White House officials, deeply worried that Democrats might take control of Congress in three weeks, are grimly determined to reverse a Republican slide in the home stretch of the midterm election campaign.
“We’re in a very difficult environment, and history suggests it’s going to be a tough year,” White House political director Sara Taylor told The Examiner in an interview. “And so we’re mindful of thatand certainly moving forward in a direction to do everything we can to help save both chambers of Congress.”
President Bush’s closest advisers concede that Republicans are reeling from their toughest two weeks in recent memory. After achieving substantial gains against Democrats in September polls, the GOP went into a tailspin when Rep. Mark Foley, R-Fla., resigned amid allegations that he sent salacious computer messages to underage congressional pages.
“It’s obviously a serious matter and may have some impact in a limited number of districts,” White House political strategist Karl Rove told The Examiner.
But as the media buzz over the Foley scandal begins to subside, White House officials are increasingly convinced the episode was a mere “blip” in the campaign, not a defining event. Rove said voters will have more important things on their minds when they cast ballots on Nov. 7.
“National security and the economy are the drivers of this election,” he said. “Along with particularized local concerns, they will continue to be at the center of the election.”
Besides, White House officials said Republicans enjoy several “underlying structural advantages” over Democrats as the campaign draws to a close.
“The party retains a very healthy cash advantage headed into this last month,” Taylor said. “And I feel very good about the structure of the ground game. We think that will play a significant role in the election.”
In fact, Republicans plan to spend tens of millions of dollars more than Democrats to pay for the “ground game,” a coordinated effort to get voters to the polls on Election Day. While Democrats were considered better at such efforts through the 2000 election, the GOP began to dominate in 2002 and 2004.
Today, Republicans are viewed as particularly adept at putting volunteers on the ground in the final 72 hours of a campaign to chase down fence-sittingvoters. These volunteers use up-to-date lists of registered Republicans, complete with accurate information on where to locate them.
In addition, Republicans have a tool at their disposal that is unavailable to Democrats — the considerable political resources of the White House. The president, first lady Laura Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney are all barnstorming the nation on behalf of GOP candidates.
“Bush is going to help turn out the Republican Party,” one senior White House official predicts. “You know, in 2004, we didn’t have great numbers with independents, but we turned out our base, which is why we won.”
Contrary to news reports that Bush is unpopular among members of his own party, a new poll by ABC News shows his job approval among Republicans has risen from 68 percent in May to 82 percent in October.
White House officials acknowledge that some conservatives remain unhappy with the president’s proposal to grant legal status to illegal aliens as part of a guest worker program. But those same conservatives can take comfort in the fact that the proposal was blocked by House Republicans, who instead pushed through legislation to build 700 miles of fence along the Mexican border.
Other Republicans are angry over skyrocketing federal spending. And yet, if they stay home in November, they risk a Democratic takeover of Congress that could result in higher taxes — a harbinger of even greater spending, according to Bush and Cheney.
White House officials are heartened by a multitude of healthy economic indicators, including lower gas prices, a record high stock market and growing consumer confidence. But as former President George H.W. Bush learned in 1992, Republican presidents sometimes don’t get credit for turning the economy around.
The younger President Bush says he is keenly aware of this challenge, which is further complicated by the fact that good economic news is often overshadowed by bad news from the war against terrorism. On the other hand, the White House believes any discussion of national security, including North Korea’s recent claim of an underground nuclear test, redounds to the benefit of Republicans.
That’s because such a discussion allows Republicans to point out that Democrats oppose the Patriot Act, the terrorist surveillance program and legislation to allow the detention and interrogation of suspected terrorists. In addition, many Democrats have called for a rapid pullout of U.S. forces from Iraq, a proposal that is unpopular among voters.
“Let me put it this way,” White House press secretary Tony Snow said. “We’re perfectly happy to have national security be front and center in this election, period.”
Taylor agrees.
“What energizes Republicans more than anything else is the war on terror,” she says. “It’s the No. 1 motivator of our base, in terms of the issues that people most care about and are most motivated to turn out.”
While Democrats are at least as energized as Republicans, they have their own share of party dissatisfaction, Taylor says.
“Their party dissatisfaction really has more to do with the fact that they really don’t like their party leadership,” she said. “They’re not really motivated by them. They’re not excited about them. They don’t think they have any alternatives.”
Republicans are even more leery of Democratic leaders and fear that a change in congressional control would unleash years of score-settling against the Bush administration. The prospect of Rep. Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., becoming speaker of the house and other liberal Democrats chairing powerful congressional committees is proving a potent motivator to Republican voters, White House officials claim.
In fact, some Republicans have placed unsolicited calls in recent days to party headquarters with offers of financial aid.
“That almost never happens,” a White House official said. “All of a sudden, there’s this fear.”
