CPAC: Nikki Haley to fight on in Michigan primary despite South Carolina loss: Live

At least one member of the Republican National Committee is working to slow Donald Trump‘s attempted takeover of the organization by pushing to keep the committee neutral until Trump is officially the presidential nominee and avoid picking up his legal bills.

Two draft resolutions are being circulated by Henry Barbour, a national committeeman from Mississippi, for consideration at the RNC‘s upcoming March meeting in Houston. Barbour said support for the resolutions among RNC members is growing but he does not yet have the needed cosponsors, and any resolutions would ultimately be nonbinding.

Gustaf Kilander filed this report from CPAC:

When he addressed this year’s Conservative Police Action Conference, right-wing commentator Michael Knowles addressed what he called a “kerfuffle” from last year’s remarks, when he said “transgenderism must be eradicated from public life.”

Last year’s statement – widely seen as a call for violence against trans people – was condemned by LGBT+ civil rights groups and the White House, amid an avalanche of anti-trans legislation aimed at young people across the country and fears of abuse and violence fuelled by the denial of trans existence.

At this year’s CPAC, he said he stands by his “observation” that “men can’t become women,” and that the backlash to his statement reveals the “identity crisis” facing an America in decline without religion.

His remarks on Thursday – part of a relatively lengthy diatribe condemning not only trans people but marriage equality, abortion rights and surrogacy – drew little attention outside the poorly attended convention hall, but underscored the ubiquity of anti-trans rhetoric that is threading nearly every single event at the conference and throughout Republican politics.

On Friday evening, during the Reagan Dinner, Bishop Joseph Strickland, the former bishop of Tyler, Texas addressed the topic Republican elected officials have hoped to avoid: the Alabama Supreme Court’s ruling that frozen embryos could be considered children under state law, saying that conservatives needed to guide Republicans politicians to support the “sanctity of life.”

“This decision by Alabama’s court was correct according to our Catholic faith,” he said addressing the conservative faithful and donors after an auction that included selling off portaits of Donald Trump and Jesus Christ and before a speech by failed presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy.

Bishop Strickland, whom Pope Francis relieved last year from his position, called upon conservative activists to push Republican elected officials to stand steadfast behind the Alabama court ruling.

Donald Trump is demanding Alabama lawmakers “act quickly to find an immediate solution” to protect in vitro fertilization in the wake of a shock state supreme court ruling that forced hospital systems and IVF clinics to halt treatments, while throwing doctors and families into legal chaos.

On his Truth Social on Friday, the frontrunner for the Republican nomination for president vowed his support for “the creation of strong, thriving, healthy American families” and “fertility treatments like IVF in every State in America.”

After a year of looking into the Biden family, little has been revealed regarding the alleged bribery and corruption of which the president, his son Hunter Biden, and his brother Jim Biden, have been accused.

“I don’t see it going anywhere substantive,” said one House Republican, adding that there “aren’t close to enough” GOP votes to impeach the president.

Ariana Baio has the full story:

The former president has yet to officially lock up the party’s nomination but is widely considered to be on the verge of doing so following this weekend’s win in the South Carolina primary, and very favourable polling ahead of Tuesday’s contest in Michigan.

Florida congressman Matt Gaetz, the subject of a long-running House Ethics Committee probe into whether he engaged in sex with an underage female while serving in the House of Representatives, lashed out at the chairman of that committee during a speech to a right-wing conference.

Mr Gaetz, who was also the target of a years-long Department of Justice probe into whether he violated criminal laws against sex trafficking by transporting the same underage female across state lines for illicit purposes, was not charged by prosecutors after that probe was wrapped last year.

But the GOP firebrand, whose struggles with the Ethics panel were reportedly a factor in his push to oust former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy from his post last year, is still facing the internal House probe, for which investigators have reportedly spoken to the female in question as well as a former friend of the congressman who allegedly witnessed him have sex with the underage girl.

Andrew Feinberg filed this report from CPAC: