Posted on 11/15/2005 11:39:20 AM PST by blaylock
Pirro Has Yet to Take Off GOPer Lagging in Polls With Clinton
By Josh Kurtz Roll Call Staff
November 15, 2005
Jeanine Pirro, the choice of Republican leaders to take on Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) next year, is struggling to establish herself as a formidable contender, political observers in Albany and Washington, D.C., believe.
Pirro, the Westchester County district attorney who was recruited into the race when better-known candidates declined to run, is in the midst of a surprisingly tough battle with former Yonkers Mayor John Spencer to secure the Republican nomination, though she is still the favorite.
"If it somehow gets spirited, she has a lot of problems," said one Republican consultant.
But even if Pirro wins the GOP nod, she is almost certain to have to contend with a more conservative third-party opponent - probably Spencer - on the general election ballot, all but crippling her already long-shot chances of upsetting the formidable Clinton.
Pirro's difficulties come as the New York Republican Party is undergoing a potentially devastating period of uncertainty with the impending departure of three-term Gov. George Pataki (R). A multilevel fight for control and direction of the GOP is already under way, at a time when the party has suffered significant defeats in recent state and local elections, with more forecast on the horizon.
"There's open warfare behind the scenes," said one Albany Republican insider who did not want to be named.
Very few Republicans think they have a chance of defeating Clinton, but in Pirro - a brassy, media-savvy crime-fighter with moderate views on social issues - they thought they at least had a star who could slow the Senator's inexorable march to a presidential run in 2008.
A new poll released Monday found Clinton leading Pirro 59 percent to 31 percent in a hypothetical matchup. The incumbent held a 59 percent to 27 percent lead over Spencer.
"The race for United States Senate is Hillary Clinton's to lose," said Joe Caruso, director of polling for the Siena Research Institute at Siena College in Loudonville, N.Y.
Beyond the head-to-head, the poll had more sobering news for the GOP. While Pirro, not surprisingly, was known to only 48 percent of the 622 registered voters who were queried Nov. 9-11, her favorable to unfavorable ratings with the poll respondents were only 26 percent to 22 percent.
Pirro has been surprisingly shaky from the moment she got into the campaign. Her fundraising has been unimpressive - especially considering the degree of antipathy toward the Clintons across the country. Pirro raised just $439,000 from July 1 to Sept. 30, compared to Clinton's $5.2 million. Pirro has also appeared tentative on issues, according to political professionals, and she has thus far been unsuccessful in wooing the state's small but influential Conservative Party.
But Pirro's camp dismisses the polls and argues that she is just beginning to hit her stride. Andrea Tantaros, a spokeswoman for Pirro, said the Republican's fundraising numbers last quarter only reflected four weeks of active campaigning and will improve dramatically in the next report at year's end.
"I think you'll definitely see that she's putting in a strong effort and that we'll have the resources in place to run a credible campaign," Tantaros said.
Beyond fundraising, Pirro's most immediate challenge appears to be denying the Conservative Party nomination to Spencer.
Although the party is not expected to make its formal endorsement until late next spring, Spencer, who has emphasized his fiscal and social conservatism as well as his opposition to illegal immigration, already has the backing of two dozen prominent Conservative county chairmen and other leaders.
"If the convention were held now, he would probably win it," said Shaun Marie Levine, the Conservative Party's executive director. "But things change."
An Empire State Republican consultant was even more emphatic.
"Pirro will not get the Conservative line, period."
In New York, which allows candidates to run on multiple ballot lines, no Republican has won a statewide election without also securing the nomination of the Conservative Party since then-Sen. Jacob Javits in 1974.
Tantaros said Pirro has been meeting with Conservative leaders across the state and is confident she can win their approval. She said Conservatives are impressed by her background as a prosecutor and do not seem prepared to use their opposition to abortion as a litmus test for the nomination. Pirro supports abortion rights.
But Spencer has been pounding Pirro as an ideological clone of Clinton's. He calls himself "the candidate to beat Hillary, not be Hillary."
Spencer's medium-term goal is getting 25 percent of the vote at the state Republican convention next spring, so he can proceed automatically to the September Republican primary with Pirro. If Spencer falls short at the convention, he must petition his way onto the primary ballot, a costly and time-consuming effort that could still fail.
Although Spencer and his advisers did not respond to phone messages Monday, he is playing his status as an outsider fighting the party bosses and Pataki consultants to the hilt.
"The pressure and the arm-twisting out there is just incredible," he said on an Albany radio program hosted by New York Post political columnist Fred Dicker earlier this fall. "What's wrong with a primary? Primaries are healthy."
On the same show, Spencer called Republican leaders' attempts to anoint Pirro "very revolting" and reflective of "the sad state of the GOP."
Stephen Minarik III, the New York Republican chairman, could not be reached for comment Monday.
Spencer may be aided in his quest for the GOP nomination by last month's departure from the race of attorney Ed Cox, son-in-law of the late President Richard Nixon. Cox dropped out after Pataki formally endorsed Pirro.
Cox had run a campaign that was a curious combination of insurgent and Cadillac. He spent $1 million of his own money in a short period of time, hired several well-connected and high-powered state and national consultants, and his exploratory committee included such names as Henry Kissinger and Theodore Roosevelt IV.
Cox attracted the support of a handful of state legislators and close to 10 county GOP leaders, all of whom bucked Pataki and the state party and may be willing to do so again.
Last week, there were rumors in Republican circles that Cox was looking for a way to get back into the Senate race, but one of his Albany-based consultants, Lynn Mueller, denied it Monday.
"There are people who have suggested that he ought to get in," Mueller said. "There are people who have suggested that they might try to draft him. So far that hasn't happened, and I don't have any expectation that it will."
Still, even the suggestion that Cox was thinking about returning could be interpreted as a sign of Pirro's weakness - and Spencer's potential to make a mess of things for her.
Whether Spencer succeeds in snaring the Republican nomination, his calls for a more conservative GOP will be echoed in the primary for governor next year. Many party leaders are lining up behind the candidacy of former Massachusetts Gov. William Weld (R), a social liberal who now lives in New York.
But others are quietly supporting billionaire businessman Thomas Golisano, who ran for governor three times as the leader and sugar daddy of the Independence Party, which was originally affiliated with Ross Perot. Two conservative state legislators and former Secretary of State Randy Daniels (R), a black ex-Democrat, are also preparing to make the governor's race.
One party insider in Washington, D.C., with ties to New York, fears that the Republican base could be turned off if Pirro is the Senate nominee and the GOP also picks a moderate to run for governor.
"If it's Pirro, then what's the other menu item?" the insider wondered.
Attorney General Facelift is toast!
Ping!
He is the Joe Biden of NY politics.
Pirro WHO???
In NY you need a NAME!~}
Didn't he invent the peanut?
If Jon Spencer is an idiot, Jeanine Pirro must be clinically retarded. She would only rate on the intelligence scale if brains were botox.
Anyone but Weld for Governor
No, that was Jimmy Washington. Don't feel bad everyone makes that mistake. :0)
That's a sickening image.
Indeed. You know so much about her you don't even know what office she holds.
One the issues, Spencer sounds like an ideal candidate for the South. But he's running in New York - not even a majority of the Republicans are pro-life there, and certainly not the voters at large.
District Attorney of Leftchester County. A total moron who is going nowhere, except maybe providing inane comments to Fox News.
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