GOP TROTTERS
In what may shape up to be an another embarrassing primary race for
the White House and the Republican National Committee, Rep.
Ed Bryant, a Republican from Tennessee, again has
refused to step aside in the Senate primary race for what will be
the open seat currently held by Sen. Fred
Thompson, who is retiring. Former Tennessee Gov.
Lamar Alexander is senior White House adviser
Karl Rove’s horse in this race, and according to
several White House sources, has met at least three times with
Bryant in the past month to persuade the conservative Republican
that he should back out and give Alexander an open field to run
on.
“Bryant has stood his ground,” says one White House political
staffer. “He’s listened to Rove, he’s been polite, but he wants to
make a race of this primary. It’s not like the White House has a
lot to offer him right now as a consolation prize.”
According to an RNC campaign consultant, Rove has told Bryant
that the Tennessee seat is critical to Republican plans to take
back the Senate, and that President Bush would prefer an
experienced statewide candidate such as Alexander over Bryant.
“He’s told Bryant that there may be another Senate seat open in
2006, that [Sen.] Bill Frist is considering not
running and that that could be Bryant’s seat,” says the RNC source.
“But that’s asking Bryant to be patient for four more years for
something that may never happen.”
Frist has never discussed retirement, and he garnered more than
60 percent of the vote in winning re-election in 2000. His seat
appears safe for many years to come.
“We didn’t need this Bryant situation,” says the White House
political staffer. “Bryant could be a serious challenger to
Alexander, make Lamar work and spend money. That isn’t what we
needed in a state that should have been a cakewalk.”
And money appears to be biggest complicating factor. President
Bush was recently in Tennessee on what Rove and others had hoped
would be the first of a several big fundraising swings for
Alexander. But because of Bryant’s presence in the primary race,
and because of what happened in California, where its handpicked
man Richard Riordan lost badly to neophyte
Bill Simon, Jr., the White House is hesitant to
raise money for one Republican candidate and not the other.
“What happens if Bryant does surprise us and wins the primary?”
asks an RNC fundraiser. “It’s kind of awkward for Bush to campaign
for him in the fall after raising hundreds of thousands against him
several months earlier. We have to stay out of this one for the
time being and hope Alexander can raise the cash on his own without
a lot of help from the White House.”
FEELING THE CROSS-PRESSURE
New York Rep. Nita Lowey, chairman of the
Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, is telling her
Democratic House colleagues they are going to win back the House.
Her colleagues aren’t necessarily buying it. After all, there isn’t
a Democratic political consultant in Washington telling them that.
“It’s been all doom and gloom,” says a House Democratic leadership
staffer. “Whatever she’s drinking I want some.”
It might not be what she’s drinking, but it’s definitely what
she’s been taking in: a poll she commissioned as DCCC chairman says
that so-called “cross-pressured voters” (those who support
President Bush’s war on terror but who are unhappy with his
domestic policies) favor Democrats 2 to 1 over Republicans. “It’s
the first bit of good news we’ve seen in months,” says a DCCC
staffer. “It gives our candidates a roadmap.”
According to several House and Senate Democratic sources, the
poll’s insights were utilized by major players who spoke at a
Florida Democratic meeting over the weekend. Potential presidential
candidates Al Gore, Sen. John
Edwards and Sen. Chris Dodd hammered Bush
on domestic issues, and pretty much let him off the hook
internationally beyond a few potshots on the Israel/Palestine
situation.
“That meeting got a lot of press play down in Florida, so we’ll
poll over the next week or so to see how independents picked up on
what we were saying and what they think about it,” says a pollster
who does work for the Democratic National Committee. “We’ll see if
Lowey’s poll is accurate or just a mirage.”
