Gary Marx

Christian Coalition 2.0, Or The Triumphant Return of Ralph Reed

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on June 23, 2009 - 12:26pm

Literally, just yesterday as I was doing my right-wing monitoring, I thought to myself "you know who's name I never see any more? Ralph Reed."

And for good reason, given his deep ties to Jack Abramoff. Actually, the last time he made any news was when he was forced to skip a fund-raiser with John McCain last year thanks to the fact that he has been permanently tainted by his association with Abramoff.

But, as Dan Gilgoff reports, Reed is now back with a new organization called The Faith and Freedom Coalition:

Ralph Reed, the Republican operative who built the Christian Coalition into a potent political force in the 1990s by mobilizing evangelicals and other religious conservatives and who did similar work to help George W. Bush win two presidential elections, is quietly launching a group aimed at using the Web to mobilize a new generation of values voters. In addition to targeting the GOP's traditional faith-based allies—white evangelicals and observant Catholics—the group, called the Faith and Freedom Coalition, will reach out to Democratic-leaning constituencies, including Hispanics, blacks, young people, and women.

"This is not your daddy's Christian Coalition," Reed said in an interview Monday. "It's got to be more brown, more black, more female, and younger. It's critical that we open the door wide and let them know if they share our values and believe in the principles of faith and marriage and family, they're welcome."

"There's a whole rising generation of young leaders in the faith community, and rather than nab the publicity I did at Christian Coalition, I want to cultivate and train that rising generation," Reed said. "One question is, who is our future Barack Obama, doing local organizing just like he was in the 1990s?"

The Faith and Freedom Coalition has been quietly active for a few weeks but has attracted no news media notice so far. Reed said that was intentional: "We're less focused on the pyrotechnics than on being a strong grass-roots presence all the way down to the precinct level, which has always been my emphasis."

The idea for the new group, which is still hashing out an organizational blueprint, was born just after Election Day 2008, when exit polls showed that Obama made gains among traditionally Republican religious constituencies, including evangelicals, conservative Catholics, and frequent churchgoers. "Since I left the Christian Coalition, we haven't had an engine designed to turn out this large part of the vote," Reed said. "After the election, people said that I ought to consider doing something about it."

Of course, the Christian Coalition was the engine that turned out "values voters," but it faltered under Reed's control. When he finally jumped ship to launch his own consulting and PR operation and "start humping in corporate accounts,” the organization all but collapsed.

Gilgoff reports that this new effort also features Gary Marx - who happens to be a long-time associate of Reed's and the current Executive Director of the Judicial Confirmation Network - and that, for now, the organization is operating out of his Century Strategies office in Atlanta:

Reed is serving as chairman of the Faith and Freedom Coalition and says he has filed papers with the Internal Revenue Service to register it as a 501(c)(4), a tax-free designation that permits lobbying and certain political activities. Gary Marx, Reed's deputy at the 2004 Bush campaign and Mitt Romney's conservative outreach director in 2008, will help advise the group. Jack St. Martin, a former top Republican National Committee staffer, is running day-to-day operations.

The Faith and Freedom Coalition plans to launch state and local chapters, as the Christian Coalition did, but is exploring the idea of organizing as much via "virtual chapters" that would operate online with the help of social networking technology. "The Internet's first wave was E-mail, and the next wave was social networking, which Obama perfected," Reed said. "There's going to be a third wave, which we're still developing."

...

Headquartered in the offices of Reed's consulting firm, Century Strategies, near Atlanta, the group plans to open a Washington office but says it will keep its staff small. St. Martin is currently the only full-time employee. "We don't want the huge overhead of a centralized group," says St. Martin, who worked at the Christian Coalition in the 1990s. "We'll have a few generals, but at the end of the day, we're going to emphasize putting boots on the ground out in the field."

Everything about this effort is pure Ralph Reed. From the focus on grassroots mobilization to his use of military language, it sounds like Reed is breaking out his Christian Coalition era playbook and seeking to recapture his former glory, even going so far as to dust off his efforts to reach out to minority groups, which, as I explained in a report [PDF] I wrote about him several years back that chronicled his rise from the College Republicans through his Abramoff-related downfall, is exactly what he tried and failed to do during his last days with the Christian Coalition:

In 1996, in an attempt to reach out to religious African American voters and bring them into the right wing movement, Reed announced that the Coalition was going to raise one million dollars to help rebuild black churches in the South that had been destroyed in a series of fire bombings. What had initially been planned as a one-day fundraising event ended up taking seven months. Similarly, Reed announced in 1997 the creation of the Samaritan Project, “A bold plan to break the color line and bridge the gap that separates white evangelicals and Roman Catholics from their Latino and African American brothers and sisters.” Reed pledged that the Coalition would raise $10 million for inner city churches, but less than a year later the project was abandoned after raising less than $50,000.

The simple point needs to be made that Reed, the man once dubbed "the Right Hand of God," had been seening his star dim even before he left the Christian Coalition and that the influence and power he had accumulated over the years all but evaporated when his efforts to exploit his Religious Right allies for Jack Abramoff's business purposes were finally revealed, culminating in his failed campaign to secure the Republican nomination for Lieutenant Governor in Georgia.

But, as we pointed out in our report: "Reed is still young and American politics is full of redemption stories. No doubt Reed is already writing his."

And with the announcement of this new effort, it looks like that is exactly what he is undertaking now.

Kyle Mantyla's blog

PFAW

Filed under:

SCOTUS Round-Up

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on May 18, 2009 - 9:56am

Several related articles today, all pretty much saying the same thing: even though right-wing groups are doubtful that they’ll actually be able to defeat President Obama’s Supreme Court nominee, they are raising lots of money to try and do so anyway and, in doing so, hope to make it an issue in the 2010 elections.

The New York Times:

While conservatives say they know they have little chance of defeating Mr. Obama’s choice because Democrats control the Senate, they say they hope to mount a fight that could help refill depleted coffers and galvanize a movement demoralized by Republican electoral defeats.

“It’s an immense opportunity to build the conservative movement and identify the troops out there,” said Richard A. Viguerie, a conservative fund-raiser. “It’s a massive teaching moment for America. We’ve got the packages written. We’re waiting right now to put a name in.”

Gary Marx, executive director of the conservative Judicial Confirmation Network, said donors, whom he declined to identify, had committed to contributing millions of dollars for television, radio and Internet advertisements that might reunite conservatives in a confirmation battle.

Conservatives face big obstacles, though, in rousing supporters or spurring Republican lawmakers to mount an all-out fight.

The movement is much diminished from four years ago under President George W. Bush, when Supreme Court vacancies last arose and conservatives marshaled their forces to champion his nominees. (Judge Richard Posner, a prominent Reagan appointee, wrote recently that the conservative movement suffers from “intellectual deterioration.”) Republicans have lost control of the White House and Congress, have no clear party leader and have received low approval ratings.

And some leading groups are having budget woes. Focus on the Family, a Colorado-based evangelical group led by the semi-retired James C. Dobson, rallied social conservatives in support of Mr. Bush’s judicial nominees, but it recently cut more than 200 jobs.

The conservative movement is sharing its resources as it prepares for the nomination. The Judicial Action Group, founded in 2006 and based in Alabama, has organized a research network — dubbed the Supreme Court Review Committee — of about 15 “pro-family ministries” and conservative legal groups, said Phillip Jauregui, president of the group.

…

Manuel Miranda, who has led conference calls for conservative groups about judges, said the focus on such issues would present “a great opportunity to really prepare the great debate with a view toward Senate elections in 2010 and the presidency.”

“It isn’t just about the nominee,” he said. “It’s about the fact that the American people gave control of presidency to a Democrat who will appoint a certain type of judge and the Senate that will most likely rubber stamp that choice.”

Bruce Hausknecht, judicial analyst for Focus on the Family’s political arm, said he believed that despite conservatives’ recent political troubles in other arenas, the public still prefers their judicial philosophy.

“This is an issue that if Americans focus on it, it will bring out their conservative side,” he said. “And that could help the political fortunes of conservatives in the future.”

The Washington Times:

Republicans are going on offense to tarnish potential Supreme Court justice hopefuls, attempting to spark an early fight over President Obama's first nomination to the high court.

…

Wendy Long and Gary Marx of the Judicial Confirmation Network penned a memo for activists on the issue last week, predicting, "The first Obama nominee to the Supreme Court will be hailed by Democrats, liberal interest groups and many in the media as a 'moderate.' No matter how liberal, activist, or extreme she may be."

They said they have crafted a video to "expose the liberal activist records of those who have been named as front-runners to fill Justice [David H.] Souter's seat."

Scott Wheeler, executive director for the National Republican Trust PAC, sent a letter to Republican senators, warning that activists "will hold them accountable" for the nomination process, so they should "keep steadfast and stay true to your Republican conservative values and beliefs."

Mr. Wheeler also went after Mr. Obama's empathy standards, saying that because they "have nothing to do with interpreting the law or the rule of law ... It is up to you and your fellow Republican colleagues to stop such a nomination."

The Washington Independent:

Conservatives, on the other hand, have a number of catch phrases they want to apply to Supreme Court nominees. “We will continue to be using the metaphor of the neutral umpire,” said Marx, echoing the language used by now-Chief Justice John Roberts in his 2005 confirmation hearing. Marx listed two other qualifications a justice should possess: “judicial restraint” and “not legislating from the bench.”

He also pulled out a Biblical reference to make his point. King Solomon, he said, did not need “empathy” or “compassion” to resolve the famous baby case. “Was that compassionate?” he asked rhetorically. “No, it was wisdom.”

Despite their success in determining which terms have come to dominate the debate, conservatives acknowledge that their purpose may not be so much to block the confirmation of a justice as to score political and perhaps fundraising points for future elections.

Marx says that the confirmation debate will have “three huge implications”: it will educate the American people about the issues, help them understand Obama’s true political philosophy and set the stage for the 2010 U.S. Senate campaigns.

According to [Brian Darling of the Heritage Foundtion], the effects of this battle could extend to 2012 as well. “Whoever this nominee’s going to be,” he said, “if the court moves forward on gay marriage or restricts the Second Amendment or goes forward with another change that’s unpopular among the American public… that’s something that will affect the president’s reelection bid.”

Still, the game is likely to change considerably when Obama announces his nominee. “To be honest, I think this is all noise,” Darling conceded. “It will become completely irrelevant when the nominee is put forth.”

Finally, the Right sees signs of hope for its chances of stopping Obama’s SCOTUS nominee in their obstruction of Dawn Johnsen’s confirmation:

Curt Levey, executive director of the Committee for Justice, says the stalled Johnsen nomination should send President Obama the message that he does not have a free hand to appoint someone "extreme" to the Supreme Court, even when there are 59 or 60 Democrats in the Senate.

"Dawn Johnsen was an executive branch appointee to the Department of Justice. They get more deference, not less, from the Senate than judicial nominees," he notes. "So, if he were to appoint somebody anywhere near as extreme as Dawn Johnsen to the Supreme Court, the nominee would very likely not be confirmed by the Senate."

A bold but unlikely pick for Obama, according to Levey, would be black Georgia Supreme Court Chief Justice Leah Ward Sears, who is a friend of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas and is more moderate than the other potential High Court picks whose names have been floated.

Kyle Mantyla's blog

PFAW

Filed under:

SCOTUS: Daly Returns As The Right Plots Strategy

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on May 1, 2009 - 2:05pm

I've been wondering why the Right's public response to the news that David Souter will be retiring has been almost non-existent. The news broke last night and yet very few right-wing groups have even bothered to so much as issue a statement - but, it turns out, that was probably because they have been busy plotting and coordinating their strategy:

Conservative groups worked into the night Thursday after news broke of Justice David Souter’s retirement to arrange a conference call early Friday morning to talk strategy with representatives of more than 60 groups.

Leaders on the call, such as Wendy Long of the Judicial Confirmation Network, told colleagues that one of their first challenges is convincing activists there is a fight to be had.

"One thing to keep in mind is that the left and media will say this doesn't really matter — Obama will just replace a liberal with a liberal,” Long said. “It's a conservative court. We need to push back against that immediately.”

Curt Levy, also of the Judicial Confirmation Network, argued to the nearly 200 activists on the conference call that this can "be a winning issue" for conservatives if they focus on what he called the "right issues" such as same sex marriage, death penalty and the Second Amendment — issues that can split Democrats.

"If [President Obama] was to nominate somebody who was anti-death penalty, pro-gay marriage, you know - took a very extreme view on the separation of church and state, etc, or against any restriction on partial birth abortion… I think this could really be a 70-30 type issue for the Republican Party." said Levy, meaning it would have 70 percent support from Republicans.

Conservative activists also made it clear that they're concerned about whether Republican senators have the stomach for this fight, since they know going in that Democrats have a nearly filibuster proof majority.

"We've really got to make it clear that we have certain expectations for Republican senators," Levy said, "Including the fact that they study the nominee and not run to the podium to endorse the nominee whoever it is.”

Another member of the Judicial Confirmation Network, Gary Marx, said he has the same concerns.

"We need to really be focused on putting wind in the sails of these Republican senators at this stage of the battle," said Marx.

The Hill has a similar article that quotes Kay Daly of the Coalition for a Fair Judicairy, of all people, and treats her organization as if it is actually legitimate:

Groups like the American Center for Law & Justice, the Coalition for a Fair Judiciary and the Committee for Justice will all prepare background research on potential nominees, setting up the eventual, inevitable attacks on the nominee as a left-wing extremist.

...

Though the new nominee is still unnamed, several top Republican operatives are already sending background documents to reporters, questioning oft-mentioned candidates' fitness for the highest court in the nation.

"Part of our strategy was already done," said Curt Levey, executive director of the Committee for Justice. "We have all our research memos done on all the top people."

Early front-runners for the bogeyman nod have cropped up: Darling mentioned Yale University Law School Dean Harold Koh, whom he called "very extreme." Sekulow specifically called out 2nd Circuit Appeals Court Judge Sonia Sotomayor, an early favorite for the nod, as "to the left of David Souter."

"This is not my ideal situation," said Kay Daly, president of the Coalition for a Fair Judiciary. "Obama could conceivably put a justice onto the bench that literally would make Souter look like [Associate Justice Antonin] Scalia."

I just wrote a post about Daly and her Coalition for a Fair Judiciary a few weeks ago, noting that she and her "organization" had been utterly non-existent for more than two years until she suddenly popped up last month, after which she immediately went silent once again:

Daly’s tagline says that she is “president of the Coalition for a Fair Judiciary,” which, while true, is something of a truism considering that CFJ’s staff has always consisted solely of Daly.

And, of course, her exhortations and claims to represent grassroots activists might carry more weight if she hadn’t been completely AWOL for the last several years.

A quick look at her website reveals that the organization has not issued a press release since November 2006, nor has any of its data on judicial confirmations been updated since the 109th Congress, while it’s “Judicial Appointments Status Report” is current as of 10/18/2006. In fact, everything on its website is at least two years out of date. Even Daly’s blog goes dormant for months at a time, with her last post having gone up back in October until she returned today to let everyone know that she had a new piece in Human Events.

As I said then, "like cicadas, these right-wing groups emerge, make a loud racket for a short period of time and then all but disappear, only to re-emerge down the road and start the whole process over again."

I, for one, genuinely hope that the Right puts Daly and her "organization" in charge preparing background on potential Obama nominees because, given her track record, she'll probably get around to releasing it some time in 2011.

For those unfamiliar with Daly, she also just so happens to be the one responsible for producing the infamous ads from Vernon Robinson back in 2006:

Kyle Mantyla's blog

PFAW

Filed under:

Will the Judicial Confirmation Network Stick to its Pledge?

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on January 21, 2009 - 5:30pm

Shortly after the election, we noted that the Judicial Confirmation Network, which had been founded with the express purpose of helping to get President Bush’s judicial nominees confirmed, was starting to sing a different tune, proclaiming that the burden would now be upon President Obama and his nominees to prove that they are qualified to sit upon the federal bench and issuing an ominous warning that “senators will be accountable for [their] votes.”

At the time, it appeared as if the JCN’s mission was about to shift from one of working to get judges confirmed to one of working to ensure that they didn’t get confirmed. But in a letter to the editor in the Washington Times, JCN Executive Director Gary Marx says that under President Obama the organization’s mission will remain the same:

The Judicial Confirmation Network was founded, in part, to support the principle that every nominee who goes to the full Senate deserves an up-or-down vote. We did not support this principle out of some amorphous notion of "bipartisanship," but rather, we believe it is the duty of the Senate to perform its constitutional role in the judicial-selection process. The Constitution is quite clear on this role, and nowhere does it require a supermajority for confirmation of the president's nominees.

If the Senate abides by the historical procedural rules governing the confirmation process, the Judicial Confirmation Network intends to stick to its principles and urge up-or-down votes - even on nominees we may oppose. It would be quite understandable if Republican senators felt otherwise - most have had extensive experience with Democratic promises of reciprocity.

Of course, the meaning of this pledge relies heavily on what Marx considers to be “the historical procedural rules governing the confirmation process” – Curt Levey of the equally right-wing Committee for Justice suggests that Marx means “those rules include respect for blue slip privileges.”

So now the question becomes which “historical procedural rules” regarding the blue slip does Marx mean; the rules Republicans had in place when Bill Clinton was President or the different ones they implemented when George W. Bush became president?

It was, on the whole, an unusual display of Democratic solidarity. On April 27, all nine Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee -- backed, according to ranking member Patrick Leahy, by the entire Democratic caucus -- signed a letter to White House counsel Alberto Gonzales about George W. Bush's proposed nominations to the federal bench. "We are not going to be rolled over," promised New York's Charles Schumer, who called the letter a "shot across the bow." The confirmation process, warned Leahy, "may grind to a screeching halt."

But not because Gonzales and Judiciary Committee Chairman Orrin Hatch were planning to fill several dozen of the nearly 100 vacancies on the federal bench with staunch conservatives. No, the offense at hand was far more grave: At a confirmation hearing in early April, Hatch had hinted that he might change an obscure policy called the "blue slip," which senators have traditionally used to exercise near-veto power over judicial nominees. During the Clinton years, any one senator could block any candidate from his or her home state (by refusing to return a memo of approval printed, literally, on a blue slip of paper); under George W. Bush, Hatch informed the Democrats, a veto would require the opposition of both home-state senators -- a substantial dilution of a treasured prerogative of office.

The JCN says it will continue to press for up-or-down votes on judges that it opposes and so, for now, we’ll just have to take them at their word despite that fact that it seems exceedingly unlikely that it will actually do so once the battle over judicial nominations inevitably heats up.

Kyle Mantyla's blog

PFAW

Filed under:

If You Can't Beat 'Em, Pretend to Join 'Em

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on March 19, 2008 - 3:13pm

With the passing of right-wing luminaries such as Jerry Falwell and D. James Kennedy in recent months, coupled with the aging of many of the Right’s traditional leaders, the movement itself appears to be in flux and some are getting worried about just what will become of it in the future. Just last week, James Dobson voiced these concerns while addressing the National Religious Broadcasters Convention:

“It causes me to wonder who will be left to carry the banner when this generation of leaders is gone. The question is, will the younger generation heed the call? Who will defend the unborn child in the years to come? Who will plead for the Terri Schiavos of the world? Who’s going to fight for the institution of marriage, which is on the ropes today.”

The emerging conventional wisdom is that the Religious Right is on the verge of being replaced by a “new evangelical” movement that shares the old-guard’s opposition to gays and abortion, but also cares about issues like poverty and the environment. The standard-bearer of this “new breed” is Mike Huckabee who, as he puts it, drinks “a different kind of Jesus juice” than the traditional leaders and routinely says things like this:

I don’t see [the right-wing movement] going into decline. I see it going into a maturing process. I think the issues are going to broaden and force Evangelicals to expand their horizons of concerns to poverty, disease, issues of education and homelessness. These are issues that I think are going to become increasingly important along with the environment as part of an overall focus that you’re going to see from - I would use a broader term - values voters - that would include not only Evangelicals but also Catholics and conservative Jewish voters as well.

Of course, just because a bunch of young upstarts think that caring about the environment is important doesn’t mean that the old-guard has any interest in broadening their agenda. As we noted last year, when the National Association of Evangelicals started to voice concerns about the environment and global warming, right-wing stalwarts like Dobson, Tony Perkins, Don Wildmon, Gary Bauer, Rick Scarborough, and Paul Weyrich dashed off an angry letter essentially demanding that the NAE fire its own Vice President over it.

The NAE didn’t back down, but the Right didn’t give up. Instead, they formed their own organization, the American Environmental Coalition, and now seek "to bring balance to the debate by being an alternative source of reliable information to Americans who seek the best way forward for our country.”

PFAW

Filed under:

Playing the Racist Card, Again

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on October 15, 2007 - 3:23pm

It seems as if Gary Marx has managed to pull himself away from his $8,000-a-month position with Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign to pen an action alert in his capacity as Executive Director of the Judicial Confirmation Network to urge supporters to contact their senators and demand a vote on the nomination of Leslie Southwick:

The Liberal Left led by Senator Ted Kennedy, Minority Leader Harry Reid, and People for the American Way will stop at nothing in order to keep common sense constitutionalist judges like Leslie Southwick off the bench. Ultimately, their unprecedented judicial filibusters are a backdoor political sabotage to manipulate the Senate rules. Their goal is to create a radical new precedent where for the first time in history a future Supreme Court nominee like Justice Roberts or Alito will be forced to receive 60 votes for confirmation rather than a simple and fair majority vote.

The vote on whether to filibuster Judge Southwick is likely to occur this week ... possibly as early as Wednesday. This is our last chance to make our voice heard. The time to call your Senators' offices is today!

Marx then encourages activists to take the time to read an op-ed penned by his partner at the JCN, Wendy Long - who, like Marx, serves on Romney’s National Faith and Values Steering Committee – in which she trots out the Right’s standard claim that those who raise concerns about Southwick’s judicial record and philosophy are really just calling Southwick a racist:

Just when you thought "white male in the South" didn't equal "presumptive racist," a disgusting spectacle with that familiar theme is unfolding in the United States Senate.

…

[Senator Richard] Durbin is doing essentially what [Duke Prosecutor Mike] Nifong and [Al] Sharpton did: attacking someone else as a racist in order to advance his own political agenda. Never mind the facts, never mind the law, just play the race card against a white man in the south and you know you have a good chance to bring him down.

It seems that whenever anyone dares to oppose any of President Bush’s judicial nominees, the Right sees some nefarious ulterior motive at work – and that is how they manage to convince themselves that opposition to Southwick stems not from concerns about his record but from some sort of deep-seeded hatred of Southern white males … the same way they said opposition to Miguel Estrada was really due to anti-Latino prejudice … and opposition to Priscilla Owen was the result of flagrant anti-woman bias … and opposition to William Pryor was actually due to anti-Catholic bigotry … and opposition to Janice Rogers Brown was in actuality rooted in racism.

PFAW

Filed under:

Romney Names High-Profile Supporters to Religious-Right Committee

Submitted by Anonymous on June 18, 2007 - 4:00pm

Mitt Romney has been aggressively courting the Religious Right for months, slowly recruiting supporters from among the cadre of full-time activists. Earlier this year he scored Pat Robertson’s superlawyer Jay Sekulow, along with Gary Marx of the Judicial Confirmation Network and James Bopp, a prominent anti-abortion attorney.

Last week Romney’s campaign announced the formation of its National Faith and Values Steering Committee, a list of 50 better- and lesser- known religious-right figures. Among the co-chairmen of the committee are Sekulow, Marx, Bopp, Matthew Spaulding of the Heritage Foundation, Barbara Comstock of the Susan B. Anthony List (an anti-abortion PAC), and Jack Templeton, head of the Templeton Foundation and Let Freedom Ring – suggesting the kind of “values” Romney hopes to be absorbing from this caucus.

Most newsworthy was the endorsement of Lou Sheldon, head of the Traditional Values Coalition and one of the most fervently anti-gay activists in the country. Nicknamed “Lucky Louie” by imprisoned lobbyist Jack Abramoff, who directed a gambling company to donate generously to TVC in exchange for support on legislation, Sheldon is the author of “The Agenda: The Homosexual Plan to Change America,” an agenda he describes as “an attack on everything our Founding Fathers hoped to give us,” consisting of Hitler-like propaganda designed to “recruit” children. “As Homosexuals continue to make inroads into public schools, more children will be molested and indoctrinated into the world of homosexuality. Many of them will die in that world,” he wrote in one “special report.”

"When I give my support for a candidate, I am giving the green light, if he wins, all the way down the line in terms of so many moral and social issues," Sheldon recently said. Sheldon joined other big-name religious-right leaders in a meeting with Romney last fall, and he recently met with the candidate for five hours, leaving with a promise that Romney would swear his oath of office on the Bible, not the Book of Mormon. “My thinking is that Mitt Romney is a person with the experience and with the Jude[o-]Christian moral values,” Sheldon told CBN’s David Brody, adding that he’d “been around Mormons long enough to know that … they are sincere about” Jesus.

Other religious-right activists on Romney’s committee include Christian Coalition board member Drew McKissic, Jay Sekulow’s son Jordan, anti-immigration writer James Edwards, and leaders or activists associated with the Alliance Defense Fund, Iowa Christian Alliance (formerly the Christian Coalition of Iowa), Heartbeat International, Legacy Law Foundation, and Citizens for Traditional Values.

PFAW

Filed under:

Romney Positioning Himself on the Right

Submitted by Kyle Mantyla on February 2, 2007 - 3:10pm

It is no secret that many on the right have been wary of Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney’s presidential aspirations and remains unconvinced by his recent claims that he is a champion of their cause. It is also no surprise that, because of this, Romney has been doing all that he can to win them over.

Since appearing alongside the likes of Tony Perkins, Bishop Wellington Boone, James Dobson, Don Wildmon, and others at the Family Research Council’s “Liberty Sunday,” Romney has steadily been working to establish his right-wing bona-fides.

For example, he recently signed the “Taxpayer’s Protection Pledge” put out by Grover Norquist’s Americans for Tax Reform, as did Sen. Sam Brownback. In addition, Romney has begun stacking his exploratory committee with right-wing activists such as Gary Marx of the Judicial Confirmation Network and Jay Sekulow of Pat Robertson’s American Center for Law and Justice.

Joining Marx and Sekulow will be James Bopp, a right-wing powerhouse whose list of clients, according to his biography, reads like a who’s who of the Right:

[T]he National Right to Life Committee, Focus on the Family, Susan B. Anthony List, All Children Matter, Catholic Answers, Christian Broadcasting Network, Gerard Health Foundation, Priests for Life, Traditional Values Coalition, Salem Radio, Vision America, the Christian Coalition, and the Republican parties of Indiana, Michigan, Minnesota, Rhode Island, Texas, and Vermont. He has argued numerous campaign finance cases in defense of pro-life, pro-family, conservative and Republican party groups, including four cases in the U.S. Supreme Court. He also serves as General Counsel for the James Madison Center for Free Speech and is a member of the Republican National Committee.

Romney is clearly competing with Sen. Brownback and the newly announced campaign from Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee for the support of the GOP’s most right-wing activists. And since Brownback and Huckabee are considered long-shots, at best, Romney is quietly positioning himself to be the Right’s candidate-of-choice when the GOP primary field begins to narrow, giving him a distinct advantage over the other front-runners, Sen. John McCain and former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani.