WALL STREET JOURNAL SHOCK SCOOP: Populism on the Rise in GOP Race

The Associated Press
The Associated Press

The Wall Street Journal’s Nick Timiraos drops a truth bomb on the 2016 Republican primary race: conservatives might not like big business in bed with big government.

From the Wall Street Journal:

The latest presidential debate vividly captured how the 2008 financial crisis has reshaped the Republican Party by unleashing a potent populist strain that could further scramble an already unpredictable primary contest.

Candidates vying for the 2016 GOP nomination have grown distinctly more leery of big banks, corporations and international trade deals, and outright hostile toward the Federal Reserve.

Some of these impulses gave rise to the tea-party movement in 2009 and flared in the 2012 GOP primary contest, but they faded with the nomination of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney, a private-equity executive.

The debate in Milwaukee didn’t appear to fundamentally alter the state of the race. But with candidates heading off to Iowa and New Hampshire on Wednesday, it showed how their jockeying to carry the populist banner could intensify in the run-up to those states’ early nominating contests next February.

Candidates who have made full-on appeals for the antiestablishment mantle—businessman Donald Trump, former neurosurgeon Ben Carson and Texas Sen. Ted Cruz—are looking to consolidate that support as the field eventually narrows. Others, such as former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush, Ohio Gov. John Kasich and Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, are walking a finer balancing act to maintain broader appeal.

Read the rest of the story here.

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