Rand Paul: 'I am running for president'

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Updated: Tuesday, April 7 2015, 10:09 AM EDT

Louisville, Kentucky (CNN)- For Rand Paul, it's all led to this moment.

Since riding the tea party wave into the Senate in 2010, Paul has carefully built a brand of mainstream libertarianism -- dogged advocacy of civil liberties combined with an anti-interventionist foreign policy and general support for family values -- that he bets will create a coalition of younger voters and traditional Republicans to usher him into the White House.

The test of that theory begins Tuesday when the Kentucky senator is expected to make official what has been clear for years: He's running for president.

"I am running for president to return our country to the principles of liberty and limited government," Paul said on his new website.

A formal announcement will come at a rally in Louisville and he'll immediately hit the campaign trail, swinging through New Hampshire, South Carolina, Iowa and Nevada -- the states that traditionally vote first in the primaries and caucuses.

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Rand Paul: 'I am running for president'

Rand Paul poised to launch presidential bid

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For Rand Paul, it's all led to this moment.

Since riding the tea party wave into the Senate in 2010, Paul has carefully built a brand of mainstream libertarianism -- dogged advocacy of civil liberties combined with an anti-interventionist foreign policy and general support for family values -- that he bets will create a coalition of younger voters and traditional Republicans to usher him into the White House.

The test of that theory begins Tuesday when the Kentucky senator makes official what has been clear for years: He's running for president.

"I am running for president to return our country to the principles of liberty and limited government," Paul said on his new website.

A formal announcement will come at a rally in Louisville and he'll immediately hit the campaign trail, swinging through New Hampshire, South Carolina, Iowa and Nevada -- the states that traditionally vote first in the primaries and caucuses.

His wife, Kelley, and former Rep. J.C. Watts of Oklahoma will be among the speakers introducing Paul at the rally Tuesday.

So far, Paul joins only Texas Sen. Ted Cruz as a declared candidate for the GOP presidential nomination. "His entry into the race will no doubt raise the bar of competition," Cruz said in a statement welcoming Paul into the race.

But the field is certain to grow in the months ahead with Jeb Bush, Chris Christie, Scott Walker, Lindsey Graham and others eyeing a campaign. Marco Rubio, a Florida GOP senator, is expected to launch his campaign next week.

For now, the nomination is up for grabs with no clear front-runner. Paul came in third place at 12% in a CNN/ORC International Poll of Republicans. Bush led the pack at 16% while Walker came in second at 13%.

Ron vs. Rand Paul

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Rand Paul poised to launch presidential bid

Can Libertarian Rand Paul Win A Republican Primary?

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Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky. walks from the stage after speaking during the Conservative Political Action Conference in February. Carolyn Kaster/AP hide caption

Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky. walks from the stage after speaking during the Conservative Political Action Conference in February.

Rand Paul is not like other potential presidential candidates.

The Kentucky senator, who announced his candidacy for the White House on Tuesday morning, doesn't fit neatly into the molds of either party.

Socially liberal on issues of crime and punishment especially when it comes to drug sentencing against a federal ban on same-sex marriage, and no foreign policy hawk, he's not your prototypical Republican.

As a fiscal conservative and an opponent of abortion rights, though, he's certainly no Democrat either.

"It's time for a new way, a new set of ideas and a new leader," Paul says in a Web video, with a heavy metal soundtrack, previewing his presidential campaign.

Paul fits more with libertarians. And, though he is the scion of the last carrier of the torch of "liberty," he's also not quite his father's libertarian.

Paul's father, the former Rep. Ron, ran for president three times before retiring. The elder Paul, 79, was always regarded as something of a gadfly, an outspoken fresh voice in the Republican primary with a passionate following of young libertarians.

Though Paul did not win a single state in 2008 or 2012, when measured by Election Day voting percentage, he routinely finished in the top three. In fact, he finished a solid second behind Romney in the critical early state of New Hampshire.

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Can Libertarian Rand Paul Win A Republican Primary?

Rand Paul joins race to be Republican presidential candidate

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Conservative US Senator Rand Paul announced Tuesday he is running for the Republican Partys nomination for the 2016 presidential race. Photograph: Mandel Ngan/AFP/Getty Images.

US Sen Rand Paul declared himself a candidate for the Republican nomination for president on Tuesday, aiming to upset the political order in Washington and disprove those in his own party who doubt that a fiercely libertarian conservative can be a serious contender.

Mr Pauls brand of politics could make him both an outlier and a target among his rivals. In a primary contest of candidates debating which of them is the most doctrinaire conservative, Mr Paul is likely to be the only one arguing for reducing federal drug penalties, clamping down on the nations intelligence agencies and taking a more deliberative approach to military intervention.

On social issues like abortion and same-sex marriage, however, he does not stray from the Republican Party line. Mr Paul (52), a Kentucky senatore, will become the second Republican to enter the 2016 campaign, following his colleague in the Senate, Ted Cruz of Texas. It will not remain a small field for long.

Packed field

Florida senator Marco Rubio is expected to announce his candidacy next week. Also waiting in the wings are Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin and Jeb Bush, the former Florida governor, who are expected to declare soon, rounding out what Republicans say is perhaps their most competitive and robust slate of candidates since 1980, when Ronald Reagan faced competition from party heavyweights like George Bush and Howard Baker.

While Mr Pauls political resume may be short - he entered politics with the emergence of the Tea Party movement, winning election to the Senate in 2010, in his first run for office - he has built over the past year and a half what Republican strategists say are some of the most extensive political operations in the states that will vote first in the partys nominating process: Iowa, New Hampshire, Nevada and South Carolina.

Much of the backbone for that political operation will come from the voters and volunteers who gave his father, former Texas representative Ron Paul, a base of energetic support in his own unsuccessful bids for the presidency in 2008 and 2012.

Varied constituencies

But Rand Paul has made it clear in his appeals over the past two years to constituencies as varied as students at black colleges, tech executives, movement libertarians and establishment Republicans that his intention is to seek out a far wider path to the nomination than his father did.

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Rand Paul joins race to be Republican presidential candidate

Frozen Islands 100% Walkthrough All levels 1 – 25 + Boss Part 1/2 – Video

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Frozen Islands 100% Walkthrough All levels 1 - 25 + Boss Part 1/2
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By: Max Difficulty Gaming

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Frozen Islands 100% Walkthrough All levels 1 - 25 + Boss Part 1/2 - Video

Worlds Largest Single Marine Reserve Created in Pacific

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British Prime Minister David Cameron's government announced the creation of the worlds largest contiguous ocean reserve on Wednesday, setting aside 322,000 square miles (830,000 square kilometers) around the remote Pitcairn Islands in the South Pacific for special protection.

The new reserve is nearly three and a half times bigger than the landmass of the United Kingdomlarger than the state of Californiaand is home to a stunning array of sharks, fish, corals, and other marine life, says Enric Sala, a National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence who led a five-week Pristine Seas expedition to the island group in March 2012 that helped establish a scientific case for the reserve. (Explore Enric's posts from the field.)

Announced via the government's 2015 budget, the reserve represents a bid by the U.K. to thwart the illegal fishing that threatens the species in its territorial waters. No fishing or seafloor mining will be allowed in the reserve, except for traditional fishing around the island of Pitcairn by the local population, says Sala.

The reserve's creation is dependent on partnerships with non-governmental organizations and satellite monitoring resources, according to the budget. Those resources are already in place, says Sala.

Thirty percent of the U.K.s waters around the world are now protected, the highest percentage of any countrys waters on Earth. Although the new reserve will become the largest single marine protected area anywhere, the network of reserves created around the Pacific remote islands by the U.S. in September is bigger in total, at nearly 490,000 square miles (1,270,000 square kilometers). (Learn about how large marine reserves are protected.)

People know Pitcairn because of the Mutiny on the Bounty, but their real bounty is the rich marine life underwater, says Sala.

About 60 people live on Pitcairn Island, most of them descendants of the Bounty mutineers from 1790 and their Tahitian companions. In September 2012, in response to the expedition, the Pitcairn Council voted unanimously to create a marine protected area in their entire economic zone, which extends 200 miles (322 kilometers) out from their four islands, three of which are uninhabited. Since the islands are administered by the U.K. as a territory, the new reserve required the support of the British government.

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Pitcairns waters contain some of the few pristine coral reefs left on the planet, says Sala. They also contain intact seamounts [submerged mountains] and deep-sea habitats that have not been touched by trawling and which harbor many species yet to be discovered by science.

On the 2012 expedition, Sala and his team discovered several new species of fish by dropping cameras into deep water. A larger effort is likely to discover hundreds of new animals there, he says. (See photos from Sala's expedition showing life on Pitcairn today.)

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Worlds Largest Single Marine Reserve Created in Pacific