IN THE HOPPER
North Carolina lame duck Sen. John Edwards pulled
down about $120,000 on Wednesday night in Venice Beach, California,
during a fundraiser in the loft of Easy Rider star
Dennis Hopper.
Edwards’ presidential campaign staff had been hoping to rake in
more than $200,000 at the $1,000 or more per head event, but blamed
the fires burning down the coast for the lower attendance.
Perhaps they should also blame the scorchingly hot candidacy of
Howie Dean as well.
Several celebrities billed as “co-hosts” of the Edwards event
pulled a no-show, even though they were in the Los Angeles area on
Wednesday night. The buzz in La-La land is that in the past month,
i.e., since the Hopper event was planned, those thought loyal to
Edwards jumped on the Dean bandwagon.
“I won’t embarrass anyone by naming names, but we know that we
have at least two of Edwards’ Hollywood backers now in our camp,”
says a Dean volunteer in Los Angeles. “We have fundraisers upcoming
down here, and you’ll see. Hollywood loves Governor Dean.
At least Edwards was entertaining during his visit with Hopper
and friends. In a 15 minute speech, the senator told the small, if
enthusiastic, gathering that President Bush’s only desire was to
further the interests of the wealthy at the expense of the middle
class.
The average income of attendees at the Edwards gathering
probably exceeded $500,000 per year.
READY TO DO THE RIGHT THING
Look for Sen. Bob Graham to announce he’s back in
the hunt for his U.S. Senate seat. An email was sent out late
Tuesday night to a number of paid and volunteer Graham staffers.
The subject line bore the title, “Update on Reelection
Announcement.”
“Things could change, but we’re getting the sense that he’s
enthusiastic about another run,” says a Graham aide in Washington.
“He doesn’t want to be party to giving Republicans another shot at
greater control of the Senate. He was openly disdainful of Senator
Edwards’ decision not to run. He’d be a hypocrite if he didn’t do
the right thing for the party.”
SERVICE WITH A SMILE
As reported by the Prowler last
week, and reported by other media outlets this week, the
Service Employees International Union is expected on November 6 to
hand its endorsement to Howie Dean. The decision
will be made by the SEIU president Andrew Stern
and the union’s 63 member executive committee.
SEIU’s leanings were made clear during a late August Washington
meeting, where SEIU rank-and-file members voted for Dean in a
beauty-contest ballot. Stern, though, put off an endorsement, in
part, out deference to his AFL-CIO brethren, who also put off a
vote.
The SEIU’s endorsement gives Dean the potential linchpin he
needs to lock in the inside track to the Democratic nomination.
That’s not because the SEIU is the AFL-CIO’s largest member.
(Remember, Dick Gephardt still has the best shot
at the overall AFL-CIO nomination because of the large number of
AFL-CIO affiliates that have already endorsed him.) No, the SEIU is
critical because it puts Andy Stern in the Dean campaign’s hip
pocket.
Over the past 18 months, Stern has helped finance the startup of
three critical 527 soft money political action groups (these are
sanctioned by the McCain-Feingold Campaign Finance Reform Act). The
Partnership for America’s Families, America Coming Together, and
America Votes all bear heavy financing by the “union label” and by
next summer these groups may have more than $100 million to spend
in support of Democratic causes, the biggest of which is the
party’s presidential candidate.
While that money can’t be spent directly on Dean for President.
It can be spent on general issues campaigns and get out the vote
programs.
In some ways, the SEIU’s endorsement might actually help
Gephardt get the full AFL-CIO nomination. That’s because AFSCME
president Gerald McEntee (he’s the man who
“discovered” Bill Clinton in 1991), was also
sniffing around Dean after his other “hot” candidates, Sen.
John Kerry and Gen. Wesley Clark,
flamed out. But McEntee and Stern despise each other, to the point
where McEntee pulled AFSCME money from some of labor’s 527 programs
because Stern was given a larger leadership role than he was.
McEntee now may turn to Gephardt, or to another candidate,
simply to spite Stern. That split in the AFL-CIO’s largest unions
might be enough to ensure that the union backing Gephardt has
already received is enough to win him the AFL-CIO’s
endorsement.
