Sen. Ted Cruz announces presidential bid with Twitter post, video

Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz announced that he will run for president in 2016 via a Twitter post early Monday.
The 30-second video accompanying the tweet featured Cruz speaking over a montage of farm fields, city skylines and American landmarks and symbols, calling on "a new generation of courageous conservatives to help make America great again."
"I'm ready to stand with you to lead the fight," Cruz says as the video concludes. Shortly after midnight Monday, the campaign had launched its website.
Cruz, the first major candidate to enter the 2016 White House race, had been expected to make the announcement later Monday during a speech at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va. He is expected to start his campaign immediately rather than launch an exploratory committee, which many do as a precursor to a campaign.
Amy Kremer, the former head of the Tea Party Express, told the Associated Press Sunday that the Republican pool of candidates "will take a quantum leap forward" with Cruz's announcement, adding that it "will excite the base in a way we haven't seen in years."
Other candidates who have been rumored to run for the GOP nomination include former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush; Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker; Florida Sen. Marco Rubio; and Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul.
Following his speech at Liberty, Cruz is scheduled to speak with Fox News’ Sean Hannity in an exclusive interview.
Cruz, 44, a favorite of the Tea Party movement who has made headlines for his conservative stance on immigration, has gone after other Republicans for their more moderate views.
In December, Cruz defied party leaders to force a vote on opposing Obama's executive actions on immigration. The strategy failed, and led several of his Republican colleagues to call Cruz out. "You should have an end goal in sight if you're going to do these types of things and I don't see an end goal other than irritating a lot of people," Utah Republican Sen. Orrin Hatch said at the time.
"Cruz is going to make it tough for all of the candidates who are fighting to emerge as the champion of the anti-establishment wing of the party," GOP strategist Kevin Madden told AP. "That is starting to look like quite a scrum where lots of candidates will be throwing some sharp elbows."
"He's awfully good at making promises that he knows the GOP can't keep and pushing for unachievable goals, but he seems very popular with right wing," added veteran Republican strategist John Feehery. "Cruz is a lot smarter than the typical darling of the right, and that makes him more dangerous to guys like Scott Walker and Rand Paul."
In recent weeks, Cruz has already come under fire over his own citizenship. Two former Justice Department lawyers said last week there is no doubt the Canadian-born senator is eligible to run for the White House.
"There is no question that Senator Cruz has been a citizen from birth and is thus a 'natural born Citizen' within the meaning of the Constitution," Neal Katyal, acting solicitor general in the Obama administration, and Paul Clemente, solicitor general in the President George W. Bush administration, wrote in a joint article.
Anti-Cruz "birthers" challenged his citizenship status because he was born in Canada. However, two years ago, Cruz released his birth certificate showing his mother was a U.S. citizen born in Delaware, presumably satisfying the requirements for presidential eligibility as a "natural born citizen."
Last month, Cruz addressed the citizenship issue during a question-and-answer session with moderator Hannity at the Conservative Political Action Conference.  “I was born in Calgary. My mother was an American citizen by birth,” Cruz said.  “Under federal law, that made me an American citizen by birth. The Constitution requires that you be a natural-born citizen.”
With a little more than a year and half to go before the 2016 election, speculation is heating up that several presidential contenders will soon officially throw their hats into the ring. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who enjoys a wide lead among potential Democratic candidates despite the recent uproar over her use of a personal email account while leading the State Department, is expected to announce her candidacy next month.

Worse Cartoon

Sun setting on daylight saving time? States consider alternative to clock-changing ‘hassle’

States across the country are taking a dim view toward daylight saving time. And some say it's time to turn back the clock -- so to speak.
Lawmakers in 10 states have proposed legislation challenging what, for many, is a twice-a-year headache, and one they just endured again earlier this month. The new bills would mostly have states pick a time ... and stay on that time.
"Every time you have the spring forward or fall back, you get in the coffee shops, churches and everybody's complaining about it and all of a sudden it dawned on me it is kind of a hassle," said Texas state Rep. Dan Flynn, who proposed a bill that would place the entire state of Texas on central standard time year-round.
Beginning in 1966, every state in the country except Arizona and Hawaii started adjusting their clocks under the Uniform Act that permanently established daylight saving time nationwide.
States move their clock back one hour in the fall and one hour ahead in the spring in an effort to "save daylight" with later sunrises and sunsets.

More on this...

• Time to do away with daylight-saving time?

But the practice has been scrutinized since its inception.
In Illinois, state Republican Rep. Bill Mitchell submitted a proposal that calls for the state to stay on daylight saving time year-round.
"It's always been a pain and a group of citizens came to me and said 'Hey we should do daylight throughout the whole year,'" Mitchell told Fox News.
Proponents of scrapping daylight saving time say it's generally unnecessary, disturbs sleep patterns and has recently become even more complicated. In 1986, Congress extended daylight saving from a six- to seven-month period and extended it again in 2005 to eight months -- mid-March to mid-November.
"Congress really gave us a wise compromise in 1966 with six months of standard time, but because of the lobbies on behalf of daylight we now spring forward in the middle of the winter," said Michael Downing, author of "Spring Forward: The Annual Madness of Daylight Saving."
Elected officials in 10 states have proposed legislation that would opt their states out of daylight saving time including Florida, Idaho, Illinois, Michigan, Missouri, New Mexico, Oregon, Texas, Utah and Washington.
The officials all cite different reasons from health to safety concerns. Some just consider the practice pointless and antiquated.
"It's like the Native American proverb -- if you cut a foot off the top of your blanket and attach it to the bottom, you didn't lengthen your blanket," Flynn said.
Downing, though, says keeping track of a standard clock nationwide could become extremely difficult if each state starts adjusting its own time.
"Once individual states start to change their clocks in innovative ways, it's no longer predictable to transportation, communication and broadcasters," Downing said. "There starts to be real costs that start to accrue as a result."
The author says the disagreement among states isn't new. In 1965, before the Uniform Act was passed, 71 major cities in the U.S. with a population of over 100,000 were using daylight saving while 59 others were not.
"No one knew what time it was," Downing said. "It does look like we're falling back, we have no consistency even in the proposals."
Downing suggests the best option could be to revert to the original six-month plan.
"Time zones, which are really are the basis of transportation and communication around the world, are in peril," he said.
Flynn, however, thinks switching time for daylight saving should be abandoned altogether.
"People do not like the hassle of adjusting their clocks twice a year," he said.
Still, despite the opposition, there are some fans of daylight saving, because of the economic and health benefits of extra light in the evening.
"I love it," said Mary Jobs, of Las Vegas. "I get to go home and still have light to walk my dog."

Obama expected Tuesday to announce change in US troop withdraw

President Obama is expected to announce in the coming days a modified plan on U.S. troop withdraw in Afghanistan to help that country’s new government fight the Taliban and other emerging insurgent groups.
New Afghan President Ashraf Ghani has asked Obama to consider some flexibility in his plan to reduce the number of non-combat U.S. troops from 10,000 to 5,500 by year’s end, as part of his government’s emerging national security strategy. And he is expected to make his case personally when he visits the United States from Sunday through Tuesday.
The White House acknowledged Friday that Ghani and Obama have talked about the issue three times in the past four months and that U.S. military officials have presented some recommendations to Obama’s team, based on Ghani’s concerns.
Jeff Eggers, the National Security Council’s senior director for Afghanistan and Pakistan, said that he expects Obama will make a statement on the issue Tuesday, after meeting in Washington with Ghani.
“But no decisions have been made yet,” he told reporters.
Obama in December 2014 ended America’s combat mission in Afghanistan, bringing an official close to his country’s 13-year war in the country. With two years remaining in the White House, the president would likely want to end all occupation in the largely unpopular war, in which there have been roughly 2,200 U.S. military deaths.
However, Obama has faced sharped criticism from Capitol Hill Republicans and other military hawks for pulling forces out of Iraq, which has now become a hotbed for the growing and dangerous Islamic State radical group.
Ghani hopes to leave Washington next week with a firm commitment for American military support in his fight against an Islamic State affiliate, which he and U.S. military leaders fear is also finding a foothold in Afghanistan.
Ghani's relationship with Washington stands in stark contrast to that of his acrimonious predecessor, Hamid Karzai, whose antagonism toward the U.S. culminated in a refusal to sign security agreements with Washington and NATO before leaving office.
Ghani signed the pacts within days of becoming president in September, and has since enjoyed a close relationship with U.S. diplomats and military leaders.
His overseas trip comes as the Afghan army is waging its first-ever solo offensive against the Taliban in the Helmand province, their southern heartland, seeking a decisive victory ahead of the spring fighting season as evidence it can carry the battle without U.S. and NATO combat troops.
Ghani, who was personally involved in planning the Helmand operation, launched in February, is expected to personally ask Obama  for enhanced backup in the offensive, including air support, said several officials close to the Afghan president, speaking on condition of anonymity.
There are 13,000 foreign soldiers still in Afghanistan, about 9,800 American troops and 3,000 from NATO  down from a peak of 140,000 in 2009-2010. The remaining troops are involved in training and supporting Afghan security forces, with battlefield backup only when necessary. Also, half of the U.S. troops are engaged in counter-terrorism operations against the Taliban and al Qaeda.
U.S. officials in recent weeks and months have said the Obama administration is indeed set to abandon plans to draw down to 5,500 troops by year's end, bowing to military leaders' requests.
While no final decision on numbers has been made, the U.S is expected to allow many of the American troops to remain well into 2016.
Ghani, however, has already signaled that he wants the U.S. to maintain 10,000 troops in Afghanistan throughout the next decade, according to a European military official who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss the talks.
Even more important is the presence of U.S. and NATO bases, which are to be dismantled in mid-2016, according to current plans -- an undertaking that would take assets away from the fight.
Ghani is likely to get a U.S. commitment for funding, training and support for the Afghan military beyond 2016, but his request to keep the bases open beyond that timeframe is purportedly still on the table.
He also wants the U.S. bases in Kabul, the southern city of Kandahar, the former capital for the Taliban's 1996-2001 regime, and the eastern city of Jalalabad to remain open as long as possible.
U.S. military officials purportedly agree that the bases should remain open at least in the near future.
In Washington, Ghani is also likely to raise the subject of a new, home-grown threat from the Islamic State affiliate. Though the offshoot's strength and reach in Afghanistan remain unclear so far, those who have swapped the white Taliban flag for the black flag of the Islamic State group, which is fighting in Iraq and Syria, are believed to have links to the group's leadership in the Middle East.
Both Ghani and his chief executive Abdullah Abdullah, who will accompany the president on his U.S. visit along with around 65 Afghan officials, have referred to the Islamic State group in recent speeches. U.S. Gen. John Campbell, commander of American and NATO forces in Afghanistan who speaks regularly with Ghani, told the Senate Armed Services Committee earlier this month that the rise of the group in Afghanistan was being taken "very, very seriously."
"The Daesh character is that it is like a maneater," Ghani told reporters in Kabul on Saturday, using an acronym for the Islamic State group.
The U.S. military was behind a February drone strike that killed Abdul Raouf Khadim, a Taliban commander who switched allegiance to the Islamic State group and set up an ISIS recruiting network in southern Afghanistan. And Khadim's nephew and successor, Hafiz Wahidi, was killed with nine of his men in an Afghan military operation in Helmand on March 16, according to the Afghan Ministry of Defense.
Parallel to his military struggle, Ghani is also trying to negotiate an end to the 13-year war with the Taliban and open a preliminary dialogue with those among the group's leadership willing to come to the negotiating table -- as a prelude to formal peace talks, possibly within two years.
Multiple efforts to start a peace process have failed in the past.

Sen. Ted Cruz reportedly will announce plans for presidential bid Monday

BREAKING NEWS –  Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz reportedly plans to announce his intentions to run for president Monday at an event at a Virginia university, which would make him the first candidate for 2016.
The Houston Chronicle reports Cruz start his campaign outright rather than launching an exploratory committee.
Cruz will give a speech at Liberty University in Lynchburg, Va. Monday and Cruz aides are aggressively promoting the event, bit will not release any information to Fox News.
“Go to Lynchburg,” Cruz spokeswoman Catherine Frazier said.
With a little more than a year and half to go before the 2016 election, speculation is heating up that several presidential contenders will soon officially throw their hats into the ring. Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who enjoys a wide lead among potential Democratic candidates despite the recent uproar over her use of a personal email account while leading the State Department, is expected to announce her candidacy next month.
For Republicans, Sens. Cruz, Marco Rubio of Florida and Rand Paul of Kentucky have all been eyed as potential candidates, along with Wis. Gov. Scott Walker, former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush and even real estate mogul Donald Trump, who formed an exploratory committee earlier this week.

Obama rips Netanyahu’s election rhetoric, says US will ‘evaluate’ options on Mid East talks

President Obama, in his first extensive post-election comments, leveled tough criticism at Benjamin Netanyahu over comments the Israeli prime minister made in the run up to his election victory, underscoring the deepening tensions between the two men.
In an interview published Saturday in The Huffington Post, Obama said he told Netanyahu in a phone call Thursday, "it is going to be hard to find a path where people are seriously believing that negotiations are possible"-- after the Israeli leader rejected the idea of a Palestinian state during the elections.
Critics say Netanyahu made a last-ditch attempt to spur his supporters to the polls Tuesday, after he also warned that Arab citizens were voting "in droves" and endangering years of rule by his Likud Party. The comments drew accusations of racism from Israeli Arabs and a White House rebuke.
"We indicated that that kind of rhetoric was contrary to what is the best of Israel's traditions. That although Israel was founded based on the historic Jewish homeland and the need to have a Jewish homeland, Israeli democracy has been premised on everybody in the country being treated equally and fairly," Obama told The Huffington Post. "And I think that that is what's best about Israeli democracy. If that is lost, then I think that not only does it give ammunition to folks who don't believe in a Jewish state, but it also I think starts to erode the meaning of democracy in the country."
After the election, Netanyahu appeared to walk back his comments about a Palestinian state, and indicated he could support a two-state solution if conditions improve. Obama, however, told the website that he will treat the situation as though Netanyahu is not interested in the creation of a Palestinian state.
"We take him at his word when he said that it wouldn't happen during his prime ministership, and so that's why we've got to evaluate what other options are available to make sure that we don't see a chaotic situation in the region," Obama said. The president reportedly declined to comment on wether the U.S. would prevent a Palestinian effort for statehood though the United Nations.
Netanyahu appeared on Fox News' "The Kelly File," and defended his comments. He said, "the conditions are that we would vacate territory instead of getting the two state solution, we could end up with a no state solution. That is a solution that would threaten the very survival in the state of Israel. I said we have to change the terms. Because right now we have to get the Palestinians to go back to the negotiating table, break their pact with Hamas and accept the idea of a Jewish state. And I think that's what the international community should be focused on."
Republicans and pro-Israel groups have criticized the White House for its tough stance on Netanyahu after his victory and for focusing only on his pre-election remarks denouncing a Palestinian state—as opposed to his post-election comments walking it back.
The American Israel Public Affairs Committee, in a statement earlier this week, voiced concern that the Obama administration is now rebuffing Netanyahu's efforts to mend ties.
"In contrast to their comments, we urge the administration to further strengthen ties with America’s most reliable and only truly democratic ally in the Middle East."

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‘Like an idiot I believed that’: Judge blasts DOJ over immigration claims, threatens sanctions

A federal judge sharply scolded a Justice Department attorney at a hearing on President Obama's immigration executive actions, suggesting that the administration misled him on a key part of the program -- and that he fell for it, "like an idiot." 
The testy court hearing was held Thursday in Texas by U.S. District Judge Andrew Hanen. The judge suggested he could order sanctions against the administration if he finds they indeed misrepresented the facts.
At issue is whether the DOJ misled the judge into believing that a plank of the Obama program -- giving deportation reprieves to thousands of young illegal immigrants brought to the U.S. as children -- would not go forward before he made a ruling on a request to halt it. In fact, federal officials had given more than 108,000 people three-year reprieves before that date and granted them work permits under the program.
Obama's executive actions would spare from deportation as many as 5 million people who are in the U.S. illegally. Many Republicans oppose the actions, saying only Congress has the right to take such sweeping action. Twenty-six states led by Texas joined together to challenge them as unconstitutional. Hanen on Feb. 16 sided with the states, issuing a preliminary injunction blocking Obama's actions.
Hanen chided Justice Department attorney Kathleen Hartnett for telling him at a January hearing before the injunction was issued that nothing would be happening with regard to one key part of Obama's actions, an expansion of the 2012 Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, known as DACA, until Feb. 18.

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• Judge threatens sanctions over DOJ immigration claims

• New action in court and Capitol Hill on immigration front

"Like an idiot I believed that," Hanen said.
A flustered Hartnett repeatedly apologized to Hanen for any confusion related to how the reprieves and work permits were granted.
"We strive to be as candid as possible. It truly became clear to us there was confusion on this point," she said.
Hartnett continued to insist that the 108,081 reprieves had been granted under 2012 guidelines, which were not stopped by the injunction, and that government attorneys hadn't properly explained this because they had been focused on other parts of the proposed action.
But Hanen pointed out that the 2012 guidelines only granted two-year reprieves and that three-year reprieves are being proposed under the program now on hold.
"Can I trust what the president says? That's a yes or no question," Hanen asked.
"Yes your honor," Hartnett replied.
The states asked that Hanen consider issuing sanctions because Justice Department attorneys had made "representations (that) proved not to be true or at a minimum less than forthcoming," said Angela Colmenero, a lawyer with the Texas Attorney General's Office, the lead attorney for the states.
Colmenero said the three-year reprieves that were granted might have caused the states economic harm as the states may have already issued various benefits, including driver's licenses, to immigrants who received a reprieve.
"There is absolutely no basis for sanctions here," Hartnett said. "The government is absolutely trying to do the right thing."
Hanen said he would issue a ruling "promptly" on what action, if any, he will take against the Justice Department.
The federal government has asked the 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans to lift Hanen's injunction while the case is appealed.
The other states seeking to block Obama's orders are Alabama, Arizona, Arkansas, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kansas, Louisiana, Maine, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, North Carolina, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Carolina, South Dakota, Tennessee, Utah, West Virginia and Wisconsin.