According to washingtontimes Sen. Rand Paul, the eye doctor turned politician, officially kicks off his long-awaited campaign for the Republican presidential nomination Tuesday in his home state of Kentucky, intent on waging a 50-state campaign that marries the small-government libertarianism championed by his father and the millennial generation with the traditional forces of the Republican Party.
The scope of the challenge and the ambition of the candidate displayed themselves in full Monday when the first-term Kentucky senator released his campaign slogan — “Defeat the Washington machine. Unleash the American dream” — designed to position him as an anti-Washington crusader able to attract new voters to the traditional Republican coalition.
The scope of the challenge and the ambition of the candidate displayed themselves in full Monday when the first-term Kentucky senator released his campaign slogan — “Defeat the Washington machine. Unleash the American dream” — designed to position him as an anti-Washington crusader able to attract new voters to the traditional Republican coalition.
Campaign advisers also told The Washington Times that Mr. Paul planned to compete in every primary election and caucus in all 50 states, all five territories and the District of Columbia, a feat that only two GOP candidates achieved in 2012.
“It’s time for a new way. A new set of ideas. A new leader, one you can trust. One who works for you and, above all, it’s time for a new president,” Mr. Paul said in a video released by his campaign as a prelude to Tuesday’s announcement.
The Kentucky senator’s “all-chips-in” message was enhanced by his winning preliminary commitment from his home state GOP to convert Kentucky’s planned presidential preference primary next May into a presidential caucus earlier in the calendar.
The move will allow Mr. Paul to circumvent Kentucky’s election law requirement that a candidate’s name may appear on the ballot for only one office. He plans to seek nomination for a second Senate term in case his presidential aspirations go south on him.
The state party, not the state government, runs the caucus.
And the challenge for a politician bred in the shadows of his famous father, former Texas congressman and presidential candidate Ron Paul, also came into clearer focus. The elder Mr. Paul gained enormous popularity among millennials but struggled to gain mainstream support from traditional Republicans, who worried about some of his views on eliminating some government agencies and his reluctance to intervene militarily abroad.
Libertarians like the elder Mr. Paul have been distrusted on issues like gay marriage by social conservatives, who are key to the Iowa caucuses, as well as war hawks, who fear the anti-interventionist agenda — shared by populists like Pat Buchanan and many libertarians — would force the U.S. to shrink from its role as the world’s superpower.
The younger Mr. Paul has sought to blunt these expected attacks, openly discussing his Christian faith, traveling to Israel to show his support for an ally that both Christians and war hawks champion and penning an op-ed insisting he would not be an isolationist as president.
But like his father, the younger Paul clearly champions the smaller-government, anti-Washington sentiments that have made both Pauls popular among college students and young adults. Rand Paul won the last three straw polls at the Conservative Political Action Conference, where younger voters tend to dominate.
He’ll get to test the popularity of his message of reining in Washington and unleashing American ingenuity on wider audiences this week during his five-state tour, which will take him from his home state to the first four presidential nomination contest states: Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina.
Getting his name on the Republican presidential nomination ballot in all 50 U.S. states and territories would be no small feat. History suggests it’s likely to be most presidential nomination aspirants’ toughest row to hoe.
It takes hordes of volunteers, separate staffs and leaders for organizations in place on the ground in each of the states and territories, money to finance it all and the know-how to pull it off.
It also takes organization and a long head start to compete successfully in states that hold presidential preference caucuses instead of primary elections to award delegates to the Republican presidential nominating convention, to be held next summer in Cleveland.
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