Rob Maness Leaving Door Open to Another U.S. Senate Run

Retired Air Force Colonel Rob Maness is leaving the door open to another possible run for U.S. Senate in Louisiana, and on Breitbart News Sunday, Maness showed why his message will resonate with a core base of conservative supporters should he choose to do so.

Maness revealed to host Matt Boyle that he recently told Sen. David Vitter (R-LA) that if Vitter wins the Louisiana gubernatorial race, Maness would be “very interested in his seat, and we are taking a very hard look at the seat.”

Maness failed to win the Louisiana Senate race in 2014 against incumbent Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) and establishment Rep. Bill Cassidy (R-LA), who eventually won the race. But he won the respect of conservatives across the state and nation with his grassroots campaign.

On Breitbart News Sunday, Maness blasted the Supreme Court for once again deciding to “legislate from the bench” last week in its rulings on Obamacare and gay marriage. He said the “most egregious decision” was the high court’s ruling that “gay marriage is an inherent right under the Constitution.” Maness predicted that, like with the Supreme Court’s Roe v. Wade decision, last week’s gay marriage ruling will set off another long cultural battle.

Maness had some serious concerns about how the ruling would impact religious liberty. He said “we need to go ahead and make sure that religious liberties are protected for all. We need to make sure that the Constitution is not misinterpreted.”

“We need to ensure that this decision doesn’t flow into all kinds of other discrimination practices against folks because of their religious beliefs, whether they be personal, organizationally or culturally,” he added. “That’s what our country is built on and we need to make sure this decision is implemented fairly and with equality.”

He said he was also “disappointed but not surprised” by Chief Justice John Roberts’s deciding vote in the Obamacare ruling because, according to Maness, Roberts, who deemed that Obamacare was a “tax” (even though the Obama administration claimed that it wasn’t) when his decisive vote upheld the law when it first came before the Supreme Court in 2012, “has shown a penchant for rewriting that law to save it.”

Maness said though he heard that “secretly a lot of Republicans are happy that the court” ruled to save Obamacare again, “the grassroots are very dissatisfied with the court and their inability to read the law… and reinterpret what plain words mean.”

On the Obamatrade deals, Maness said he “cannot fathom a good reason why this Republican Congress will give this particular president more power under TPA [Trade Promotion Authority], especially if we have to keep the agreements like TPP [Trans-Pacific Partnership] and TiSA [Trade in Services Agreement] secret until TPA is passed.”

“Obviously there are things that are going to hurt the american people in these bills,” Maness said, recognizing that Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL) has been one of the only lawmakers who has been revealing truths about the trade bills that the bipartisan permanent political class want to hide from the American public.

On the 2016 field, he said there are “plethora of good, solid candidates” in the field and every one should be vetted thoroughly in the coming months. He said he was looking for a candidate who has “achieved victory when the odds said it was against them” and for “folks that believe in a principled view of the Constitution and what it says about the limited role of our federal government” in addition to someone who will fight for a “strong national defense but will insist on the Constitutional powers being adhered to.” He also said the Republican nominee should have a “strong record of principled decision making that doesn’t go with the flow.”

He was critical, though, of Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL). Maness said he’s “not happy with his stance on immigration and I certainly wasn’t happy with what he said on the marriage decision.” Maness noted that Rubio essentially said “we shouldn’t fight it and we should just move on” and sounded like the most liberal of Republicans in doing so.

After he failed to win Louisiana’s Senate race in a better-than-expected showing in 2014, Maness started his GATOR PAC, which formed to “inspire and recruit conservative activists and citizen leaders who are committed to accountability in government, constitutional principles, certainty and prosperity.

He said that the PAC ensures that he will start any future candidacy with “a good base” and mentioned that his organization has “kept the fundraising machinery well-oiled” in addition to training hundreds of grassroots activists across Louisiana.