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Making an Impact
“The Lone Star Project … hammers Republicans whenever it gets a chance, promoting strong local Democratic candidates and even bringing lawsuits.”
(Roll Call, Stuart Rothenberg,
March 12, 2009)
“Anyone who questions whether [The Lone Star Project] can make life difficult for a Republican legislator should talk to former Sen. Kim Brimer.”
(Austin American Statesman, February 17, 2009)
“[The Lone Star Project] is responsible for the aggressive stance the party has taken toward DeLay and other Lone Star State Republicans since the 2004 election.”
(The Washington Post, March 6, 2006)
"David Dewhurst has said most Texans don't have much sympathy "for someone who that can't fill out a two page [health insurance] application every six months".
The Democrat-supported Lone Star Project in Washington reported this week that Dewhurst failed to file necessary forms at least six times in recent years.
(San Antonio Expres News,, 4/12/2007)
"The Justice staff memo was obtained by the Lone Star Project ...The story broke the same day the U.S. Supreme Court was considering legal challenges to the plan brought by Democrats and minority groups."
(Houston Chronicle, 12/3/2005)
"The Texas chapter of the NAACP, along with the Lone Star Project, have analyzed the amicus brief filed by the Justice Department and have concluded, justifiably, that the Voting Rights section of the Justice Department is now controlled by partisan political appointees."
(Roll Call - Donna Brazile, 2/28/2006)
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Will Republicans Pull the Plug on Pete?
Even John Cornyn questions Sessions after latest gaffe
The bar was set low for Pete Sessions (R-Dallas) when he took over as campaign leader for Congressional Republicans. His party lost the majority in 2006 and gave up another 21 seats in 2008. Even so, Sessions has managed to dramatically underachieve since his appointment to head the NRCC. In fact, a series of embarrassing public comments, his failure to gain financial support from colleagues and donors, and the loss of a Congressional special election where Republicans had a clear advantage certainly call Sessions’ competence into question - and make it fair to wonder whether he will survive in his current post. Even prominent fellow Republicans are shaking their heads trying to figure out Pete Sessions' bizarre comments. After Sessions spun a wild conspiracy theory earlier this week claiming that President Obama wanted to sabotage the economy, fellow Texan and Senate Republican Campaign Chairman, John Cornyn, flatly rejected the odd-ball theory, saying "I don’t know where he’s coming from," and that “I’d like some sort of clarification about what he meant.” (Source: The Dallas Morning News, May 13, 2009) It has gotten so bad for Sessions that this week Democrats began referencing his antics in fundraising letters. (Source: Congressional Quarterly, May 14, 2009) It's still early in the 2010 election cycle and national Republicans have a high level of tolerance for wacky statements and political incompetence. Just the same, like a baseball team that must change managers before the season gets out of hand, Republican leaders may need to reconsider their choice of Pete Sessions as Chair of the National Republican Campaign Committee.
| Sessions fumbles golden open seat opportunity
When Hillary Clinton was appointed Secretary of State, it set in motion a series of political events that should have played out to Pete Sessions’ advantage. The Governor of New York filled Mrs. Clinton’s vacant Senate seat with Congresswoman Kirsten Gillibrand, who represented an upstate New York Congressional District where there are 70,000 more registered Republicans than Democrats (Source: The Hill, April 25, 2009). The open seat congressional election was a great opportunity for Sessions and Congressional Republicans to fight on friendly ground and take back a House seat. Despite this advantage, under Sessions’ leadership, the NRCC was never able to get the Republican campaign to settle on a clear message and was outflanked by a more nimble and more disciplined Democratic campaign. Still clueless after losing a race he should have won, Sessions said he would use the same losing strategy in future campaigns, commenting that "Although Jim was unsuccessful in his hope to change Washington, he has shed light on our Party's efforts to win back the majority in the House." (Source: The Washington Post, April 24, 2009)
GOP should have known better
Perhaps the Republican leadership failed to vet Pete Sessions before handing him the political reins at the NRCC. Throughout his political career, Pete Sessions has underperformed politically, made odd public statements and shown bad political judgment:
- Underperformer: During the '90's, Sessions lost two congressional races. In 2004 in a district custom-drawn for him, Sessions ran well behind George W. Bush. (Source: Texas Legislative Council)
- Stupid stunts: Despite holding a huge lead in a safe Republican district, Pete Sessions was stopped by the police for stealing his opponent’s yard signs. (Source: TX-32: Pete Sessions busted stealing opponents signs)
- Home county turned Blue: After Democrats swept the Republicans in Dallas County in 2006, Sessions took the political lead for local Republicans and hand-picked the County Party chair. The results were a disaster. Under Sessions' leadership, local Republican candidates have lost every single contested county-wide race in Sessions’ home base. (Sources: Houston Chronicle, November 8, 2008 and Dallas Observer, December 3, 2008)
| Members and donors “dissing” Sessions
The most important job of a congressional campaign committee chair in the minority party is to restore faith and trust among donors and win the support of colleagues by convincing them to contribute to the campaign committee. So far, Sessions has failed at both:
- This past fundraising cycle, the National Republican Campaign Committee raised just $2.03 million – compared to the $3.5 million the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee raised during the same period. The DCCC still has a $1 million cash on hand advantage over the NRCC, which is, according to Politico, “a signal that Republicans still have a lot of work to do to catch up to the Democratic fundraising machine.” (Source: Politico, March 23, 2009)
- The NRCC hasn’t even been able to raise money from its own caucus, as only one member of the leadership and only two of the ranking committee members have contributed. (Source: The Hill, April 22, 2009)
Pete praises the Taliban
Before the ink was dry on his new NRCC letterhead, Sessions embarrassed himself, his constituents and congressional Republicans by saying that his party would adopt Taliban tactics to confront their political opponents.
- On February 5, Sessions told Hotline: "Insurgency, we understand perhaps a little bit more because of the Taliban...And that is that they went about systematically understanding how to disrupt and change a person's entire processes… And we need to understand that insurgency may be required when the other side, the House leadership, does not follow the same commands, which we entered the game with." (Source: Hotline, February 5, 2009)
- Even Republican pundits distanced themselves from Sessions, as former GOP Congressman and current MSNBC host Joe Scarborough said, “I don’t really think it would be good to run in 2010 with a party that is actively associating itself with the Taliban.” (Source: Politico, February 10, 2009)
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