Ny Safidinao

OXON HILL, Md. — Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul has won the Conservative Political Action Conference's annual presidential preference straw poll. Pollsters announced Saturday that Paul won 25.7 percent of the votes in the annual survey, giving Paul his third consecutive win in as many years. Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker came in second, with 21.4 percent. Sen. Ted Cruz came in third in the contest with 11.5 percent, followed by retired neurosurgeon Ben Carson with 11.4 percent and former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush with 8.3 percent. All of the other names listed received under 5 percent. The three-day CPAC conference in suburban Washington draws many libertarian-leaning college students whose views and priorities differ significantly from the Republican Party at large. But it is nonetheless seen as a barometer of certain conservative activists' early leanings. Pollsters said just over 3,000 attendees voted. Nearly half identified as between the ages of 18 and 25. Respondents said economic i

Jeb Bush stood firm at the Conservative Political Action Conference Friday, defending his position on immigration reform and Common Core before a sometimes skeptical crowd of voters who don’t always see eye to eye with his policies. Energetic and composed, Bush also defended his record on granting drivers licenses to illegal immigrants while he was governor of Florida. “The simple fact is there is no plan to deport 11 million people,” he said. “We should give them a path to legal status where they work, where they don’t receive government benefits … where they learn English and where they make a contribution to our society.” His comments were met with a mix of applause and scattered boos from the crowd – a change from earlier in the day when just the mere mention of his name triggered a chorus of boos. Bush’s appearance at CPAC was largely seen as an olive branch to those conservative voters who have disapproved of some of his controversial ideas, as he moves toward a 2016 presi

Support for legalizing marijuana has rapidly outpaced opposition, with a slim majority (52%) favoring its legal use as of October 2014. That trend is driven largely by the Millennial generation, who support marijuana at much higher rates than their elders. But when looking more closely at the opinions of young and old, the age gap is starkest among Republicans and those who lean Republican – a strikingly similar trend to what we’ve seen within the party when it comes to same-sex marriage . Six-in-ten (63%) GOP Millennials say the use of marijuana should be made legal, while 35% say it should be illegal, according to our February 2014 survey. That level of support is higher than among Republican Generation Xers (47%) and Baby Boomers (38%), and much higher than among GOP members of the Silent generation (17%). (When we asked the question again in October, overall opinion was only slightly changed.) Republican Millennials, however, are not as supportive of marijuana legalization as

The annual Conservative Political Action Conference  begins this week, a three-day event hosted by the American Conservative Union  where activists, officeholders, campaign consultants and others will hear from a dozen or so potential Republican presidential candidates – among them Jeb Bush, Scott Walker, Rand Paul, Chris Christie and Ted Cruz. Last year’s series of Pew Research Center reports on political polarization  used a 10-item scale of ideological consistency to place Americans into five categories: consistently conservative or liberal, mostly conservative or liberal, and mixed. By that metric, 9% of the public overall is consistently conservative, including 20% of Republicans and Republican leaners; most of the remaining Republicans and leaners were “mostly conservative” (33%) or had a mixture of liberal and conservative views (37%). Here are five facts drawn from our package of reports about consistent conservatives: 1 Consistent conservatives participate in politics at

NATIONAL HARBOR, Md. — Jeb Bush survived his Conservative Political Action Conference appearance here on Friday, holding his own on immigration and education in front of activists who see him as the GOP’s most moderate potential 2016 candidate. On immigration, Bush, the former Florida governor, said the country “first and foremost” must secure its borders. Still, he also defended his record of supporting in-state tuition and driver’s licenses for undocumented immigrants in Florida. Story Continued Below Bush maintained his support for the Common Core education standards reviled by some conservatives, but he also said the federal government shouldn’t be dictating education policy to the states. “The role of the federal government, if there’s any, is to provide more incentive for school choice,” he said. Bush argued forcefully against President Barack Obama’s foreign policy, accusing him of underestimating Russia, creating a void in the Middl