Archive for the ‘Tea Party’ Category

Court names the 20 people who wanted to toss Arizona elections, put themselves in office – The Arizona Republic

Had the case gone their way, Arizona would have seen the inauguration ofGov. Bradley James Burchfield, Phoenix Mayor Samantha Nicole Arrey and Maricopa County Sheriff Brian Steiner.

Those three were among the 20 people who filed a request with the Arizona Supreme Court that the past two general elections be invalidated and certain people who won their seats in those contests be tossed out of office. In their place, the group offered to install themselves as temporary caretakers until a proper election could be held.

The group initially filed its petition anonymously, its names under seal by its request.

However, the Arizona Supreme Court, in a Wednesday ruling, ordered the names be made public. A document was unsealed Thursday that revealed the names.

None appear to be recognizable political figures in Arizona.

Arizona Supreme Court at 1501 W. Washington St. in Phoenix.(Photo: Patrick Breen/The Republic)

QAnon appears at election audit: Did QAnon sneak in (or get invited) to Arizona's sham election audit?

The group filed the papers under the name: We The People of the State of Arizona. But a spokesperson for the group had said that was meant as a generic description, not a proper name.

The spokesperson said this group had no affiliation with the pro-Trump political group We The People, which has also been a champion of the Arizona State Senate-ordered audit of all 2.1 million ballots cast in Maricopa County.

This group had asked for anonymity for security reasons. In its filing, it said the members understood that their names would be public should the court act on the petition and entertain installing the members into public office.

Once in office, the group argued in a motion, their public stature "would have provided a measure of safety in itself."

The Arizona Supreme Court dismissed the case three business days after it was filed. It then gave the group a deadline to file a motion explaining why the individual's names needed to be kept from public view. After receiving that motion on Monday, the court rejected the request on Wednesday and ordered the names be made available.

The group's novel petition suggested that a slew of office holders who won election in the 2018and 2020elections, as well as the 2019 Tucson mayoral election, were holding their office improperly. The group offered a novel solution: to take the place of what it called usurpers until a proper election could be held.

The claim was rooted in a truth: The federal agency charged with certifying the two companies in the United States that audit election machines had not given a by-the-book certification for years. Both were still certified under federal law as their renewals were still working through the bureaucratic process.

A spokesperson for the Election Assistance Commission, the federal agency created by the Help America Vote Act, said both companies have continued to have staff visit and assess the machines, ensuring their testing was up to accreditation standards.

Jack Cobb, the co-founder of Pro V&V, one of the groups, told The Republic that the problem wasn't practical, but political. His company was still operating up to federal standards, he said. But the board of political appointees simply hadn't voted to renew the certification, providing a final stamp of approval.

The Arizona Supreme Court said, in its ruling, that even if the requestwastimely, it could not entertain tossing out election results absent evidence that the errors pointed out by the group would have changed the results.

"The validity of an election is not voided by honest mistakes or omissions," the court wrote in its ruling, citing a case dating back to 1887, when Arizona was still a territory.

The court also pointed out that the petitionwas, by statute, meant to be filed by a county attorney or state attorney general, or someone with a viable claim to the office.

In its ruling, the court said that "nothing in the statutes Petitioners cite grants them a private right of action to remove office holders and sit in their stead."

Elwin "Buz" Slade, a real estate agent in Tucson, who was part of the group, said he had a feeling the petition would be tossed out by the Arizona Supreme Court, continuing what he sees as a decades-long pattern of government corruption.

"Big money controls everything," Slade said during a phone interview on Thursday. "And if you have money, you get to pick who gets to be in office."

Slade, in the court filing, was contesting the seat held by Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos. Slade said he was tapped to be sheriff mainly because he looked the part. "I'm just a big guy and they said, 'You should be sheriff,'" he said.

Though as a young man he protested the Vietnam War in Tucson, Slade said the last Democrat to earn his vote was former President Jimmy Carter. He said he was active in the Tea Party movement, and held fast to his conservative beliefs even in the hostile heavily-Democratic area of Pima County in southern Arizona.

Slade said he was vocal about his politics and would talk "ad nauseum with friends until they told me they don't want to hear me."

If he were sheriff, Slade said he would have done the basics. "I would have listened to my deputies, enforced the law,"he said. "Yeah, I would have been a good sheriff."

The group asked the court to oust four statewide officeholders: Gov. Doug Ducey, Secretary of State Katie Hobbs, State Treasurer Kimberly Yee and the Superintendent of Public Instruction Kathy Hoffman. It also sought to boot four members of the Arizona Corporation Commission, the mayors of Phoenix and Tucson, Maricopa County Recorder Stephen Richer, Maricopa County Sheriff Paul Penzone, Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos, and six state lawmakers, including the speaker of the Arizona House of Representatives.

The group said it targeted as many office holders as there were members of the group willing to take their place in office. The group said it chose the offices strategically, knowing the transition would be a difficult time for the state but that having ordinary citizens in these key places would keep the state running as smoothly as possible.

The group spared Attorney General Mark Brnovich in its court case, according to Slade, because the group didn't have any lawyer who could have replaced him.

Although the same machines the group found problematic were also used for the 2020 election for U.S. President, the group did not seek redress for Arizona's electoral votes being awarded to President Joe Biden and not former President Donald Trump.

The group had filed its action with the Arizona Supreme Court anonymously, using only initials. In the filing, it included a series of documents that contained the individual members' names, dates of birth and home addresses, which the group said was intended to show all were qualified to hold public office in Arizona.

The court, in its ruling on Wednesday, ordered that a copy of those affidavits be unsealed, with the addresses, dates of birth and phone numbers redacted.

The court said that the group's concerns about security could not overcome the requirements set out in the Arizona Constitution, state statute and the rules governing the courts.

The court said that "the public's right to know the identities of Petitioners outweighs their desire to proceed anonymously."

Although the group referenced a provision in the state constitution that said no person should be disturbed in their private affairs, the court said, in its ruling that members' effort "to unseat publicly elected officeholders through this Court is not a private affair."

Two people involved with the effort have communicated with The Republic only through email, denying requests for interviews by phone.

However, both spoke on an online talk show hosted by former state legislative candidate Liz Harris, who has provided thrice daily updates on the audit ordered by the Arizona State Senate of the 2.1 million votes in Maricopa County. The interview took place on May 11, the day the state high court dismissed the case.

Daniel Wood was the 2020 Republican candidate for Congress representing District 3.(Photo: Arizona Secretary of State)

Maricopa supervisors frown on audit: Maricopa County Board of Supervisors and elected officials speak out against Senate Audit

Rayana Eldan, whose name, along with Daniel Wood, a 2020 Congressional candidate, were the only two used in the court filing, said that she started looking at the problems with the election in January or February.

"We're not contesting a county or a couple of votes here," Eldan said on the show, which has since been removed from Harris's Facebook page and made private on YouTube. "We're basically saying the entire state wasn't treated fairly and their rights were violated."

Eldan said the court's rejection of the lawsuit for not being timely did not allow for the situation at hand, with someone like herself, unversed in minutia of election law, finding a major problem through their own research weeks or months later.

"We found fraud," she said. "We found problematic things at the very top level. It's interesting the way they framed it and so easily dismissed us and told us we weren't in compliance."

Eldan described herself, through most of her life, as "kind of a hippie environmentalist. I'm not a longtime MAGA Republic person," she said, using the acronym for the Trump campaign slogan, Make America Great Again.

"I'm just kind of a person who got sick of seeing my heart misappropriated by both sides," she said. "The identify politics thing."

Had the petition been successful, Eldan would have been temporarily installed as the mayor of Tucson, the state's second largest city.

Wood, who has announced his intention to campaign for Congress again in 2022, said on the show that the group came together after hearing a speech he gave at a district meeting. He described the group as ordinary citizens, not affiliated with any recognized or established group.

"This has nothing to do with any organization, has nothing to do with some kind of plan or Q," he said, referring to the QAnon conspiracy theory that imagines Trump was preparing to dismantle and arrest a global cabal of politicians and celebrities engaged in crimes against children. Wood posted about the QAnon conspiracy during the 2020 campaign and told The Republic he followed Q's writings and had found some truth in them.

Wood said that he had first learned of the certification issue in the spring of 2020, but realized the issue would have been too much for him to tackle on his own.

"In my mind," he said, "I was thinking borderline treason."

The 20 names and the seats they contested were:

Read or Share this story: https://www.azcentral.com/story/news/politics/arizona/2021/05/20/here-arizonans-who-filed-quo-warranto-case-wishing-high-office/5188106001/

Continue reading here:
Court names the 20 people who wanted to toss Arizona elections, put themselves in office - The Arizona Republic

‘Imitation’ Episode 2: Ma-ha’s idol dreams rekindle after Tea Party band forms, but are her hopes too high? – MEAWW

'Imitation' Episode 2 will see how Ma-ha (Jung Ji-so) will now deal with an opportunity that seems too good to be true. In the first episode, she had been sent from the original agency that was training her to be an idol to another company where she came very close to debuting as an idol but things went wrong in the last moment.

So for a few years, she continues to do odd jobs including playing part roles in movies. Her dream about debuting as an idol seems far away, initially, but that may not be true for long.

READ MORE

'Doom at Your Service' Episode 1 and Episode 2: What if you could kill everyone? K-drama has unique premise

'Mine' Episode 1 and Episode 2: Premiere episodes promise another mystery plot like hit SBS show 'Penthouse'

On the other hand, there is Kwon Ryeok (Lee Jun-young) who debuted as a singer for Shax and upon the disappearance of one of his members over a love affair, he takes over the band and ensures that the band doesn't end up falling prey to media tabloids' gossip. Since then, he has been working non-stop and risen in popularity. He also has become an actor while also being an idol, thereby ensuring that Shax is not going to be victimized by media over scandals.

The show observes and portrays the different kinds of people who make up the world of Korean entertainment and K-pop industry. With increasing interest in all things Korean, this is the latest show to delve into the theme of idol hopefuls and abuse that they face at the hands of agencies that tie them up in slave contracts.

So in the second episode, we will see how Kwon Ryeok ends up saving Ma-ha from an embarrassing situation after she is left behind by her manager at a shooting spot outside the city. However, something doesn't seem right because he tells her she will do no better than imitating other stars. This is a reference to the odd jobs that her manager gets her to do. It is harsh and we wonder why he is so rude to her but what is interesting is that Ma-ha may receive another shot at the whole idol thing.

She along with her two friends who were supposed to debut as Omega receive a deal from another entertainment agency and their agent seems to be dead set on ensuring that they make their debut. He tells them his plans and informs them that their band will be called Tea Party, but can they really make it? After all, the world of entertainment is cutthroat.

'Imitation' airs every Friday on KBS2 and can be streamed on Viki.

See the rest here:
'Imitation' Episode 2: Ma-ha's idol dreams rekindle after Tea Party band forms, but are her hopes too high? - MEAWW

‘Stop the Spending Spree’: Fiscal conservatives mobilize to block Biden’s jobs and families plans – USA TODAY

With a badly aging bridge as his backdrop, President Joe Biden stood in reliably Republican Louisiana on Thursday to pressure GOP lawmakers to support his $2.3 trillion infrastructure plan, calling it a "blue collar blueprint to rebuild America." (May 6) AP Domestic

WASHINGTONTim Phillips had some straight talk for fellow freedom fighters who gathered in an Iowa restaurant in April.

Their side lost the first few months of the big, big battle going on in Washington as Congress passed a $1.9 trillion coronavirus rescue package, said Phillips, head of the fiscally conservative group Americans for Prosperity. But its still possible to stop the more than $4 trillion in additional spending that President Joe Biden has proposed.

In the next few months, Washington, D.C., is going to be making some decisions that could literally dramatically transform our country, Phillips said as he urged the gathering of more than 160 peopleto do more than youve ever done before.

That meeting, held in the district of Rep. Cindy Axne, a moderate Democrat who is among the top targets for Republicans in the midterm elections, was the first of more than 100 events around the country that AFP has in the works for a major campaign that kicks into gear next week.

In details provided first to USA TODAY, the groups End Washington Waste: Stop the Spending Spree campaign also includes several milliondollars in advertising to pair with the planned rallies, town halls, phone banks and door-to-door canvassing.

"This spending spree we're seeing out of Washington, D.C., is both unprecedented and unsustainable," Phillips told USA TODAY.

Tea Party supporters in front of the U.S. Supreme Court.(Photo: Photo by Alex Wong/Getty Images)

Even with the influx of cash and mobilization of a nationwide network, itremains to be seen whether conservatives can generate the kind of grassroots activism that roiled lawmakers districts when Democrats debated how to overhaul the health care system in 2009. Democrats eventually passed the Affordable Care Act, with no support from Republicans, but lost the House in the 2010 midterm elections.

The lawmakers being pressuredinclude more moderate Democrats and those representing politically competitive seatsin Virginia, Wisconsin, Michigan, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Pennsylvania, Florida, Texas, Arizona,Georgia, Illinois, Kansas, Minnesota, New Jersey and Oregon. The initial target list also includes a moderate Republican, Pennsylvanias Brian Fitzpatrick, who sometimes crosses party lines to vote with Democrats.

White House pitch: Joe Biden looks to sell child care, education plan with state-specific details

Former President Barack Obama, in his memoir, described the Tea Party summer of 2009 when he was greeted by angry protesters as he traveled the country to discuss his health care plan. He wrote that the Tea Party represented a genuine populist surge, even if he thought some of theanger was misdirected and that it was carefully nurtured by groups like Americans for Prosperity.

Vanessa Williamson, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who has studied the Tea Party, said Americans for Prosperity was one of the groups that, recognizing the opportunity presented by Tea Party enthusiasm, stepped in to organize that conservative energy.

President Barack Obama wipes his brow while holding a health care town hall meeting in the Central High School gym on August 15, 2009 in Grand Junction, Colorado.(Photo: John Moore, Getty Images)

And they benefited hugely from it, she said, and massively expanded their reach on the ground.

But, Williamson added, some of the tea partiers opposition to Obama was about him, personally, as the first Black president, who some conservatives falsely claimed was not born in the United States. Biden doesnt inspire the same motivation, she said.

In addition, former President Donald Trump moved the GOP to the left on spending, lessening the appeal of the traditional fiscal conservative view that equates small government with economic freedom, said Lara Putnam, a history professor at the University of Pittsburgh who studies citizen activism.

Donald Trumps sweet spot as a persuasive politician was not about a small, noninterventionist government, she said.

Rather than going after major entitlement programs like Social Security and Medicare that Republicans have argued for years are gobbling up the budget, Trump signed spending bills with significant increases even as he cut taxes.

Progressive groups are also mobilizing, both to support Bidens proposals generally and to specifically fight back against groups like Americans for Prosperity.

In Wisconsin, for example, a local pizza restaurant owner recently touted Biden's proposed subsidized child care assistance in a call with reporters organized by the Main Street Alliance, a progressive small-business group.

Building Back Together, a progressive organization run by Biden allies, began airing TV ads Wednesday in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Georgia and Nevada to promote Bidens blue-collar blueprint to build America.

President Joe Biden says he wants to pay for his infrastructure plan by raising corporate taxes.(Photo: Evan Vucci, AP)

Democrats argue that polls show the elements of the plans including improved infrastructure, free community college, more help for families and higher taxes on the wealthy and corporations to pay for it are popular.

But even if thats the case, politics are not an aggregation of survey results, Williamson said.

Our politics are the result of organized interests operating in the party system, she said.

GOP response: Republicans draw 'red line' in negotiations with Joe Biden on infrastructure package

Democrats are betting that some of the anger about Washington that contributed to Trumps election grewout of frustration that long-standing problemsarent being addressed.

Trust in government has eroded because the government hasnt really delivered for the people, White House chief of staff Ron Klain said at an April event with Georgetown University. Klain argued that the Biden administrations COVID-19 vaccination program is a key to restoring that trust, which will be further enhanced when people see the difference Bidens plans can make in their lives.

Former Sen. Joe Donnelly is trying to make that case at events in Indiana where, as a House member in 2009, hundreds of people crowded the town hall meetings he held to talk about health care.

Former Indiana Sen. Joe Donnelly(Photo: Corey Ohlenkamp/Star Press)

At a recent gathering in a park in Logansport, Indiana, Donnelly touted the real meat and potatoes that are in Bidens plans.

Biden's American Families Plan in charts: What's in the plan with subsidized child care and free pre-K

Pitching improved roads, bridges and a better internet is easier, he said, than it was fighting the scare tactics against the Affordable Care Act. Those arguments about death panels and losing ones doctor were so personal that they were especially hard to combat.

Now the discussion is about, how do we revive Americas economy? How do we bring jobs back? Donnellysaid. Its harder to scare people about broadband than it is about their health.

From left, Club for Growth President David McIntosh, Tea Party Patriots President Jenny Beth Martin, Americans for Prosperity President Tim Phillips and FreedomWorks President Adam Brandon give statements outside the West Wing on March 8, 2017, after meeting with President Trump.(Photo: Andrew Harnik, AP)

The case Americans for Prosperity is making against Bidens plans centers on both size and scope.

Theres too much wasteful spending that will lead to higher taxes, fewer jobs and a rigged economy, the group argues.

Officials say theyre not trying to block all action, but want any bill to be more targeted and to not raise taxes.

Although Americans for Prosperity says theyre offering alternative solutions, Phillips said that given the massive amount of money the government has already spent through the coronavirus rescue package, its difficult to envision a package with even more money that the group could get behind.

As for the polls showing support for Bidens plans, Phillips said theres always a lag time, with a new administration and a new Congress, between extreme policies and public dissatisfaction and concern.

Its kind of the term `whistling past the graveyard,' he said with a chuckle. I would be wary of someone saying all this stuff is polling super greatwithin the first 120 days of a new administration.

U.S. Representative Cindy Axne (D-IA) talks with voters at Smokey Row Coffee in Des Moines, Iowa, Tuesday, Nov. 3, 2020.(Photo: Zach Boyden-Holmes/The Register)

On the day the group was mobilizing in Axnes district, a local paper published her case for Bidens infrastructure bill.

Im focused on securing the investments that will ensure Iowa gets what it needs to be competitive, she wrote.

She's also, however, joined with a group of other farm-state and centrist Democrats to try to exemptfamily farmsfrom a proposed tax increase on inherited assets that would help pay for part of theBidenplanfocused on child care and education.

Chris Larimer, political science professor at the University of Northern Iowa, said the broad benefits of Bidens plans may make it harder for opponents to attack than the Affordable Care Act.

But Axne, he said, is in an incredibly tough district. Her re-election margin was less than 2 percentage points. And the 2022 midterms are likely to turn on voter mobilization.

The arguments being made now by both sides could affect that turnout.

And so it's going to be: How is it framed? Is the Biden administration able to talk about it in ways that Democrats in vulnerable districts can really point to specific job gains or tangible benefits for those constituents? Larimer said. Thats the challenge for vulnerable Democrats.

Billions on the way: How much money is headed to your state, city from the COVID rescue plan

Read or Share this story: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2021/05/13/americans-prosperity-try-stop-bidens-infrastructure-spending/5041246001/

Read this article:
'Stop the Spending Spree': Fiscal conservatives mobilize to block Biden's jobs and families plans - USA TODAY

In booting Cheney, ‘My Kevin’ leads GOP back to Trump – Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) Republican Kevin McCarthy is leading his party to an inflection point, preparing to dump Rep. Liz Cheney from the No. 3 House leadership position and transform whats left of the party of Lincoln more decisively into the party of Trump.

The GOP leader argues that ousting Cheney has less to do with her very public criticism of the former presidents lies about his 2020 election loss to President Joe Biden than her inability to set aside personal convictions and do her job. As conference chair responsible for communicating a unified party message, Cheney has lost the confidence of rank-and-file lawmakers, he said this week.

But in tossing aside Cheney, the daughter of the former vice president and as close as it gets to GOP royalty, and promising a big tent to win back power, McCarthy is hollowing out a cadre of lawmakers intent on governing while he is elevating the people and personalities most loyal to Donald Trump. In one stroke, he is amplifying the former presidents false claims about the election and seeking to mend his own tattered relationship with Trump, reasserting himself as Trumps man in the House.

Its a transformational moment for McCarthy, who resurrected his political career by attaching himself to Trump who called him My Kevin and is now on a glidepath to become House speaker, second in line to the presidency, if Republicans win control in next years elections.

Theres a complete changing of the guard here, said Adam Brandon, president of the conservative FreedomWorks, a tea party group aligned with Trumps rise.

This started as one thing and morphed into something else: Its about the future.

The vote as soon as next week is expected to be decisive, showing the power of Trumps reach, particularly on McCarthy. The GOP leader initially criticized Trumps actions after the 2020 election, saying he bears responsibility for the deadly Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, the most serious domestic assault on the building in its history.

Five people died after Trump encouraged loyalists to fight like hell as Congress was certifying his defeat to Biden. In a private call during the insurrection, McCarthy had urged Trump to call off the rioters, only to face the presidents rebuke.

The saddest day I have ever had in Congress, McCarthy said that night, even as he joined 138 other House Republicans in voting to overturn Bidens win.

McCarthy stood by Cheney when she faced a February challenge for leading 10 House Republicans to vote to impeach Trump for his role in the insurrection. McCarthy argued that the House GOP needed to stay united against newly empowered Democrats, and she easily survived.

But in between the lines, McCarthy was also considering the optics of the moment, according to Republicans who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the private vote. Booting Cheney so soon after the riot would be a bad look for the party, especially when House Republican leaders were also encouraging a unified vote of support for newly elected Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, a Trump ally who faced reprimand from Democrats over her conspiracy-laden social media rants.

The GOP leader counseled Cheney to stay on message, but as she continued to warn the party off Trumps falsehoods, he groomed a newly transformed Trump acolyte, Rep. Elise Stefanik, R-N.Y., as her replacement. Like McCarthy, she is raising millions of dollars for the GOP as a Trump defender.

A last straw was Cheneys press conference at the House GOPs retreat in Florida last month when Cheney criticized Trump anew and broke with McCarthy to back a bipartisan commission fully focused on investigating the Capitol attack.

The American people need to know how we got to Jan. 6 people need to be held accountable, she said.

In an essay in Wednesdays Washington Post, she warned colleagues, History is watching.

McCarthy, who has jetted to Trumps private club at Mar-a-Lago to win back the former presidents support, had already changed his own tune, now saying he did not believe the former president had provoked the Jan. 6 insurrection.

Trump has made clear he wants Cheney out. During an event with the conservative Freedom Caucus at Mar-a-Lago ahead of the House GOP retreat, Trump told lawmakers that Cheney and other RINOs, including Senate leader Mitch McConnell and Sen. Mitt Romney of Utah, must go, according to two Republicans who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the private remarks. RINO refers to those considered insufficiently loyal or conservative Republicans in name only.

In private calls with lawmakers, Trump had expressed similar displeasure with McCarthy, too, according to one of the Republicans.

Its not like the My Kevin days, the Republican aide said.

Never fully supported by GOPs far right flank, the California Republican has labored to win over the partys conservatives by embracing Trump and giving the former presidents allies a seat at the table in House leadership.

McCarthy was among the first Republicans in Congress to endorse Trumps presidential campaign and quickly became a close confidant and late-night telephone buddy, often fielding his calls in view of reporters in the Capitol.

In many ways, McCarthy had bridged the partys path to the Trump era years earlier. He recruited the tea party class of Republicans who seized control of the House in the 2010 midterm elections, newcomers who shut down the government during hardball fiscal fights with then-President Barack Obama.

Underestimated by Democrats as a legislative lightweight, without a House Speaker Nancy Pelosi-style resume of committee work and policy chops to pass bills, McCarthy revels in outperforming expectations, steadily rising to the top GOP leadership position.

But McCarthy has always had other would-be leaders on his heels. After the Freedom Caucus led by Mark Meadows forced former Speaker John Boehner into early retirement, McCarthy withdrew his own bid to become speaker in 2015. The gavel slipped away again after Speaker Paul Ryan retired and Republicans lost House control in 2018.

McCarthy has faced potential challenges from conservative Rep. Steve Scalise, R-La., the GOP whip in charge of counting votes, though the two are more friendly rivals now, as well as from Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, the de facto leader of the swelling conservative ranks and another Trump confidant.

Jordan said McCarthy has done what the others failed to do bring the Freedom Caucus and conservatives into the fold. While Boehner punished what he sometimes called the knuckleheads, and Ryan simply ignored them, McCarthy showers the far right with face time and rank. He made Jordan the top Republican on the Judiciary Committee, the perch he used to defend Trump from impeachment.

Hes going to become the speaker if we take back the House, Jordan said an interview Thursday.

McCarthy, who declined to respond to an interview request, has said he wants House Republicans to focus their attention against Democrats, not on internal party rifts.

Without Cheney, he may have fewer dissenters to contend with.

The frustrating thing about this is that theyre both right, said Michael Steel, a former top Boehner aide.

Cheney is correct that President Trump lost the presidential election ... and McCarthy is also right the job of the Republican leader is to gain the majority and become speaker of the House.

See more here:
In booting Cheney, 'My Kevin' leads GOP back to Trump - Associated Press

5 Things To Do: Mothers Day Weekend in the Central Valley May 7 – YourCentralValley.com

FRESNO, California (KSEE/KGPE) Here are 5 things happening over Mothers Day weekend around the Central Valley!

Saturday, May 8 at 5:00 p.m.

The streets of Old Town Clovis will be cruisin, rockin and rollin with bands Diamond After Dark & Pure Harmony. There will also live DJs and music. The event is open and free to the public.

For more info visit the Clovis Smogs Valley Car Club on Facebook

Saturday May 8 at 3:00 p.m.

Plan to celebrate mom at the Kearney Mansion Museum with a traditional tea party. The planned event is scheduled to be held on the Mansions veranda with tables well spaced apart.

For more info visit the Kearney Mansion on Facebook

Saturday May 8 8:00 a.m. 12:00 p.m.

The City Attorneys Office Code Enforcement Division and the Fresno Economic Opportunities Commission Local Conservation Corps Recycling Program will hold a Waste Tire Amnesty Day.

For more info visit city of Fresno on Facebook

Sunday May 9 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m.

Spoil mom this Mothers Day with a spectacular brunch the whole family will enjoy at Engelmann Cellars.

For more info visit Engelmann Cellars on Facebook

Saturday May 8 at 5:00 p.m.

Enjoy outdoor dining with a view at the Fresno Chaffee Zoo. There are outdoor dining areas with tables spaced for social distancing so you can take in a view of the savanna while enjoying your meal with family.

For more info visit the Zoos website

Go here to read the rest:
5 Things To Do: Mothers Day Weekend in the Central Valley May 7 - YourCentralValley.com