Ahead of the 2016 presidential election, potential candidates are plotting their campaigns by the book — by writing them.
A political memoir has become a key component to a presidential campaign, a tool candidates use to float policy ideas and promote themselves. And, in this election cycle, there will be no shortage of new tomes.
Republican Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida will release a book next month, “American Dreams,” that will launch his platform for a potential bid and send him on a tour to promote it. Ditto former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, who next month will release his book, “God, Guns, Grits and Gravy.”
Rubio and Huckabee will add their names to a long list of other potential contenders for the presidency who have already released political works this year. Rep. Paul Ryan, R-Wisc., released his book, The Way Forward: Renewing the American Ideal, in August. Former Sen. Rick Santorum, R-Pa., published his, Blue Collar Conservatives, in April.
Hillary Clinton made a big splash this summer with the release of her memoir, Hard Choices, which recounted her tenure as secretary of state. The book’s publication was marked by a nationwide tour of size and scope of a presidential campaign, with countless media interviews, book signings and speeches.
But Clinton is not the only Democrat using the publishing industry as a launching pad for a potential campaign. Jim Webb, a former Democratic senator from Virginia who has announced an exploratory committee for the presidency, published a memoir this year of his military service, I Heard my Country Calling. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., published A Fighting Chance in April, creating buzz that she might challenge Clinton for the Democratic nomination, although Warren has denied such a motive.
For some potential presidential contenders, a book deal also can mean a big payday. Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, inked a deal earlier this year to receive a $1.5 million advance for his memoir.
Political memoirs often are not published for their sales potential. All Things Possible, the book penned this year by New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, a potential Democratic contender for the presidency, sold only 945 hardcover copies in its first week.
But books offer candidates a medium through which to put their policy ideas on record, present their personal histories in a rosy light, and lay out their selling points for a presidential bid. Then, during a campaign, candidates will often invoke what they have written.
“You’ll see candidates remind voters and the media that they’ve developed ideas or reforms on these issues,” said Kevin Madden, a former senior adviser to Mitt Romney’s 2012 presidential campaign. “They’ll take to a debate stage and declare, ‘I’ve talked about the three steps we need to take to become energy independent in my book…,’ time and time again.”
By the same token, however, books can provide ammunition for foes, especially when an issue has shifted politically since the book was published.
In a Republican primary debate in December 2011, Texas Gov. Rick Perry and Romney clashed over whether the health care reform Romney pushed as governor in Massachusetts was a model for Obamacare, and whether Romney supported an individual mandate. As evidence, Perry pointed to one of Romney’s books.
“I read your first book and it said in there that your mandate in Massachusetts should be the model,” Perry said. “And I know it came out of the reprint of the book. But, you know, I’m just saying, you were for the individual mandates, my friend.”
Indeed, a book that deviates from innocuous on-message talking points can be more interesting, but also strewn with potential political landmines.
In President Obama’s first book, Dreams from my Father, which was published in 2005, he wrote of having done marijuana and “maybe a little blow.” The candid admission created a stir when Obama ran for president in 2008.
Sen. Rand Paul’s most recent book, Government Bullies, became the source of controversy when BuzzFeed reported it included multiple instances of plagiarism.
“Ultimately, I’m the boss, and things go out under my name, so it is my fault,” Paul told CNN at the time. “I never had intentionally presented anyone’s ideas as my own.”
In the heat of a presidential campaign, such missteps can be fatal. To prevent them, a candidate who writes a book solely as a tool to run for president will often turn the manuscript over to his own research team for evaluation in advance.
On Romney’s campaign, Madden said, “We directed our own opposition research team to give the draft manuscripts the same scrutiny they would give an opposing candidate’s book.”
