All Entries in the "Rand Paul" Category

Judge reprimanded for touting U.S. Sen. Paul’s campaign

By Jack Brammer jbrammer@herald-leader.com FRANKFORT — A circuit court judge for McCreary and Whitley counties has been publicly reprimanded for sending campaign materials via email to all Kentucky circuit court judges last year touting Republican Rand Paul’s bid for the U.S. Senate. The state Judicial Conduct Commission dismissed two other judicial misconduct charges against Daniel [...]

State Fair attracts candidates; charity ham auctioned for $600,000

By Jack Brammer

jbrammer@herald-leader.com

LOUISVILLE — Candidates for state office swarmed to the state fair early Thursday to meet and greet more than 1,600 people at the 48th annual Kentucky Farm Bureau Country Ham Breakfast, where a charity ham was auctioned for $600,000.

Both Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear and his Republican challenger, Senate President David Williams, said they were pleased with their campaigns so far. But Williams’ wife, Robyn Williams, told reporters she abhors TV ads by an independent group that attack her husband as a gambler and a big spender.

One ad criticizes Williams for spending $17,000 for an entertainment center with a large-screen TV for his Capitol Annex office in 2006. Outside the breakfast, the Kentucky Democratic Party introduced “TV Man,” a young man who carried a replica of the TV with Williams’ picture.

The ads, paid for by the Kentucky Family Values PAC, are “disgusting,” said Robyn Williams.

Rand Paul to trade political attire for surgical garb Sunday in Lexington

By Jack Brammer
jbrammer@herald-leader.com

U.S. Sen. Rand Paul will trade the weighty topics of national debt and health insurance, which he talked about Thursday with the Lexington Rotary Club, for surgical garb Sunday morning.

Paul, a licensed ophthalmologist in Bowling Green, will perform six free cataract eye surgeries as a volunteer for the non-profit organization Surgery on Sunday at the Lexington Surgery Center on Harrodsburg Road.

Senate rules prohibit Paul from receiving pay for performing surgeries, so he keeps his practice sharp by performing them for free.

Paul joked before a crowd of several hundred at Fasig-Tipton that his volunteer work for Surgery on Sunday “is kind of a selfish thing on my part.

“While I won’t get paid, I want to have a backup in case I lose my day job,” he said.

U.S. Sen. Paul encounters frustrations at first town-hall meeting

By Jack Brammer
jbrammer@herald-leader.com

HARTFORD – In his first town-hall meeting in Kentucky since he was elected last November, U.S. Sen. Rand Paul ran into a crowd Tuesday frustrated and angered by the sour economy.

He said the sentiments were not unlike those he is seeing throughout the state.

Paul, a Bowling Green Republican who was swept into office with support of the Tea Party movement, was pounded with questions at the public meeting that ranged from excessive regulations to federal health care changes.

The setting was the Hartford City Hall in the Ohio County community in Western Kentucky that is primarily Democratic in voter registration. There has been a sign on the city’s outskirts since the 1950s that declares it “Home of 2,000 Happy People and a Few Soreheads.”

Videos from speeches at Fancy Farm 2011

Videos from key speeches at Fancy Farm 2011, including Mitch McConnell, Rand Paul, Steve Beshear, David Williams and Gatewood Galbraith. All videos by Rich Copley.

Gov. Steve Beshear:

Sen. David Williams:

Political heat turned up at parties’ pre-Fancy Farm breakfasts

By Beth Musgrave and Jack Brammer
bmusgrave@herald-leader.com
jbrammer@herald-leader.com

MAYFIELD – Senate President David Williams told Graves County Republicans Saturday morning that Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear has not done enough to create jobs or make Kentucky’s economy more business-friendly.

Williams, speaking at a Republican breakfast at Graves County High School, said Beshear recently made a joke about Williams’ frequent references to Tennessee and how the state has surpassed Kentucky in many key economic areas.
But the Kentucky economy is not a joke, Williams said.

“When you have double-digit unemployment, it’s not a laughing matter,” Williams said.

Williams said he would be a pro-life governor who has a plan to change Kentucky’s tax structure and “get us back in the job-building business.”

Beshear-Abramson campaign touts economic records in new TV ads

By Jack Brammer
jbrammer@herald-leader.com

FRANKFORT – The re-election campaign of Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear and his running mate, former Louisville Mayor Jerry Abramson, started airing two TV ads Monday touting their economic records.

The ads come on the heels of a TV ad by the Republican Governors Association that claims Kentucky’s economy has suffered over the last four years with one of the Top 10 unemployment rates in the nation and that GOP gubernatorial nominee David Williams has a plan to improve it.

Beshear and Abramson are featured in the 30-second Democratic campaign’s new ads. Williams is not mentioned.

Fancy Farm schedules speakers for annual political picnic

By Jack Brammer – jbrammer@herald-leader.com

Candidates for governor, U.S. senators and a “farewell” speech by Lt. Gov. Daniel Mongiardo will highlight this year’s Fancy Farm picnic, which traditionally kicks off the fall campaigns in Kentucky.

Mark Wilson, political chairman for the 131st annual picnic on Aug. 6 at St. Jerome Catholic Church in the small Western Kentucky community of Fancy Farm, released information Wednesday about the picnic’s political speaking program.

Wilson said Democratic Gov. Steve Beshear and Republican Senate President David Williams have confirmed they will speak at the picnic about their campaigns for governor.

Wilson also said Lexington attorney Gatewood Galbraith, who is running for governor as an independent, will be invited to speak if his required candidacy papers have been formalized.

Marshall County judge-executive picked to emcee Fancy Farm picnic

FRANKFORT – Longtime Marshall County Judge-Executive Mike Miller has been selected to emcee the 131st annual Fancy Farm political picnic that unofficially will kick off this fall’s campaigns for governor and other state offices.

Miller, a Democrat, has held the county judge office since 1974.

Mark Wilson, who organizes the political speaking at the free picnic on the campus of St. Jerome Catholic Church in Graves County with his wife, Lori Wilson, said the picnic’s committee tries to alternate between Democrats and Republicans in finding an emcee.

“They’d run me out of town if we picked someone from the same party every year,” he said, noting that, in some years, persons not affiliated with any party are selected to emcee.

Rand Paul questions official over airport pat-down of Kentucky girl

By Halimah Abdullah – habdullah@mcclatchydc.com

WASHINGTON — U.S. Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky, squared off with Transportation Security Administration head John Pistole Wednesday over a controversial pat-down of a 6-year-old Kentucky girl.

Paul, a strident opponent of what he sees as overreaching homeland security policies, sharply criticized the TSA’s random searches of travelers during a senate hearing.

Pistole said that while some pat downs are random, most are based on intelligence.

“I guess this little girl would be part of the random pat-downs, this little girl from Bowling Green Kentucky, one of my constituents,” Paul said. “They’re still quite unhappy with you guys as well as myself and a lot of other Americans who think you’ve gone overboard, you’re missing the boat on terrorism because you’re doing these invasive searches on six-year-old girls.”