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Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry To Announce 2nd White House Bid Today

Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry addresses the Rick Scott's Economic Growth Summit in Lake Buena Vista, Fla., on Tuesday. Perry announces his 2016 run for the Republican presidential nomination today.
Phelan M. Ebenhack AP
Former Texas Gov. Rick Perry addresses the Rick Scott's Economic Growth Summit in Lake Buena Vista, Fla., on Tuesday. Perry announces his 2016 run for the Republican presidential nomination today.

Rick Perry, the former governor of Texas and 2012 Republican candidate for president, is announcing a second bid for the White House.

Perry plans a formal announcement later today, but his website, rickperry.org has already been re-launched with a campaign logo and a slick video heavy on military imagery in which the candidate touts his experience as governor ("someone that's been tested"). Perry says: "We don't have to accept the weakness abroad that we're seeing today. We don't have to accept the slow economic recovery that we see here at home."

Perry, whose campaign four years ago imploded after a series of embarrassing gaffes culminating with the infamous "oops" moment during a televised debate, has been busy reshaping his image. NPR's Jessica Taylor, reporting last week from Iowa, where Perry was making an appearance, says he "looks more at ease" than during the previous campaign:

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"[Gone] are the pressures of office, leaving the governor's mansion after 14 years this January. He now wears dark-rimmed glasses, which have become his trademark on campaign literature, and more comfortable dress shoes instead of cowboy boots."He talks of optimism and a time of new birth in America in his stump speech – but that, too, is what he needs to save his own political hopes. He's currently mired in low single digits in state and national polling."

The New York Times adds:

"[Whether] Mr. Perry has done enough to repair the damage from his failed run in 2012 and to thrust himself out of the second tier of candidates he finds himself in remains unclear. Even in Texas, Mr. Perry has already lost crucial support to some of his rivals. Steve Munisteri, a former chairman of the Republican Party of Texas, has been heading up Senator Rand Paul's presidential campaign in Texas. Many of the grass-roots Tea Party activists in Texas have flocked to Mr. Cruz, while some of those in the more mainstream Texas Republican establishment are supporting Mr. Bush, whose son, George P. Bush, is the state's new land commissioner."

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