TO: Interested Parties
FROM: Brad Woodhouse, President of American Bridge 21st Century
TITLE: The C[onservative] Team
DATE: May 4, 2015
The Republican presidential field keeps getting wider, but not any deeper. Mike Huckabee, Carly Fiorina and Ben Carson are set to announce their long-shot bids this week.
And although they’re more likely to win FOX News contracts than the White House, each of these three candidates can and will have an impact on the contours of 2016 and the eventual GOP nominee. Look no further than Mitt “Self Deportation” Romney’s lurch to the right in the previous presidential nominating contest — one of the weakest fields in quite some time.
Carson, Huckabee and Fiorina will have their moment in the sun and fire up base. When they do, the true contenders will have to react. Will Walker, Bush and Rubio lose the primary to win the general? If history is any indication, it is quite likely to be just the opposite.
When it comes to electability, these three may make the core of the C-Team, but they’re also extremely and unabashedly conservative. Here’s how we expect Huckabee, Carson and Fiorina to shift the wide field right.
Former Governor Mike Huckabee is facing a crowded field for the evangelical base of his party. He will split the goodwill he has with those voters with the likes of Ted Cruz, Scott Walker and others, forcing a face-off on social issues that can permanently damage a Republican candidate. You can also expect the former preacher to lean heavily on his “fair tax” agenda. This is voodoo economics on steroids, but Huckabee will hold his party’s feet to the flame.
-
Read the full American Bridge Scouting Report on Mike Huckabee here.
Ben Carson, a neurosurgeon turned Tea Party darling, sees moral decay everywhere he looks. But his desire to end Medicare and Medicaid is only going to cause decay of the primary field as his competitors struggle to keep up with his zealotry. Calling for the abolishment of these enormously successful and popular programs may curry favor with the Club for Growth crowd, but they’re positions at odds with a vast majority of the American people.
-
Read the full American Bridge Scouting Report on Ben Carson here.
Failed senate candidate Carly Fiorina enters the field as one of it’s personally wealthy candidates, having negotiated herself an eye-popping golden parachute upon her ouster from HP. Like Romney, Fiorina was a pioneer of outsourcing American jobs–and you remember the GOP base leaping to his defense on the issue, don’t you? She’s also a stout defender of the practice and the tax breaks that encourage it.
-
Fiorina: “There Is No Job That Is America’s God Given Right.” While speaking in Washington DC in January 2004, Fiorina discussed the issue of offshoring. She said, “There is no job that is America’s God-given right anymore.” [Sacramento Bee, 5/13/04]
-
Fiorina: California Should Not Panic About Outsourcing. “The valley has to see itself competing on a world stage,” Fiorina said. She said Silicon Valley should not be panicked about the exporting of jobs to places like India, but that it should be “clear-eyed” about it and focus on doing things that cannot be done elsewhere. [San Jose Mercury News, 7/23/03]
-
HP Moved Jobs To India Under Fiorina. In May 2004, it was announced that a Boise software and consulting firm lost several contracts and placed dozens of workers on notice that they may lose their jobs because Hewlett-Packard moved some of the work to a company in India. CRI Advantage, with 200 employees, was informed by HP that some contracts would end. This caught the attention of not only the state Department of Commerce but also US Senator Mike Crapo. Crapo met with dozens of technology companies to understand the danger of offshoring. [Idaho Statesman, 5/30/04]
-
Fiorina Part Of Project To “Actively Campaign” For Offshoring. On March 17, 2004, it was reported that the Computer Systems Policy Project, comprised of eight CEOs from the nation’s largest technology companies, was “actively campaigning against a protectionist backlash [against offshoring], saying that improving education and research is what the United States needs to stay competitive.” The Computer Systems Policy Project included Carly Fiorina. [Scripps Howard News Service, 3/17/04]
-
Fiorina Defended Her Comments On Outsourcing. In an appearance on Cavuto, Fiorina responded to critics that described her take on outsourcing during the 2004 campaign as “almost heartless” by focusing on it as a competitive advantage. “That’s been going on in this company for 40 years,” said Fiorina. “It is a way of continuing to add value and be efficient. The United States is now competing on a global stage…And so, what we as a nation need to do is always think about how do we add more value so that we continue to be the leading economy in the world…But my point is that a nation, like a company, has to think about its competitiveness.” She went on to say that leaders had to be “realistic and honest” about economic realities. [Cavuto, 11/17/04]
Published: May 4, 2015