News

From Roll Call

The stakes are high and the challenges many as a new Senate Republican leadership team attempts to find its bearings and lay a foundation for winning the majority in November. 

Four seats separate Republicans from Senate control, and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (Ky.) could find his power strengthened in the coming months as his new team looks to the veteran Member for guidance in navigating the political minefield that could upend their quest to flip the chamber. Among their challenges: developing an appealing agenda, coordinating with an unpredictable House Republican majority and avoiding internal dissension in advance of the post-election leadership elections that could further shake up the Conference. 

From The U.S. News & World Report:

The GOP is continuing to push back against the Obama-led spending spree from the last two years. It's difficult to do, given that Democrats still have the capacity to pass a continuing resolution to fund the government through the next few months—in lieu of the yearly appropriations bills—that would give them the authority to do much of what they want to do over the next two years even if the Republicans object.

Nevertheless, individual leaders are stepping up to the plate and offering their own ideas to bring down spending. On Tuesday the Senate Republican Caucus approved a resolution introduced by South Dakota Sen. John Thune "to cut federal non-security discretionary spending to fiscal year 2008 levels," a move that, if implemented, would roll back federal outlays considerably.

From The Hill:

South Dakota state Rep. Kristi Noem (R), who has evoked comparisons to former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin and gained national attention after a monster third-quarter fundraising haul in her race to unseat Rep. Stephanie Herseth-Sandlin (D-S.D.), is embarking on a final campaign swing with Sen. John Thune (R-S.D.).

Noem's campaign said Friday that Thune, a rumored 2012 Republican presidential hopeful, will stump with her at several stops during a bus tour that will hit more than 25 South Dakota cities before Election Day.

From The Hill:

Thune, a member of the Senate GOP leadership who may challenge Obama in the 2012 presidential election, posed the quintessential question for a party trying to unseat incumbents.

"I would like to suggest a simple question people should ask themselves to help cut through all the talk: Are you better off today than you were two years ago?" Thune said Saturday.

From The Colorado Statesman:

Three Republican Senators — two current and one former — flanked GOP hopeful Ken Buck to rally voters Tuesday on the day county clerks sent out mail-in ballots across Colorado. Sounding a decidedly western theme, Wyoming Sen. John Barrasso, former Colorado Sen. Bill Armstrong and the event’s headliner, South Dakota Sen. John Thune, embraced Buck and urged supporters to add Buck to their number.

“There is today, ladies and gentlemen, going on in Washington D.C., a war on the West,” said Thune, who is exploring a potential 2012 presidential bid. “There are policies coming out of Washington that are completely counter, completely anti- to what makes this part of the country tick.” He listed federal proposals to regulate methane emissions from livestock and even a scheme to “regulate dust,” drawing laughter from the small crowd assembled at Clement Park.

From The Washington Post:

On June 17, President Obama and Vice President Biden proclaimed that it would be a "Recovery Summer." Now that summer's over and it's clear there has been slower economic growth and meager hiring, that declaration has come back to haunt the administration in the GOP's new ad campaign.

From The Hill:  

"Senator Thune has been standing up to the Obama-Pelosi-Reid agenda in the U.S. Senate, the exact type of leadership that the people of Arkansas have been demanding from their U.S. Senator," Boozman said in a statement. "I look forward to welcoming him to Arkansas and, ultimately, serving with him in the U.S. Senate."