Labor Supporter Says Dean Ignored His Entreaties to Quit By ADAM NAGOURNEY
WASHINGTON, Feb. 19 - One of Howard Dean's most powerful labor supporters, Gerald W. McEntee, said on Thursday that he had decided that Dr. Dean was "nuts" shortly before he withdrew his support for Dr. Dean's candidacy and begged him to quit the race to avoid a humiliating defeat.
Mr. McEntee, the president of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, defended his decision to abandon the campaign, saying he told Dr. Dean that he did not want to spend another $1 million of his union's money "in order to get him a couple of extra points in Wisconsin."
"I have to vent," Mr. McEntee, the often blunt leader of the nation's largest public service union, said in a leisurely interview in his office here. "I think he's nuts."
Mr. McEntee said he reached his assessment of Dr. Dean after watching what he described as a series of halting appearances in Iowa, leading up to his shouted concession speech. He said that he did not believe Dr. Dean, the former governor of Vermont, understood how substantial his decline was after that, and that he was stunned when Dr. Dean did not bow to pressure from labor unions to pull out earlier this month.
"I go to Burlington, and I meet with him," Mr. McEntee said. "I'm telling you, I threw more ice water on his head in about 25 minutes than probably he has ever had. And I said: `Don't do Wisconsin, O.K.? Don't go in.' I told him to get out. I said, `You can't win.' "
"He said he's still going into Wisconsin," Mr. McEntee continued. "I said: `We're not. We're off the train. If you think I'm going to spend $1 million to get you another point after this election is over, you're crazy.' "
A spokesman for Dr. Dean, Jay Carson, said Mr. McEntee's attacks on Dr. Dean could endanger the party's chances of defeating Mr. Bush. "All Democrats have to be united to win this election," he said. "This kind of personal attack is not going to help us beat George W. Bush."
The remarks by Mr. McEntee came the day after Dr. Dean ended his candidacy. In the speech Dr. Dean made on Wednesday, he went out of his way to praise the other two big unions that had joined Mr. McEntee in endorsing him, the Service Employees International Union and the International Union of Painters and Allied Trades, for sticking with him.
Mr. McEntee, who flirted with endorsing John Kerry and Gen. Wesley K. Clark before settling on Dr. Dean, said his union was probably going to sit it out for a while. "At this point, there's no way we're going to endorse anybody," he said. "I think we need a rest. Maybe in an asylum."
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