Georgia Tipsheet

Five Georgia Republican congressmen said Thursday it appears the recent decision by Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano to release upwards of 2,000 undocumented immigrants from federal detention was “politically motivated” and not a necessary consequence of sequestration budget cuts.

“The agency’s decision to mass release illegal aliens detained in federal custody under the guise of budget cuts is both puzzling and alarming,” reads a new letter signed by GOP Reps. Paul Broun, Phil Gingrey, Doug Collins, Lynn Westmoreland and Tom Graves.

Sec. Napolitano announced earlier this month that budget cuts had forced the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) to release hundreds of low-risk detainees from custody, but the conservative quintet say in a new letter that the release violates the agency’s “mission of ensuring the safety and security of the American people.”

The Associated Press reported last week the agency had designs on the release of an additional 3,000 low-risk undocumented immigrants to offset budget cuts that might otherwise affect investigative and protective units.

The White House said the decision was made by career civil servants and not political appointees, but the Peach Staters say the timing of the release–Napolitano delivered congressional testimony on the impact of sequestration on DHS the day before the ICE release but made no mention of the pending discharge–gives reason to believe politics infected the decision.

“We fail to see how releasing 2,000 illegal aliens before sequestration went into effect on march 1 nor plans to release 3,000 more during March … ‘minimize[d] the impact of sequester,’” the bunch wrote. “In fact, your repeated failure to be forthcoming about the releases gives the impress that the decision was politically motivated.”

The group have asked Napolitano to respond to a series of questions probing the release’s provenance and want an accounting of the number and offenses of detainees released in Georgia.

One of the letter’s signatories, Rep. Broun, has already announced a campaign for the Republican Senate nomination and a second, Rep. Gingrey, is also expected to pursue the nod.

- James Richardson

Four of Georgia’s most conservative congressional lawmakers warned the president in a stern letter Monday that they consider U.N. Ambassador Susan Rice an unfit candidate to lead the State Department.

The letter, orchestrated by Republican Rep. Jeff Duncan from neighboring South Carolina, attracted the signatures of some 97 GOP lawmakers. Among them: Georgians Paul Broun, Tom Price, Tom Graves and Lynn Westmoreland.

“Ambassador Rice is widely viewed to have either willfully or incompetently misled the American public on the Benghazi matter,” the letter reads. “Her actions plausibly give U.S. allies (and rivals) abroad the reason to question U.S. commitment and credibility when needed. Thus, we believe that making her the face of U.S. foreign policy in your second term would greatly undermine your desire to improve U.S. relations with the world and continue to build trust with the American people.”

Ambassador Rice has weathered intense Republican criticism, most notably from Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, in the months since on the attack on the diplomatic mission in Libya that claimed the lives of four Americans, including the U.S. ambassador.

She said in interviews in the days that followed the attack that it was a “spontaneous” reaction to a previously-unknown internet film. Blame and explanations have since shifted, though the White House’s official response later affirmed that it was, in fact, an orchestrated terror attack.

President Barack Obama has vigorously defended Rice, calling the criticisms of her “outrageous,” even as he has said he remains undecided on who to tap for the Foggy Bottom post.

Of course, the letter will have little bearing on that decision: because the responsibility of confirming presidential nominations falls to the Senate, not the House, it was little more than a symbolic admonishment.

- James Richardson

An ambitious attempt by Georgia Republicans to fill the ranks of senior House leadership with the most conservative among them own resulted in a flop Thursday, neither of the two hopefuls winning a top caucus job.

Rep. Tom Price was defeated Wednesday behind closed doors in his bid to take over the GOP conference, the fourth-highest post GOP post, and now finds himself on the outside looking in on top leadership.

At number five, he previously steered the Republican Study Committee, viewed by members as a conservative check on top leadership. But the deep bench of Georgians vying for leadership jobs left hope for some that the state wouldn’t lose its control of the vaulted organization.

Rep. Tom Graves already had the support of every former RSC chair, which generally translates into a lock on the job, but his opponent, Rep. Steve Scalise, crossed the twenty-percent-support threshold to force a full vote of the group’s membership.

The chairman selection process is a complicated one, the group’s rules giving deference to the opinion of its founders and previous chairs. But it’s not always so: Graves ultimately fell short, Republican aides confirmed to Tipsheet, when ballots for the full caucus were tallied.

Scalise, of Louisana, is not the first to override the opinion of the group’s founders. Not that it will lessen the sting of defeat for Graves, but one of his endorsers, Rep. Jeb Hensarling, accomplished the same in 2006.

- James Richardson

Georgia legislators Paul Broun and Tom Graves topped the Georgia delegation with a 98 percent rating on FreedomWorks’s latest round of congressional scorecards.

The strongly conservative group, which ranks members based on “Freedom” and “Anti-Freedom” votes, released a fresh round of these scorecards yesterday tallying 2012 votes. Rounding out Georgia’s top 3 was Congressman Lynn Westmoreland, who notched a 93 percent rating from the group.

Meanwhile, embattled 12th district Democrat John Barrow earned a 28 percent rating from the group. Though it was the highest of any Georgia Democrat, it significantly trailed Senator Johnny Isakson’s 73 percent score, which was the lowest received by a Republican. Such a mark may prove notable for Barrow, as FreedomWorks had previously endorsed Wright McLeod in the 12th’s GOP primary, but the group has not yet stated if they have intentions of supporting state Rep. Lee Anderson in the fall contest.

-Brandon Howell

Coming on the too big to not be news heels of the Supreme Court’s “ObamaCare” ruling, and a first-ever vote to hold the Attorney General of the United States in contempt, the House of Representatives capped off a historic week with an overwhelming vote to maintain current interest rates on student loans, among other things.

The bill, which included infrastructure measures, passed the House with an overwhelming 373-52 margin, and cleared the Senate 74-19.

Notably, Georgia Republicans came near an even split on the matter. Just 2 of Georgia’s 6 Republican Congressmen voted “yea”, with those members being Tom Price and Jack Kingston. Westmoreland, Scott, Gingrey, Graves, Woodall and Broun all veered to the right, joining 46 other Republicans in voting against the omnibus package. Meanwhile, in the Senate, both Saxby Chambliss and Johnny Isakson cast ballots with the majority.

The vote comes in the wake of speculation that Congressman Westmoreland may potentially seek to lead the NRCC in 2013, as well as a push for Graves to chair the RSC (Republican Study Committee), not to mention mild VP speculation. Scott is President of the freshman class and, meanwhile, Price may have a looming opportunity to move to the fourth-ranking spot overall, Republican Conference chair.

-Brandon Howell

A new regression index of federal lawmakers has found a number of Republican Georgian pols betraying the partisan bent of their districts.

The Madison Project, a conservative political action committee and advocacy group, unveiled on Wednesday a new scaled rating system that amalgamates various legislative scorecards with the partisan voter index to calculate a conservative “performance index.”

This new composite–a “measure of how many points the member is over-performing or under-performing the ideological bent” of their constituents, per the group–has all but two of the state’s Republican House delegation failing local conservatives.

Reps. Tom Graves and Jack Kingston bookend the new scorecard, with the former “over-performing” by 8.5 points and the latter “under-performing” his south Georgia district by 15.5 points.

- James Richardson

Party officials have been forced to quickly renegotiate the qualifying process for 2012 hopefuls with the Secretary of State’s website seizing up.

Registrars are qualifying candidates through hard copy. Among the first: Georgia Speaker David Ralston, U.S. Reps. Tom Graves, David Scott and John Lewis and radio talker-turned-Congressional hopeful Martha Zoller.

UPDATE: The SOS website has regained functionality, allowing would-be candidates to again qualify digitally.

- James Richardson