The candidate clinched his party's nomination Tuesday after scooping up 71 percent of the vote in the Texas Republican primary.
Republican presidential primary
The Ron Paul campaign is dead, but his delegate and convention strategy lives on. Will the "Revolution" actually be televised in Tampa?
Rick Perry drew chuckles on purpose over the weekend with his speech at the Gridiron Dinner in Washington, D.C.
Ron Paul's campaign is bleeding money and reporters. Will he be able to slog through to August?
The newest Texas primary date, which will "probably" be held on May 29, affects more than congressional races.
If the congressman can pick up enough votes in Maine's Washington County, which delayed its vote due to inclement weather, he might end up winning the state.
Ron Paul as a Romney-appointed chairman of the Federal Reserve? Rand Paul as a running mate? Don't laugh. Politics has made stranger bedfellows.
The rapper's Facebook wall blows up after he posts a pro-Ron Paul, pro-marijuana photo.
The Washington Post spoke to former Paul staffers who say the congressman was heavily involved with the company that produced the articles, some of which contained racist passages.
A new poll finds that only forty percent of Texans approve of the governor's performance, and pundits continue examining the political effects of his failed campaign.
Other presidential hopefuls from Texas have gracefully exited the stage when their time was over.
A group of evangelicals endorse Rick Santorum, Rick Perry defends the corpse desecrating-Marines, and the governor (and his hair) seem visibly shaken in South Carolina.
Rick Perry (inadvertently?) revises his list of the three federal agencies he would kill as President.
Flags, footballs, and fighter jets all flicker across the screen in the governor's latest campaign ad.
The governor's "vulture capitalism" remark causes a major South Carolinian donor to close his checkbook.
Protest candidate and Tucson music legend Al "Dick" Perry has better name placement on the Arizona ballot than the Texas governor.
After Ron Paul sends a snarky tweet about Jon Huntsman's poor showing in Iowa, Huntsman takes a jab at Paul on Piers Morgan.
Rick Perry, clad in running gear, proves that running a presidential campaign is a marathon, not a sprint.
In Thursday’s GOP debate in Sioux City, Rick Perry scored one of the night’s most memorable lines when he compared himself to the often-underestimated Broncos quarterback.
Glen Maxey's new e-book, Head Figure Head: The Search for the Hidden Life of Rick Perry, is a collection of "he said, he said" accounts.
Ron Paul may be enjoying a campaign surge, but he’s going to have a hard time winning over the Republican base.
Ron Paul’s talons were out over the weekend, slamming the decision to let billionaire mogul Donald Trump moderate the Newsmax debate in Iowa.
The governor gets good grades for his performance in Saturday’s foreign policy debate despite questions about Israel policy, and the Dallas Morning News profiles the Perry marriage.
Perry ally throws in the white flag, we learn the origination of the phrase “turn in the barrel,” and the governor tweets about foreign policy.
New Hampshire speech goes viral, prompting mixed reactions ranging from speculation about drunkenness to "approachable and warm."
Erstwhile presidential candidate Rick Perry met with Rick Santorum in Austin, but the details of their discussion are unknown. Maybe Santorum hopes the state will switch to a winner-takes-all primary.
The Texas Republican congressman's campaign appears to report every expense—even a $0.22 purchase from FedEx—to the Federal Elections Commission.
The presidential candidate visited the Metroplex, attending church in McKinney and stumping at a "faux-rustic farm" in Plano.
Rick Perry raised only $2.9 million in the last quarter of 2011, new campaign finance documents reveal.
NPR's John Burnett traveled to Colonia Juarez, Mexico, to explore a side of Romney’s biography that he doesn't stump about.
Hero Builder, a toy company based in Connecticut, created two action figures of the governor complete with "Oops" sound bite.
The governor is "not a factor," according to the American Research Group president.
The Washington Post tries to put a fresh spin on the old red vs. blue divide by studying the voting habits of people who live close to one of the two retail chains.
Never mind the pin-up calendar: Ron Paul’s new campaign video lands body blows on presidential primary opponent Newt Gingrich.
The governor may have taken a break from the campaign trail for Thanksgiving, but that didn’t stop the campaign press corps.
The governor's parents, Ray and Amelia Perry, give nearly unprecedented interview about their son and the state of America.
Bill Hader picks up the Perry mantle on "SNL," giving Weekend Update an exclusive interview about his "bizarre, animated" New Hampshire speech.
I’m not surprised. As I said last when the Daily Beast‘s Jill Lawrence wrote that Perry needed an economic plan, there is no chance, zip, zero, zilch, none, that Perry would come out with a detailed plan. It’s not what they do. Perry is going to stick to the Carney…
$17.1 million raised in the third quarter fundraising period. This is a very impressive performance. It buys time and staying power through the next rounds of debates and into the early primaries. The accelerated primary schedule benefits candidates with the most money. (The original version of this post said $18.1…
The Republican War Room poll (Sept. 30), from the Houston Chronicle: Romney 28.2% Cain 23.7% Gingrich 9.8% Perry 9.1% Perry has dropped 15 points in ten days. Florida is arguably the most important state in the country in Republican politics. Texas has more delegates, but Texas is not in…
The sample covers 1,002 adults and covers the dates of September 19-October 2. Repondents were divided into “lean-Republican” voters and “registered voters.” From the Post’s story: After a quick rise in the race for the Republican presidential nomination, Texas Gov. Rick Perry has experienced an almost equally dramatic decline,…
The next Republican debate, presented by the Washington Post and Bloomberg News, will be held on October 11 at Dartmouth College in Hanover, New Hampshire. Charlie Rose will be the moderator. Here is the official statement by the sponsors: The Washington Post-Bloomberg debate will focus on the issues voters say…
This one from Zogby IBOPE, the latter initials refer to a Brazilian firm that has acquired the Zogby operation. This poll is described as “interactive” but what that means is not explained. The respondents are “all likely voters and likely Republican primary voters.” This gibberish is a good reason why…
Many readers will be familiar with this poll since it has received a great deal of coverage. The poll was posted on September 29. The sample covers 925 registered voters, and there was a smaller subset of likely Republican voters. Romney 23% Perry 19% Cain 17% Gingrich 11% Bachmann 3% In the August poll, Perry led with 29%. I'm not going to engage in a lot of punditry concerning this poll. Residents of Mars know by this time that Perry had a bad debate performance that explains his loss of support. He has squandered a lot of momentum, but it's too early to write him off. The problem for Perry is that the attacks on him are going to continue. Furthermore, Perry doesn't seem able to control his mouth.
The poll was conducted by American Research Group (ARG) Sample Size: 600 completed telephone interviews among a random sample of likely Republican caucus goers living in Iowa (517 Republicans and 83 no party (independent) voters). Sample Dates: September 22-27, 2011 Margin of Error: ± 4 percentage points, 95% of the time, on questions where opinion is evenly split. September 2011 Romney 21% Bachmann 15% Perry 14% Ron Paul 12%
A lot of people are writing Perry off after his awful performance in the Florida debate, but this poll was taken AFTER the disastrous debate. Perry is not a good debater. He is no match for his rivals, who know federal issues better than he does, and are much…
Could Rick Perry’s stunning loss of the Florida straw poll have been averted? Possibly. The question here is whether the Perry camp was so overconfident that it scheduled him to go to a similar straw poll in Michigan without addressing the delegates in Florida. At the times, Perry and…
We like to think that Texas politics is as rough as it gets, but it really isn't. This has been a one-party state since W. defeated Ann in 1994. Perry has had a lot of money spent against him, but he has never been in danger of losing a race since the light gov battle against John Sharp in 1998. Perry has had it so easy in the last decade that I wonder if it has dulled his political acumen. He has looked lost at times in the debates. Last night (Thursday) was one of those times. He couldn't even deliver his prepackaged lines. He also says things that are patently false, such as his earlier claim that the poverty rate is the highest in history. The fact is that Perry has gotten this far without ever having to deal with a talented opponent, other than Sharp. He refused to debate Bill White in the general election, on trumped-up grounds; he ducked out on the National Conference of Editorial Writers when they met in Dallas a couple of years ago, choosing to speak with local TV reporters instead; he wouldn't talk to any newspaper editorial boards in Texas during his race with Bill White. The problem is, he hasn't had any big-league experience, and it shows. Sooner or later, he was bound to pay a price for not engaging in the give and take of a major political campaign.
The Texas tea party's revolt over Rick Perry's immigration stand is, well, revolting. I seldom agree with Perry, but he is right this time--right in a moral sense, but wrong politically. Building a wall will not make Texas a better state. Denying scholarships to the children of immigrants will not make Texas a better state. Calling a special session to pass a sanctuary city law, whose sponsor, Burt Solomons, said "does nothing," would not make Texas a better state. It's hard to imagine that the Republican Party is too far to the right for Rick Perry, but that may be the case, as astonishing as it seems. Perry is counting on Hispanic votes to elevate him to the GOP nomination and the presidency, but openly courting Hispanics could result in an erosion of his tea party base. The Perry campaign does not appear to be a smooth operation. I'm not forecasting doom and gloom. He's still in great shape in the polls. He has forged a large constituency. But he is running this race as if he were running for governor in Texas, almost as if he were the incumbent. He hasn't adapted to the format of a primary race, which is like an audition for a movie role: Multiple contestants are more or less reading from the same script, and everything depends upon how well you deliver your lines.
UPDATE: Note to readers: Below, I wrote, "I don't see any mystery in these results. Romney figured to gain after Perry's lackluster performance in the Tampa debate." In fact, the poll was taken during the period Sept. 9-12, BEFORE the debate. So Perry's performance in the Tampa debate had no effect on the poll. No other candidate reached 10% in the poll: Bachmann 9% Palin 8% Paul 8% Cain 4% Gingrich 4% Santorum 2% Huntsman 1% Poll details: --Conducted Sep 9-12 for Bloomberg News by Selzer & Co. of Des Moines, IA --Interviews with 997 U.S. adults ages 18 or older. Some questions included an oversample of 205 self-identified Republicans and Republican-leaning independents. --Interviewers contacted households with randomly selected landline and cell phone telephone numbers. --Percentages based on the full sample may have a maximum margin of error of plus or minus 3.1% FAVORABILITY Perry 32% favorable, 41% unfavorable, 25%+ no opinion