CPAC straw poll: Paul 31% Cruz 11% Carson 9% Christie 8% Walker 7% Santorum 7%

[Mr. Morden]

CPAC will be held March 6-8.  Nearly all the likely 2016ers will be speaking.  Here's the tentative program:

http://www.cpac.org/sites/default/files/CPAC2014Schedule.pdf

Note how the schedule is dominated by folks who've publicly floated the possibility of running for president in 2016.  Namely:

Bolton
Carson
Christie
Cruz
Huckabee
Jindal
Paul
Perry
Rubio
Ryan
Santorum
Trump

Bush was invited, but declined to attend.  I assume that Walker was invited too, but he might also be busy:

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/370250/no-cpac-jeb-bush-eliana-johnson

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Update: Paul wins:

link

Paul 31%
Cruz 11%
Carson 9%
Christie 8%
Walker 7%
Santorum 7%
Rubio 6%
Ryan 3%
Perry 3%
Jindal 2%
Rice 2%
Huckabee 2%
Palin 2%

[All Along The Watchtower]

lol Trump

[Mr. Morden]

The straw poll ballot hasn't been released yet.  Last year, the results were:

Paul 25%
Rubio 23%
Santorum 8%
Christie 7%
Ryan 6%
Walker 5%
Carson 4%
Cruz 4%
Jindal 3%
Palin 3%
Other 14%
Undecided 1%

In other news, CPAC has made peace with GOProud, a gay Republican group, and will allow them at the meeting, but will not have them as a sponsor, or give them a booth.  One of the GOProud founders quit the group, because he said this doesn't go far enough:

http://www.latimes.com/nation/politics/politicsnow/la-pn-cpac-gay-rights-goproud-conservative-20140219,0,747918.story#axzz2uO1d6lHz

However, while the gays are deemed sort of OK, the atheists are not:

http://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/washington-whispers/2014/02/25/big-mouth-gets-atheists-booted-from-cpac-booth

[eric82oslo]

What about atheist gays? A danger to society?

[Mr. Morden]

They have some promo pics of the speakers on their Facebook page.  e.g….

[Mr. Morden]

The schedule of CPAC speakers who are also possible 2016 candidates (being generous, and including Gingrich, Lee, Palin, and Trump):

Thursday

9:00am Ted Cruz
9:24am Paul Ryan
10:25am John Bolton
11:01am Chris Christie
12:00pm Bobby Jindal
12:16pm Marco Rubio
12:31pm Mike Lee
[Also at 12:30 in another room--not a speech, but a book signing event by Joe Scarborough]
2:45pm Donald Trump

Friday

9:00am Rick Perry
10:23am Mike Huckabee
2:25pm Rick Santorum
2:51pm Rand Paul

Saturday

12:45pm Newt Gingrich
12:58pm Ben Carson
5:23pm Straw poll results are announced
5:47pm Sarah Palin

[Vega]

Probably Ted Cruz or Rand Paul will win the straw poll. However, Santorum could come close too.

[Mr. Morden]

Probably Ted Cruz or Rand Paul will win the straw poll. However, Santorum could come close too.

These are more movement conservatives than conservative Evangelicals.  Not really Santorum's best crowd.  Yes, he came in third last time, but with a divided field, 8% is good enough for third.  I don't seem him reaching the ~20% support that would be needed to "come close" to victory.

[Vega]

Probably Ted Cruz or Rand Paul will win the straw poll. However, Santorum could come close too.

These are more movement conservatives than conservative Evangelicals.  Not really Santorum's best crowd.  Yes, he came in third last time, but with a divided field, 8% is good enough for third.  I don't seem him reaching the ~20% support that would be needed to "come close" to victory.

True, good point. I still could see him reaching third or fourth though. Just depends.

I'm wondering if John Bolton could be in play at the straw poll; doubt he would win it...

[Mr. Morden]

As far as I can tell, they still haven't announced the names on the straw poll ballot.  Last year, they had about 20 names on the ballot, and Jeb Bush specifically asked for his name to be taken off.  Any guesses as to who they might include or exclude this time?

Also, looks like we'll get some on the ground reporting from Inks:

https://uselectionatlas.org/FORUM/index.php?topic=170439.msg4078862#msg4078862

[Vega]

I can see Ryan wanting to take his name off.

[Non Swing Voter]

Lol what a freakshow. 

[Mr. Morden]

The straw poll will include a whopping 26 names:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/mar/4/cpac-to-test-26-candidates-for-president-with-stra/?page=all

That story doesn't give the full list, but it does mention the following names:

Ayotte
Carson
Christie
Cruz
Haley
Huckabee
Jindal
Martinez
McDonnell (what?)
Palin
Paul
Perry
Rubio
Ryan
Santorum
Scott
Thune
Trump
Walker

That's 19 names.  So there are 7 others, who they didn't name.  Bolton, Bush, and Peter King would be among the more obvious names not listed there.  Who else?

[BaconBacon96]

The straw poll will include a whopping 26 names:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2014/mar/4/cpac-to-test-26-candidates-for-president-with-stra/?page=all

That story doesn't give the full list, but it does mention the following names:

Ayotte
Carson
Christie
Cruz
Haley
Huckabee
Jindal
Martinez
McDonnell (what?)
Palin
Paul
Perry
Rubio
Ryan
Santorum
Scott
Thune
Trump
Walker

That's 19 names.  So there are 7 others, who they didn't name.  Bolton, Bush, and Peter King would be among the more obvious names not listed there.  Who else?

I'd confidently say Mike Pence, John Kasich, Rob Portman, Allen West

Mary Fallin, Brian Sandoval, Joe Scarborough, Rick Snyder, Condi Rice and even Jon Hunstman could be on that list.

[Vega]

If for some reason Hunstman get's on, he won't be well received.

[Supersonic]

I'll certainly be watching online.

[Marnetmar]

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Erm

Why do they think this is a good idea? You'd think the GOP would be trying to, y'know, improve their image after recent events.

[Mr. Morden]

A must read primer for those attending CPAC: http://dailycaller.com/2014/03/05/a-primer-for-getting-lucky-at-cpac/

[Mr. Morden]

I agree with Catanese here:

http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/03/05/chris-christies-big-moment-at-cpac

We can largely predict what most of the potential 2016ers will say at CPAC.  But Christie is the interesting one to watch.  To what extent does he try to play to the crowd?  (a crowd that refused to invite him to this last year)

[Senator Cris]

Link for the live of CPAC?

[Mr. Morden]

Link for the live of CPAC?

Good question.  According to this:

http://blogs.wsj.com/washwire/2014/03/05/cpac-2014-schedule-features-ted-cruz-chris-christie/

it'll be on C-SPAN.  Though I don't seen anything about it on their website at the moment.  I would check back here:

http://www.washingtontimes.com/specials/cpac/

as the time approaches as well, as they might have some info.

[Mr. Morden]

A preview of Christie's speech:

http://www.usnews.com/news/articles/2014/03/06/christie-to-tell-cpac-stop-letting-media-define-us

[Mr. Morden]

From Twitter:

[Mr. Morden]

Allegedly, we'll get a live stream here:

http://therightscoop.com/watch-live-cpac-2014-live-stream/

But they haven't started yet, so I don't know.  It'll also be on C-SPAN (both TV and internet stream) from 12:40pm onwards: http://www.c-span.org/schedule/?channel=1

[Mr. Morden]

Last link didn't work.  This one seems to: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/03/06/cpac-2014-live_n_4898787.html?&ncid=tweetlnkushpmg00000016

Cruz speaking now, but the audio isn't great.