Sen. Rand Paul Conference Call - November 19th, 2015 - Granite Grok

Sen. Rand Paul Conference Call – November 19th, 2015

Senator Rand Paul
UNITED STATES – SEPTEMBER 26: Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky.,(Photo By Bill Clark/CQ Roll Call)

I had an opportunity to sit in on a conference call today with Sen. Rand Paul at 3:30 EST. Short call, three questions asked (which was good for me because I was listening in from work). These are not verbatim quotes of questions or answers just a synopsis from my notes on the call. If any of you were also on the call and have more detail please share. Thanks!

1) Is the current screening process for Refugees insufficient?

Synopsis of Answer: We have no certainty about who is coming or who is here.

There are a million students visiting, 150,000 of whom are Muslim, and we do not know if they are in school or what they are doing.

Need a 100% entry exit strategy so we know that if we let you in we know if you’ve left.

Sen. Paul pointed out the Tsarnaev’s were refugees and also remarked on some individuals in Bowling Green, KY who came in as refugees and tried to buy Stinger missiles.

 

2) Jeb Bush called for boots on the ground in Middle East.

Synopsis of Answer: First Iraq war didn’t help, and added chaos, so a next one won’t work either.

We do need boots but they must be Arab boots from civilized Islam so (as an example) that as they liberate territory they can share their version of Islam with locals as an alternative to ISIS.

 

3) Electoral strategy, Path to the Nomination?

Synopsis of Answer: Have a significant ground game in place in the first four primary states.

Believes his campaign/ideas appeal to students, young voters, college students. Mentioned issues like legalizing marijuana, surveillance state, or friends sent to overseas wars.

Also appeal to independents and liberty movement libertarians and conservatives who are their campaign backbone.

Said, Carson is in decline and people’s tolerance for Trump is growing thin so the race is really wide open.

Finally, Sen. Paul did explain at the beginning of the call, with regard to the refugee situation, that it is of primary importance to keep America safe from attack, and that we need to be scrutinizing people coming here. He also explained that an amendment he proposed to address housing funds for refugees was defeated in the Senate, but I did not catch the specifics of the amendment or its purpose.

Update: Here’s a link to the details on the Senate amendment, from Breitbart:

Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) forced his own party’s leadership to yank a bill off the floor of the Senate on Thursday over refugee housing, a significant political and policy victory for the Kentucky Senator and 2016 GOP presidential candidate.
Paul also blasted Senate leadership on Thursday for not considering his amendment to the Transportation, Housing and Urban Development funding bill that would have blocked any current refugees in the United States from getting public housing.
“Well I think what boggles my mind is the biggest issue in our country right now is keeping us safe from attack,” Paul told Breitbart News on Thursday afternoon when reached by phone. “My amendment tells the president that we don’t approve of bringing more people here from the Middle East until we have adequate controls on who’s here already. My amendment was not only pertinent to the biggest issue of the day, it was also germane to the bill. Both parties tried to stop me from offering it and that’s a tragedy.”
Paul’s amendment to the so-called T-HUD funding bill would have cut off public housing funding for refugees in America right now.
After the establishment in both political parties tried to stop him, but failed, Senate Majority Leader Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-KY)52%
 pulled consideration of the full T-HUD bill from the Senate floor. McConnell canceled all scheduled votes on the bill on Thursday, and sent the U.S. Senate home for the weekend, because he couldn’t figure out how to block Paul.
Paul said in a statement:
“As you may have seen, Senate leadership filed cloture on the Transportation and Housing Bill, without my germane amendment on welfare for new refugees. This is an outrage and I will not back down. I will oppose cloture as long as this amendment is being blocked by Senate leaders of both parties.   will use all available Senate rules and procedures to force them to use all possible time. My request is simple – an up or down vote on his Amendment to cut off welfare to new refugees. We should be pause the refugee program while we fix it and ensure national security is addressed. This vote is to send a message to President Obama to halt this program now.”
The significance of what just happened can’t be understated. Paul just took on the Senate Majority Leader of his own political party–who’s also from his own state of Kentucky–and won. Now, the next stages of the battle begin and it’s unclear where this goes from here.
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