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An open letter to RNC Chairman Reince Priebus regarding his comments at CPAC

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Attendees at CPAC Friday were treated to 13 minutes of vacuous remarks and awkward one-liners by RNC Chairman Reince Priebus, the highlight of which was his announcement that the RNC was now in control of how the presidential debates will be handled in the media during the 2016 presidential cycle. Matt Nye, National Chairman of the Republican Liberty Caucus, wrote this open letter to Chairman Priebus in response:

Dear Chairman Priebus,

First of all, I commend you on appearing at CPAC to speak to the conservative activists in attendance there. It took guts to appear in front of the same conservative activists who have been repeatedly insulted and betrayed by the Republican Party under your leadership the last few years.

I also appreciate the fact the RNC has finally decided to take control of the debates after decades of letting the liberal media drive the bus, although I expect the rules adopted probably don’t bode well for candidates who don’t have the blessing of the consultant/donor class. Regardless, the change in policy is progress in the right direction, and I applaud you for it.

One of the criticisms most often leveled against Republicans is that we have become the party of “no”. At an event with 11,000 grassroots activists in attendance from all over the country, you had the opportunity to set the tone for the 2016 cycle by stating, for once, not what Republicans are against, but what we are for.

Sadly, instead of talking about how the principles that made this country great can solve all our problems – how cutting spending, lowering taxes, reducing regulations and eliminating wasteful government agencies would result in great economic prosperity for both the country as a whole and individual households nationwide – you spent almost all of your time poking fun at Hillary’s decadent lifestyle and painting her as another Barack Obama.

Chairman Priebus, I don’t disagree that Hillary is out of touch with the average American, and would make a terrible Commander In Chief. However, the same case was easily made against Obama in 2012, yet the Republicans failed to capture the White House that year.

I’ve got some bad news for you Mr. Chairman – the “we’re not the Democrats” strategy that seemed to work so well for the Republicans in 2014 isn’t going to work again in 2016, and the reason is actually quite ironic. The reason is the leadership of the Republican Party is almost as out of touch with the average Republican voter as Hillary is with the average American.

The American people gave Republicans the House in 2010, and the Senate in 2014. The clear message was “stop the Obama agenda!” The Republicans who won campaigned on things like repealing Obamacare, reigning in out of control spending, fighting the Executive Branch’s over-reaches in regards to things like amnesty for illegals, and getting justice for scandals like Fast and Furious, Benghazi and the IRS targeting conservatives. And it worked. They got elected.

Unfortunately, even with control of both houses, the Republicans have failed to do any of those things, and still behave as though they are in the minority. They have failed to take a principled stand on a single issue when there was a chance it would be more than symbolic.

At one point in your CPAC address you made the statement “we know what we stand for.” What you should have said is: “we know what to campaign on.” Because so far the Republicans have done nothing but pay lip service to the issues and voters that put them in office in 2010 and 2014. And therein lies the problem for the Republican Party in 2016 and beyond.

Activists will walk over hot coals for candidates if they believe them to be people of principle who offer a genuine alternative to the opposition and will follow through on their promises. Likewise, voters will reward candidates who keep their promises and follow through by electing them to office again and again. The key words in the prior sentences are “follow through” and “keep their promises”; unfortunately those are precisely the two things the Republicans haven’t done.

Mr. Chairman, if the Republicans fail to follow through on their promises now that they control both houses, they will fail to take the White House in 2016. Why am I so sure of this? Because we’ve already seen a slightly different version of that movie in the 2012 elections.

While activists and voters will turn out en masse for a candidate who both espouses the same principles they believe in and acts on them, they won’t get out of bed for a candidate who shares the same basic philosophy of the opposition and differs only in regards to how to implement the plan. As proof of this phenomenon I offer the 2012 defeat of Mitt Romney by President Obama.

The primary reason the Republicans failed to capture the White House in 2012 was because the signature issue was socialized medicine (Obamacare), and the Republican establishment put up the only Republican candidate who had socialized medicine in his home state. Rather than choose between full blown government controlled socialized medicine under Obama, and socialized medicine “lite” under a crony capitalism model via a Romney Republican administration, millions of disenchanted Republican voters simply decided to sit it out and stay home.

This, Mr. Chairman, was in spite of the fact many of the same charges you made against Hillary in your speech were as applicable to Obama in 2012 – and more so. This type of apathy exhibited by disillusioned Republican voters is exactly what the Republicans can look forward to in 2016 if the latter doesn’t follow through on the promises they made to the voters in 2014. The House controls spending, and the Republicans now control both houses, so the only possible explanation for the fact the outrageous spending continues can be is: the Republicans want it that way. Unfortunately for the Republicans, the American people don’t want it that way.

Given that we have the exact same Republican leadership in place at the National level now that we had after the 2010 elections, I don’t expect we will see any change, and given what we’ve seen in regards to the Republicans folding on the Cromnibus spending bill a couple months ago and the current sell-out on Obama’s executive action on amnesty, I think it’s safe to say leadership has learned nothing from Romney’s loss in 2012, and is tone deaf to the message just sent in 2014.

In closing, you mentioned you were in charge of “the boring stuff” like databases and the ground game. If that is all you are in charge of, this letter may be misguided, but if you have any sway or voice with those who control the direction of the party – and as Chairman I would expect you to have some – I urge you to listen to the voters that gave you the seats you now have, and follow through on the commitments that were made to win them. Failure to do so makes the party as a whole look like a fraud, and that could prove fatal to both the party and our Republic.

Sincerely,

Matt Nye
Chair 
Republican Liberty Caucus

RLC National Board Votes To Rescind Poliquin Endorsement After Obamacare Vote

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WASHINGTON, DC – The National Board of the Republican Liberty Caucus (RLC) voted Thursday to rescind its endorsement of Representative Bruce Poliquin, R-Maine 2nd CD, after he voted against the repeal of Obamacare.

Poliquin was one of only three Republicans to vote against the repeal because, he claimed, “more than 60,000 Mainers have invested their time and energy in choosing health care plans that work for their families.” Poliquin said he would only vote to repeal Obamacare if Republicans had a replacement bill ready to vote on at the same time.

“We were both stunned and disappointed by Rep. Poliquin’s vote,” said Matt Nye, National Chair of the Republican Liberty Caucus. “Obamacare is an abomination that is steadily destroying the best health care system in the world every day it is in existence, and it will ultimately result in a complete government takeover of health care and a lower standard of care for all Americans. While it is true that health care in the United States had issues prior to Obamacare, Americans were definitely better off before Obamacare was passed.”

Nye said RLC took its position because, “For our organization it is a litmus test issue, and there is simply no excuse for a ‘No’ vote to repeal it.”
Nye said Poliquin’s justification about replacing Obamacare with a free market alternative, which included a statement that “if Congress fully repeals Obamacare it just be fully prepared to replace it with a free market alternative” fell on deaf ears with the RLC Board.

“The notion that the free market requires Congress to pass a bill in order for it to function is absurd on its face,” Nye said. “Free market economics does not need the hand of government to give its imprimatur to what is acceptable and what it not. Consumers should be free to make their own personal choices and providers should supply plans which the market can accept. If they cannot, consumers will vote with their purchasing decisions without government collusion.”

“Poliquin’s reasoning is analogous to cutting off your arm at work and saying you’re not going to stanch the bleeding until you’ve worked out a new safety policy with management,” said Nye.

The Republican Liberty Caucus Board took its position against Poliquin because he applied voluntarily to seek the RLC endorsement and signed The Liberty Compact which reads, “I pledge to the citizens of this state, and to the American people, that as their elected representative I will work to: restore liberty, not restrict it; shrink government, not expand it; reduce taxes, not raise them; abolish programs, not create them; promote the freedom and independence of citizens, not the interference of government in their lives; and observe the limited, enumerated powers of the Constitution, not ignore them.”

Nye said Poliquin either does not believe in what he signed or he was duplicitous in asking for the RLC endorsement by claiming to be what he is not.

“Either way, we can no longer stand by him nor include him in our honorable list of endorsed elected officials which includes Rand Paul, Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, Justin Amash and many others who still stand on principles in their votes,” Nye said.

The Republican Party Deserves a New Speaker; Contact Your Representative Now!

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System Administrator
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At it’s last board meeting, the RLC National Board voted unanimously to encourage its members to contact their representatives to support anyone other than Speaker John Boehner in the upcoming House Speaker vote.

“In 2010 voters returned control of the House to the Republicans to help rein in President Obama and the Democrat agenda; in 2014 they returned control of the Senate to the Republicans for the same reason, yet somehow Speaker Boehner thought the message being sent was business as usual,” said RLC Chairman Matt Nye. “The passage of the ‘CRomnibus’ spending bill last month was a complete betrayal of those voters by House leadership, and must not go unanswered.”

“Even the most politically inept individual could see that all Republicans had to do to run the board was pass a short term continuing resolution funding government at the exact same levels until Republicans took control of the Senate in the new year. That Speaker Boehner chose to pass a spending bill for the entire year instead of waiting to control both chambers is illustrative of either a) complete alignment with the Democrats and President Obama or b) incompetence of an almost unimaginable magnitude,” Nye said. “Neither of those are qualities you want in an individual who holds the third most powerful position in the United States government.”

“We encourage our members in every state to contact their representatives and ask them to vote for anyone other than Speaker Boehner for the position of Speaker,” Nye said. “Boehner has proven time after time he is as out of touch with the average Republican voter as President Obama is out of touch with the average American.”

The House switchboard phone number is 202-224-3121.

RLC Urges Congress to Block Obama Proposed ‘Net Neutrality’ Rules

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The Republican Liberty Caucus has urged Congress to intervene to prevent the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) from adopting President Obama’s so-called “Net Neutrality” rules, which would stifle free speech, technological innovation and competition in the marketplace.

“Handing the keys to Internet access to corporate cronies in cahoots with government bureaucrats is anything but ‘neutral’,” said RLC National Chair Matt Nye of Florida. “This move will logically culminate with the free and open exchange of ideas being impeded by government agents presuming to deem what constitutes proper Internet content and at what speed you will be able to access it. It will violate First Amendment free speech as well as the free market competition that has made the Internet and all of the companies that thrive there the tremendous successes they are.”

Internet Service Providers (ISPs) are currently classified as information services under Title I of the Communications Act of 1934, but President Obama proposes that ISPs be reclassified as “information providers” under Title II, which would convert them to government-controlled public utilities. This would give the FCC power to regulate pricing and earnings as well as determine who could build digital networks.

“These rules would bestow inordinate power to appointed government czars to determine the players on the Web down to deciding the so-called fair rate of return on their revenues,” said Nye. “This will result in a small handful of mega-media conglomerates controlling access to Web content, freezing out the entrepreneurial small firms which are the fountainhead of technological innovation and creative content.”

“Once that happens, access pricing will increase which will have a chilling effect of freezing out web sites, blogs and other new media which are the basis of free expression and democratic debate,” Nye explained.

The RLC Statement of Principles includes the clause: “We oppose any restriction of free speech on the internet or in other media. We oppose any program to tax internet commerce or to tax or license website operators. We oppose efforts to limit the definition of journalism.” Nye said he spoke on behalf of the national organization to uphold those principles.

“The public voice must be heard loudly to protest this power grab to give the government control of the free exchange of ideas over the Web,” Nye said. “We urge citizens of all political persuasions to flood Congressional offices, the White House switchboard and the FCC headquarters with a clear message: ‘KEEP YOUR HANDS OFF OUR INTERNET ACCESS!’”

RLC PAC Donates $1000.00 to WV 2nd Congressional District Candidate Alex Mooney

By
Stephanie Butcher
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MARTINSBURG, WV – Delegate Larry D. Kump delivered a $1000.00 contribution from the Republican Liberty Caucus PAC to 2nd Congressional District Candidate Alex X. Mooney on Friday. The RLC officially endorsed Mooney in April.

“Having known Alex X. Mooney for many years, it was both a pleasure and a privilege when the West Virginia Republican Liberty Caucus asked me to present a campaign contribution to him,” said Delegate Larry D. Kump.

“The West Virginia Republican Liberty Caucus enthusiastically endorses the election of Alex Mooney as West Virginia’s next Congressman.

“We also endorse and applaud Alex’s principled commitment to individual liberty, personal accountability, and personal empowerment for all Mountaineers,” Kump stated.

The Republican Liberty Caucus is a 527 voluntary grassroots membership organization dedicated to working within the Republican Party to advance the principles of individual rights, limited government and free markets. Founded in 1991, it is the oldest continuously-operating organization within the Liberty Republican movement. Further information and membership to the Caucus may be obtained by visiting www.rlc.org

RLC Endorses Tom McMillin in Michigan’s 8th Congressional District

By
Laura Ebke
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EAST LANSING, MI- Today the Republican Liberty Caucus is pleased to announce the endorsement of Tom McMillin for Congress in Michigan’s 8th Congressional District. McMillin has served in the Michigan House of Representatives since 2008 and has a lengthy record of voting for fiscal responsibility and the preservation of individual Liberty.

Dennis Marburger, Michigan Republican and RLC Michigan board member said, “State Representative Tom McMillin has consistently fought for liberty in the Michigan Legislature, even when he was alone in his own party. He has led the fight against asset forfeiture,
NSA warrantless spying, NDAA indefinite detention, Common Core, Obamacare and fiscal recklessness. The good people of Michigan’s Eight District deserve a Defender of Liberty and oath keeper as a change of pace after all these years.”

Currently McMillian serves as Chair of the Oversight Committee in the Michigan House of Representatives. In addition to his outstanding work in that capacity, he also is an active member of the Education, Regulatory Reform and Financial Liability Reform committees.

“Tom McMillin is an outstanding candidate for Congress,” said RLC Chairman Matt Nye. “He has proven himself many times over to be a loyal defender of Liberty in the Michigan House. Residents of Michigan’s 8th Congressional District can vote for Tom with confidence. They know they have a statesman they can depend on to always work for them.”

McMillin earned a bachelor’s degree in accounting and economics from the University of Michigan. He is a certified public accountant with the knowledge, skills and experience necessary to tackle our complex budget, tax and national debt issues.

CISPA Returns as CISA – Take Action Today!

By
Laura Ebke
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CISPA is back and this time it’s loaded with additional 4th amendment violations to make it easier to catch the next Edward Snowden. The new bill is called The Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act of 2014 (‘CISA’) and it will hit the floor of the Senate next week. The Republican Liberty Caucus is part of a bipartisan coalition of groups concerned about civil liberties and committed to preserving the constitution which are committed to stopping this legislation.

According to the ACLU:

“The bill would create a massive loophole in our existing privacy laws by allowing the government to ask companies for ‘voluntary’ cooperation in sharing information, including the content of our communications, for cybersecurity purposes. But the definition they are using for the so-called ‘cybersecurity information’ is so broad it could sweep up huge amounts of innocent Americans’ personal data.

“The Fourth Amendment protects Americans’ personal data and communications from undue government access and monitoring without suspicion of criminal activity. The point of a warrant is to guard that protection. CISA would circumvent the warrant requirement by allowing the government to approach companies directly to collect personal information, including telephonic or internet communications, based on the new broadly drawn definition of ‘cybersecurity information.’”

We know from past experience the chilling effect which these ‘voluntary’ government programs have. Companies feel threatened and become overly cooperative and your data becomes incredibly vulnerable. This allows the government to get away with gross violations of you privacy and security without any search warrant or due process of law.

The government is not protecting your interests. They should be writing laws to provide additional security for your online communications making clear that the 4th amendment applies to them, not building a loophole to stop whistleblowers.

The Obama administration if not our friend on this so we need to stop it dead in the Senate. The ACLU points out that “The Obama Administration has brought more ‘leaks’ prosecutions against government whistleblowers and members of the press than all previous administrations combined…If misused by this or future administrations, CISA could eliminate due process protections for such investigations, which already favor the prosecution.”

We urge you to write your Senators. Click on the link below to go to the online tool for that purpose. Thanks to RLC Texas for getting us the text for this article.

http://libertyactioncenter.com/campaign/53c67c35-31d8-4cd1-b5e3-206532741282

RLC Endorses George Brikho in Michigan’s 9th Congressional District

By
Laura Ebke
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ROYAL OAK, MI – Today the Republican Liberty Caucus (RLC) is happy to announce the endorsement of George Brikho for Michigan’s 9th Congressional District. Brikho seeks to reign in bloated government spending, ease onerous regulations and restore essential liberty to citizens.

“George Brikho shares our core principles,” said RLC Chairman Matt Nye. “He is committed to limiting the size and scope of government. George shares our frustration with federal government run amok. He understands we must reform taxes and free markets in order to achieve prosperity for all Americans.”

In addition to economic issues, Brikho focuses heavily on civil liberty issues. He is an outspoken privacy advocate and a strong supporter of the rights of law-abiding Americans to bear arms, issues of critical importance to all voters.

“George Brikho loves Liberty, America, his family and his neighbors. That’s what motivates him to challenge political oligarch Sander Levin, the multi-decade incumbent congressman for Michigan’s Ninth District. George understands how and why the incumbent’s voting record and collaboration with the politically powerful special interests have hurt the ordinary people in Michigan,” explained RLC-MI Board member George Marburger.

The married father of three is a small business owner. For more information about the candidate visit georgebrikho.com.

RLC Endorses Rep. Kerry Bentivolio in Michigan’s 11th Congressional District

By
Laura Ebke
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MILFORD, MI. -The Republican Liberty Caucus is pleased to announce the endorsement of Congressman Kerry Bentivolio for a second term in Michigan’s 11th congressional district. The Congressman also received the RLC endorsement during his successful 2012 run.

“The RLC is proud to endorse Congressman Bentivolio once again,” said RLC Chairman Matt Nye. “He is willing to challenge not only the Democrats in Congress, but the establishment Republicans who sometimes lose focus and fail us on important liberty issues.”

Bentivolio serves on the Small Business Committee as well as the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. A member of the Congressional Sportsman’s Caucus, he has worked tirelessly to preserve our rights under the 2nd Amendment.

“We look forward to continuing our relationship with Kerry Bentivolio. He is an ally of the RLC who shares our core principles. The RLC knows Congressman Bentivolio will always fight to reduce the size and scope of government. He stands up for our civil liberties,” stated Nye. “Voters know they can count on Congressman Bentivolio to obey the Constitution.”

Kerry Bentivolio has an extensive resume that includes service in the US Army during the Vietnam War and over 20 years as a member of the Michigan Army National Guard. He earned a Masters of Education from Marygrove College and taught English and history for many years on both public and private school. He and his wife, Karen, reside on a small farm in Milford.

Labrador for Majority Leader!

By
Laura Ebke
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The Republican Liberty Caucus (RLC) announced a resolution of its National Board, today, urging Rep. Raul Labrador of Idaho to run for Majority Leader of the House.

“Labrador’s election as Majority Leader,” according to RLC National Chair Matt Nye, “would represent an acknowledgement by House members that Eric Cantor’s primary loss last week is a sign that new ideas are gaining influence in the Party. More and more, Republicans are asking that the Party return to its small government roots, and Labrador represents that element of the Party well.”

After Labrador’s name was mentioned as a potential candidate for Majority Leader, the RLC National Board looked at the options, reviewed Labrador’s history—which includes a 90% rating on the RLC’s most recent Liberty Index—and determined that Labrador was an exceptional candidate for the position.

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