic State in areas where they lack another defender,
especially in conservative communities like the ones in western Iraq and
eastern Syria, where the group is strongest. The analysts emphasized that
most Sunnis do not support the Islamic State’s harsh interpretation of
Islam, or its brutality, but that some were becoming more susceptible to
its political talk about protecting oppressed Sunnis.

“Now, with the sectarian polarization of the region, under the skin of
every single Sunni there is a tiny Daesh,” Mr. Hamidi, a Sunni, said, using
the Arabic acronym for the Islamic State.

By attacking ISIS in Syria while doing nothing to stop Mr. Assad from
bombing Sunni areas that have rebelled, he added, the United States-led
campaign was driving some Syrians into the Islamic State camp. “The
coalition is scratching the skin and making this Daesh come out.”

A slang word has even emerged, aid workers in Palestinian refugee camps in
Lebanon say, for someone who supports ISIS just a little bit. Some people
say, with a hint of sheepishness, “I’m a Dawoosh,” using an Arabic
diminutive that suggests “a cute little Daesh.”

In Iraq, the Islamic State has largely engulfed a pre-existing Sunni
insurgency. It has deeper roots there, having grown out of Al Qaeda in
Iraq, that sprang from resistance to United States after the 2003 invasion.

In 2006, Iraq became embroiled in civil war, with Sunni and Shiite militias
carrying out sectarian attacks on civilians. Now, some of those Shiite
militias are among the most effective forces on the ground after the
partial collapse of the Iraqi Army. But there have been reports of revenge
killings by the militias, and some Sunnis trust them so little that they
prefer the Islamic State.

The situation in Syria is similar in some ways, with Mr. Assad relying on
support from Iran and Iranian-backed militias. But the Islamic State faces
greater challenges winning popular support in Syria, where its Iraqi
leadership is viewed as foreign and where there remains a significant
collection of Sunni insurgent groups opposed to both the Islamic State and
the government.

Washington is trying to recruit some of those rival groups to be trained
and equipped as a front-line force against the Islamic State in Syria. But
the program is small, with only 90 fighters in the first round of training,
and recruiting is a challenge, since most Syrian insurgents place the
highest priority on fighting the Assad government.

Also arrayed against the Islamic State in Syria are many hard-line Islamist
groups, including the Qaeda-affiliated Nusra Front. They can match the
Islamic State in espousing Sunni sectarian views, condemning minority
sects, and reject its claim to represent Sunnis, calling them instead
“khawarej,” a term from Islamic history signifying divisive outsiders.

The Islamic State has made more inroads in areas where either it or the
government has stamped out alternative insurgent forces. That was the case
in Palmyra, the first city the group took directly from government forces,
which had crushed a rebellion there in 2012.

One resident of Palmyra who opposes both the Islamic State and the
government said it was trying to persuade townspeople to view it as a
liberator.

“For the last seven years, they have been winning hearts and minds in
Iraq,” he said, using only a nickname, Dahham, for safety reasons. “This is
the same approach they are using in Palmyra, and nobody stood against them.”

Rami Jarrah, an antigovernment activist who also opposes ISIS, said the
group scored a victory by destroying the prison. The site has powerful
resonance across the spectrum of opponents of Mr. Assad, from secular
communists to Sunni Islamists accused of taking part in a Muslim
Brotherhood insurgency that was crushed in the 1980s.

Syrians who lost loved ones to abuses by the governments of Mr. Assad and
his father, Hafez al-Assad, may now feel that while global powers ignored
their pleas for help, “justice has been met at the hands of extremist
militants,” Mr. Jarrah wrote on Facebook.

With the recent gains by the Islamic State, Washington is tinkering with
tactics and weapons. Anti-tank missiles are on their way to Iraq, to
destroy American tanks that the group took from fleeing Iraqi soldiers.

But United States military support has its limits, given the Iraqi Army’s
weakness, which in turn reflects the divisions that have made Iraqi
national unity elusive.

“ISIS can only really be defeated by the Sunnis in Iraq,” said Emma Sky, a
Briton who was a political adviser to the American military in Iraq. That
is what happened in 2006, when the American military established the
Awakening program, paying Sunni tribes to switch sides and fight Al Qaeda
in Iraq and the greater Sunni insurgency.

The United States, unable to act unilaterally as it did in 2006, is now
pushing the Iraqi government to arm Sunni tribes to fight the Islamic
State, but little has happened in the face of objections by harder-line
Shiite leaders. There is also a reluctance among Sunnis to fight ISIS,
because many do not see being governed by Baghdad as something worth
fighting for.

“We need assurances that those who are fighting against Daesh will have
rights and be treated like Iraqis,” said Osama Nujaifi, a vice president of
Iraq and a Sunni.

Some Iraqi Sunnis, having seen what ultimately happened with the Awakening,
take a once bitten, twice shy approach now. Envisioned as a long-term
effort to empower the Sunni community, the Awakening collapsed because the
Shiite-led Iraqi government never fulfilled promises of full- time jobs to
the Awakening fighters.

Sheikh Wissam al-Hardan, a Sunni from Anbar Province who is loyal to the
government, said that Sunni fighters still on the payroll of what remains
of the Awakening groups had not been paid in 15 months.

“There is no reconciliation between the government and the Sunnis,” he
said. “The government considers them as if they are all ISIS.”

*Cuba officially off U.S. terror blacklist
<http://www.cnn.com/2015/05/29/politics/cuba-terror-list/index.html> // CNN
// Kevin Liptak – June 3, 2015 *

The United States officially removed Cuba from its list of countries that
sponsor terrorism on Friday, setting the two nations up for a full renewal
of diplomatic ties.

President Barack Obama originally announced in April that he was
recommending that Cuba be removed from the terror blacklist after a State
Department review. Friday marked the expiration of a 45-day period when
Congress could have blocked the move.

"The rescission of Cuba's designation as a State Sponsor of Terrorism
reflects our assessment that Cuba meets the statutory criteria," the State
Department said in a statement Friday.

The statement noted that the U.S. "has significant concerns and
disagreements with a wide range of Cuba's policies and actions" but said
these fall outside the criteria related to rescinding a state sponsor of
terror designation.

Cuba was originally placed on the terror list in 1982 when the U.S.
government accused the Fidel Castro regime of sponsoring communist groups
in Latin American and Africa. But independent analysts have for years cast
doubt on the country's current terror ties, and the State Department said
its association with certain groups had "become more distant."

Three other countries are currently named as state sponsors of terror:
Iran, Sudan and Syria.

The terror listing was one of the final barriers to restoring diplomatic
relations between the United States and Cuba. Obama announced in December
that he was ending a nearly half-century of frozen relations, stating that
the freeze wasn't benefiting either nation.

The administration has already lifted some of the restrictions on travel
and trade with Cuba, including permitting some ferries to run services from
Florida to the island. American visitors are still required to obtain a
license from the federal government before traveling to Cuba, though the
Treasury has made it easier to obtain permission to go.

The removal of the terror designation will also ease some trade
restrictions, though in order for full economic ties to be restored,
Congress will need to lift the embargo on Cuba that's been in place since
1960.

Some lawmakers -- including Republican and Democratic Cuban-Americans --
staunchly oppose any normalization in relations with Cuba, accusing Obama
of sidling up to a brutal dictatorship.

House Speaker John Boehner said on Friday that Obama "handed the Castro
regime a significant political win in return for nothing" by removing Cuba
from the terror list.

"The communist dictatorship has offered no assurances it will address its
long record of repression and human rights abuses at home," Boehner said in
a statement.

Despite the objections, neither Boehner not other opponents of Obama's Cuba
policy sought to block the terror designation removal in Congress. A GOP
congressional source said leaders anticipated that overcoming a
presidential veto on the measure would be difficult, and determined the
practical effects of the removal were minimal.

Former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, an expected contender for the 2016 GOP
presidential nomination, wrote in a statement that, "Neither continued
repression at home nor Cuba's destabilizing activities abroad appear
sufficient to stop President Obama from making further concessions to the
Communist regime in Havana."

White House Press Secretary Josh Earnest dismissed Republicans' concerns on
the terror list removal and said the potential of Obama visiting Cuba
remains a "presidential aspiration."

In January Obama met with Cuban leader Raul Castro at the Summit of the
Americans in Panama, the first time the leaders of the two countries had
met for substantial talks since before the Cuban revolution. Visiting Miami
on Thursday, Obama made a stop at the Shrine of Our Lady of Charity, a
religious site honoring the patron saint of Cuba, to pay respects the large
Cuban diaspora in the United States.

Officials have been negotiating the reopening of embassies in Washington
and Havana, though some sticking points -- like how freely American
diplomats will be able to move around Cuba -- remain.

The U.S. is eying the current head of the U.S. Interests Section in Cuba,
Jeffrey DeLaurentis, as the first U.S. ambassador to Cuba in more than 50
years. Plans are being formulated to remodel the current building on
Havana's waterfront that houses the interests section to use it as the
embassy.

*OPINIONS/EDITORIALS/BLOGS*

*Romney defeating Bush in GOP establishment primary
<http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/presidential-campaign/243898-romney-defeating-bush-in-gop-establishment-primary>
// The Hill // Brent Budowsky – June 3, 2015*

Almost immediately after Mitt Romney announced he was not running in the
2016 race, I speculated that he may be engaging in a clever ploy to stay
out of the line of political fire, hoping that former Gov. Jeb Bush
(R-Fla.) fails as a candidate and the growing army of GOP presidential
candidates creates a deadlock for the Republican nomination, and the party
turns to ... Mitt Romney!

There are many scenarios that could unfold in the GOP race. It is certainly
possible that a candidate such as Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker (R) or
Florida Sen. Marco Rubio (R) could catch fire and seize the Republican
nomination. I have an upcoming column about Rubio that considers his
prospects.

If Romney, the Republican 2012 nominee, is actually pursuing the
Machiavellian strategy I suggest, recent events in the GOP make this
scenario even more likely. Currently, the absurdly growing GOP field makes
a deadlocked primary and convention process more likely, with numerous
candidates holding between 8 and 13 percent of the GOP vote. The GOP
debates could well become a farce with so many candidates.

Next, in the unlikely event that one of the right-wing candidates such as
Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) begins winning primaries, I guarantee that the
entire GOP national party leadership will move aggressively to stop that
candidate, correctly fearing that candidate would lose a landslide to
Hillary Clinton (D). In this case they would almost certainly turn to ...
Mitt Romney!

For this scenario to unfold, there is a secondary primary process, outside
the formal primary process, to determine who the establishment compromise
nominee would be. New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie (R) could have played that
role, but it ended on a bridge to New York. A Machiavellian Romney would
have nothing to fear from Christie.

In my theory, the big bet Romney would have to have made is that the Bush's
campaign would fail, paving the way for Romney as the alternative to a
rightist front-runner or a deadlocked convention.

Let's be direct. This Romney bet, if he made it, appears to be paying off.
Bush has been a very weak candidate, another name in a big bunch of
mid-range candidates. Bush could not answer the obvious question about the
Iraq War initiated by his brother, George W. Bush (Bush 43). A long list of
aides, advisers, donors and supporters of Bush 43 are refusing to support
Jeb Bush. Why? The right dislikes Jeb Bush even more than they dislike
Romney. And Bush has very high negative ratings generally and among
Republicans, while Romney gets great public relations from a charity boxing
match and supports various GOP candidates in many states.

The more Bush lags in the GOP sweepstakes, the more Romney gains in the GOP
establishment primary within the larger primaries.

Romney, by nature, is a takeover artist. Might he be planning his greatest
takeover since the 2012 Republican National Convention? Every week brings
more evidence that his big bet has a real chance of paying off.

*Hillary Clinton is political, but her foundation isn’t
<http://www.bostonglobe.com/opinion/2015/06/03/the-work-clinton-foundation-apolitical/ICXwH5DOwKr19RTFBy02DN/story.html>
// Boston Globe // Dan Payne – June 3, 2015 *

THE MUCH-DISCUSSED Clinton Foundation builds partnerships with businesses,
governments, nongovernment organizations, other foundations, and wealthy
individuals. Like Robin Hood, the foundation used those resources to reduce
childhood obesity and improve meals at 20,000 US schools, aid 56,000 small
farmers in Malawi, launch programs to save forests in Cambodia, Guyana,
Indonesia, Kenya, and Tanzania, and cut the cost of HIV/AIDS medications
for 9.9 million people in 70 countries.

Clinton detractors would have us believe the foundation is an arm of
Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign. But judging by the politics of its
donors, people give and support the foundation without regard to her
campaign. Consider these big donors:

Big Media is well-represented, an indication that they don’t see the
foundation as a political arm of Campaign Hillary. Comcast, NBC Universal,
News Corporation, Thomson Reuters, Time Warner, and Turner Broadcasting are
big contributors; other big givers include Carlos Slim, the Mexican telecom
magnate and largest shareholder of The New York Times Company. Bloomberg
News donated $500,001-$1 million. (Gifts are reported as a range.)

If the foundation benefits Clinton’s candidacy, that will come as news to
James Murdoch, co-chief operating officer for the company that owns Fox
News, donated $1 million-$5 million, as well as his father Richard, who
founded Fox News and gave $500,001-$1 million.

Major conservatives have given major dollars. Calling itself “The #1
conservative site in the nation,” Newsmax Media chipped in
$100,001-$250,000 and also $1 million-$5 million. The recently deceased
Pittsburgh billionaire Richard Mellon Scaife, principal heir to the Mellon
family’s old banking, oil, steel and aluminum fortune, was described as
“one of America’s leading funders of conservative causes.” He donated
$250,001-$500,000.

Even big name Republicans are on board. Many Republicans have supported
Foundation events, including the Global Initiative meetings. Guests have
included Laura Bush; former two-time presidential candidate Mitt Romney; TV
host Donald Trump, who also forked over $100,000; New Jersey Governor Chris
Christie, presidential candidates Carly Fiorina; former Secretary of State
Condoleezza Rice, and former Treasury Secretary Hank Paulson.

What about Stephanopolous? Yes, George Stephanopolous, of ABC News, gave
$75,000 to the foundation, which was publicly listed. Yes, he helped Bill
Clinton’s campaign for president and should have told his bosses and his
audience about his donation. But he gave to support efforts against AIDS
and deforestation. His gift reveals nothing about his political history
that wasn’t already known.

How diverse can you get? None other than onetime vice presidential
candidate Sarah Palin attended a Clinton Global Initiative session to hear
a speech by Senator John McCain, the-then presidential nominee.

The ideological variety of the foundation’s supporters shows its work is
seen by even the most political people as apolitical. Many things can be
said to criticize Hillary Clinton. But using the Clinton Foundation to
advance her run for president isn’t one of them.

*Democrats, Don’t Freak Out!
<http://www.slate.com/articles/news_and_politics/politics/2015/06/hillary_clinton_s_poll_numbers_have_fallen_democrats_shouldn_t_be_worried.html>
// Slate // Jamelle Bouie – June 3, 2015 *

George W. Bush is popular again.

According to a new poll from CNN, the majority of Americans—52 percent—have
a “favorable” view of Bush, versus 43 percent who still aren’t keen on the
former president. And while he isn’t as popular as his post-presidential
peers—including his father—he’s in far better shape than he was during his
final days in office, when most Americans disliked and disapproved of his
administration.

But more striking than this is his stature versus the current president,
Barack Obama. In addition to their survey on Bush, CNN also finds that the
43rd president is more popular than the 44th, who is as liked (49 percent
approval) as he is disliked (49 percent disapproval).

Conservatives, no surprise, are thrilled. But before touting these numbers
as proof of Bush’s ultimate success—and Obama’s clear failure—they should
consider this fact of public opinion: Richard Nixon and Lyndon Johnson
aside, every president becomes popular, or at least more popular, out of
office. Jimmy Carter was so unpopular he faced a powerful Democratic
opponent to his re-election campaign and lost the general election in a
popular and electoral vote landslide. But 35 years later, his
favorable/unfavorable spread is also better than Obama’s. The other
one-term president of the past generation, George H.W. Bush, has also
recovered from his prior unpopularity. On the eve of the 1992 election, his
approval rating was 43 percent. Today, 63 percent of Americans have a
favorable view of the elder Bush, versus 31 percent who still aren’t
convinced. Likewise, Bill Clinton was popular throughout his eight
years—with an average approval rating of 55 percent—and has become more
popular as his tenure has moved to memory. According to Gallup, he has an
average post-presidential rating of 60 percent.

Put bluntly, George W. Bush’s popularity isn’t news, although it would be
if, after seven years of a quiet post-presidency, Bush was still as hated
as he was at the end of 2008.

With that said, what’s striking about the rehabilitation of Bush is that
it’s concurrent with Hillary Clinton’s return from the stratosphere of
public opinion. At this time four years ago—when she was chief diplomat and
the 2012 election was still in the distance—Clinton was among the most
popular figures in the country with a favorable rating of 60 percent.
Indeed, just 31 percent of Americans held an unfavorable view of her. She
was less popular in 2012, but not by much; the atmosphere was partisan, but
not so much that it hurt her standing.

That changed in 2013, as she slid from a 56 percent favorability rating in
January to 48 percent one in December. And her numbers fell further in
2014, from a high of 50 percent to just under 47 percent at the end of the
year. Her recent decline—as well as her higher unfavorables—are part of the
same trend. Through 2012, less than one-third of respondents had a poor
view of Hillary Clinton. By last month, the anti-Hillary crowd had grown to
almost 47 percent of Americans, inching out her supporters.

For the media, this reflects scandal. Between the email controversy,
foreign donors, and the Clinton Foundation, the public is already weary
from Hillary’s baggage. At the same time, those are relatively young
stories—they’ve only been in the news a few months. If you want to
understand the broad trend of Clinton’s decline, you have to look at her
position: She was outside of politics.

By leaving domestic politics after the 2008 election, Clinton entered a
sort of post-presidency, not dissimilar to Bill Clinton’s or even George W.
Bush’s. In public life, but out of the spotlight, she was no longer a
partisan figure, which—for Democrats, Republicans, and independents
alike—made her palatable. She wasn’t, to borrow from the New Republic’s
Rebecca Traister, asking for anything.

Now she is. And as she’s gone from a potential candidate to a live one, her
popularity has climbed down from the stratosphere. Now, she’s back to where
she was in 2007—a well-known and polarized politician with tremendous
opposition on the right and substantial support on the left. Like Bush, her
journey through public opinion has less to do with her and everything to do
with her place in the political firmament.

There is one difference. When he left office, Bush was genuinely unpopular,
so much so that—four years later—a majority of voters still blamed him for
the country’s poor economic conditions. For as much as Republicans might
celebrate his present standing, I’d be shocked if they asked him to
campaign for the eventual nominee. Americans have warm feelings for the
former president, but that sentiment wouldn’t survive the scrutiny of a
campaign.

Clinton didn’t leave on a high, but she didn’t leave on a low either. When
Obama claimed victory in the Democratic primary, 48 percent of Americans
had a favorable view of Clinton. Which means that, with her current
ratings, she’s returned to her norm as a partisan figure. And it’s a good
one. By 2009, that 48 percent had become 50 percent as Democrats forgave
and forgot the combat of the previous year. In the same way, the secret of
her present decline is that it’s driven by Democrats, who will return to
the “team” as the country enters election season. Despite everything,
Hillary is in good shape.

If you aren’t convinced, consider the reverse scenario. Imagine that the
Republican Party had a former senator turned presidential candidate turned
secretary of state, who at worst pulled a plurality of all voters, and who
at best pulled a firm majority. Would the GOP reject her, or would they
immediately embrace her standard, confident that—even with the inevitable
scandals and criticism—they’re still positioned for victory.

*A ‘favorable’ way to stop Hillary Clinton’s ‘trust’ fall
<http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2015/06/03/a-favorable-way-to-stop-hillary-clintons-trust-fall/>
// WaPo // Jonathan Capehart – June 3, 2015 *

Hillary Clinton’s first big rally of her 2016 presidential campaign will
take place on Roosevelt Island on June 13. And it’s coming at the right
time. Two national polls released Tuesday and a couple of fundraising
stories out of New York spell trouble for the Democratic candidate. By
making the case for her candidacy, putting forth ideas that can be debated
and answering reporters’ questions, Clinton can use the next six months to
turn all of this around.

The Post-ABC News poll puts Clinton’s favorability rating at 45 percent, a
seven-year low. The CNN-ORC poll has it at 46 percent, the worst it has
been since 2011. That CNN survey also puts her unfavorable rating at 50
percent. The former secretary of state who once soared in public opinion is
now upside down. To make matters worse, the public’s view of Clinton’s
trustworthiness took a hit.

In the CNN-ORC survey, it plummeted eight points since March, from 50
percent to 42 percent. When asked whether “is honest and trustworthy”
applies to Clinton, 57 percent said no. That’s an eight-point jump since
March. The Post-ABC News poll wasn’t as bad, with a five-point drop to 41
percent in trustworthiness. But there was a six-point spike in
untrustworthiness to 52 percent. These numbers do not a president make. But
I should point out that neither poll asked about the trustworthiness of
Clinton’s two Democratic rivals — Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) and former
Maryland governor Martin O’Malley — or anyone in the cavalcade of
Republican presidential hopefuls. Not trusting Clinton is one thing. A
trust match-up between her and the declared GOP 9 and the undeclared six
would be a much more useful measure.

Of course, Clinton’s trust plunge has to do with an avalanche of stories
about lingering questions about her e-mails, her private e-mail server and
the fundraising actions of the Clinton Foundation. Each new revelation
feeds the negative narrative that the Clintons play by different rules than
the rest of us. Candidate Clinton’s March press conference about the server
didn’t quell queries, and her relative silence since then contributed to
the diminished opinion of her.

Meanwhile, stories about the lack of enthusiasm among deep-pocketed
Democratic donors are certain to add to the seeming mayhem around Clinton’s
campaign. But, folks, I’m here to remind you that we are still at the
beginning of a very long process.

We know all about Clinton, but we don’t know what her candidacy is all
about. That will change with her speech on the 13th at Franklin D.
Roosevelt Four Freedoms Park. The national park commemorates President
Roosevelt’s 1941 State of the Union address, otherwise known as the “four
freedoms” speech. In it, FDR called for “a world founded upon four
essential human freedoms,” including freedom of speech, freedom of
religion, freedom from want and freedom from fear.

The symbolism of Clinton’s chosen location and the speech it honors gives a
clue into where her campaign is headed. Translating FDR’s universal vision
into specific and viable policies for a 21st-century nation and world is
vital to Clinton right- sizing those poll numbers. So is answering direct
questions from reporters, which The Post’s Anne Gearan reports will start
happening around the same time as the big rally.

The sooner Clinton gets this part of the campaign up and running, the
better. It’s time she show that she can listen to the American people as
she travels the country and talk to them at the same time.

*MISCELLANEOUS*

*Lanny Davis: Hillary Clinton and the frenzy of the media
<http://thehill.com/opinion/lanny-davis/243964-lanny-davis-hillary-clinton-and-the-frenzy-of-the-media>
// The Hill // Lanny Davis – June 3, 2015 *

"Mobs of reporters and cameramen and other Big Timers were out there
wearing bush jackets with leather straps running this way and that and
knocking back their Pepsi-Colas and Nehis and yelling to each other and
mainly just milling about, crazy with the excitement of being on the scene,
bawling for news of the anguished soul of Louise Shepard. They wanted a
moan, a tear, some twisted features, a few inside words from friends, any
goddamned thing. They were getting desperate. Give us a sign! Give us
anything! Give us the diaper-service man! The diaper-service man comes down
the street with his big plastic bags, smoking a cigar to provide an
aromatic screen for his daily task — and they’re all over him and his
steamy bag. Maybe he knows the Shepards! Maybe he knows Louise! Maybe he’s
been in there! Maybe he knows the layout of chez Shepard! He locks himself
in the front seat, choking on cigar smoke, and they’re banging on his panel
truck. ‘Let us in! We want to see!’ They’re on their knees. They’re
slithering in the ooze. They’re interviewing the dog, the cat, the
rhododendrons. … These incredible maniacs were all out there tearing up the
lawn and yearning for their pieces of Louise’s emotional wreckage.”

—Tom Wolfe, The Right Stuff (1979), describing the media scrum at the home
of Louise Shepard, wife of Alan Shepard, America’s first astronaut, who had
just returned safely from a suborbital flight in space.

Has anything changed?

Decades later, on May 22, Ruby Cramer of BuzzFeed was in the small town of
Hampton, N.H., covering a Hillary Clinton event at — I am not making this
name up — Smuttynose Brewing Co., a locally owned small business that
proudly brews its own brands of beer.

Cramer reported that a small group of 60 local townspeople attended,
including Lenore and Gary Patton, ages 78 and 79, respectively. For about
an hour, the Pattons and the five dozen other guests listened to Clinton
talk “in granular detail” about challenges facing small businesses.

The event was open to the press. And here’s what happened next, as reported
by Cramer:

“The spell of the everyday was broken. Clinton was swarmed by reporters.
From the aisle, pressed up against the wall of beer cases stacked to the
ceiling on pallet shelves, they gathered in a thick circle that happened to
coalesce right around the two best seats in the house. Lenore and Gary
Patton could not talk to the candidate they had come to see. They could not
even get out of their chairs.

“Cameras flashed wildly. Lenore was crunched. Gary had a tape recorder in
his right ear, a television camera in his left, and microphones overhead.
They were inches from Clinton, with her ‘in the eye of the hurricane,’ as
Gary put it after watching her field questions on Iraq, her emails, and her
image. (‘Do you have a perception problem?’)”

Clinton responded by saying she would let voters decide for themselves.

“ ‘Hey,’ Gary said to no one in particular. ‘She’s smart. She’s
experienced. End of story. ... This woman has what it takes.’

‘She has ideas for the direction of the country she wants to go in,’ said
Lenore. ‘She cares about the middle class. We’re about as middle class as
you can get.’

‘She’s so experienced, she’s so bright, and she’s so adroit,’ her husband
added. ‘And I came in here not necessarily feeling all of these things, but
I go away thinking that we would be lucky to have her as the president,
because she has so many attributes that you need. It’s an incredibly
impressive performance.’ ”

A CNN poll published on Tuesday reported that the former secretary of
State’s favorable and trustworthiness ratings have dropped. Shocking! She
has been pounded virtually every day for the last two months by mainstream
media, far-right media and every Republican running for president, so that
shouldn’t be surprising.

Lest we forget, just recently The New York Times/CBS national poll showed
that the percentage of Americans who rate Clinton as a strong leader has
increased from 57 percent in March to 65 percent, and she is still
defeating most Republicans in most polls by a significant margin.

Is there a disconnect between Clinton and real voters like Lenore and Gary
Patton? Or is the disconnect between the frenzied media scrum and partisan
Republican presidential candidates, and real, everyday Americans?

You decide.

*Alexandria Phillips*

*Press Assistant | Communications*

Hillary for America | www.hillaryclinton.com