By Shelley Kofler, KERA News
http://stream.publicbroadcasting.net/production/mp3/kera/local-kera-719097.mp3
Houston, TX – Republican Presidential Candidate Ron Paul of Lake Jackson Texas says he's ending his official Presidential campaign to begin his new Candidate for Liberty campaign. KERA's Shelley Kofler reports from Houston where the GOP is holding its state convention.
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Hundreds of passionate supporters crowded a ballroom as maverick candidate Ron Paul announced an official end to his Presidential bid, and the beginning of his Campaign for Liberty, which will attempt to shake things up at the GOP National Convention in September.
Paul: I believe our time has comeBy not being an official candidate I will be to do much more.
While the former libertarian and Congressman from Lake Jackson, Texas won no delegates in his home state and few elsewhere, he raised millions over the Internet. And he ignited a movement that attracted those like Lane Culpepper, a state republican delegate from Athens.
Culpepper: Most of the people are getting tired of paying too many taxes and getting regulations put on them, and I feel like the size of our government they don't like .
Becky Sublette from Tarrant County likes Paul's message of getting government out of Americans' lives.
Sublette: Its not so much about him winning the election. It's about getting this message out across the country. It's personal freedoms it's accountability.
Paul's call for ending the Iraq War, his argument that it's bankrupting the country resonates with Steve Heath of Farmers Branch.
Heath: The issue for me was the war because I could't understand why we were in it. I thought that was very foolish.
Paul still has some $4. 7 million campaign dollars he will use to jump start his campaign for liberty. He invited supporters to join him in Minneapolis for the Republican National Convention, where they'll hold an alternative convention.
In Houston, Shelley Kofler KERA News