August 19, 2006
G.O.P. Deserts One of Its Own for Lieberman
By ANNE E. KORNBLUT
Facing Senator Joseph I. Lieberman's independent candidacy, Republican officials at the state and national level have made the extraordinary decision to abandon their official candidate, and some are actively working to help Mr. Lieberman win in November.
Despite Mr. Lieberman's position that he will continue to caucus with Democrats if re-elected, all three Republican Congressional candidates in Connecticut have praised Mr. Lieberman and have not endorsed the party's nominee, Alan Schlesinger. An independent group with Republican ties is raising money for Mr. Lieberman, who has been a strong supporter of President Bush on the Iraq war.
Senator John McCain of Arizona, while saying he would support the Republican nominee, is not planning to campaign for him, and even allowed two of his aides to consult with the Lieberman camp before the Aug. 8 Democratic primary. And Newt Gingrich, the Republican who once served as House speaker, has endorsed Mr. Lieberman's candidacy.
While some Republicans are quietly rooting for his Democratic opponent, Ned Lamont, because they feel he would be such a polarizing liberal target, many leading Republicans say it would serve the party better to have a centrist like Mr. Lieberman remain in office, particularly after being spurned by his own party.
But one thing is clear: there is little to no talk of bolstering Mr. Schlesinger, 48, the Republican nominee, a little-known former mayor of Derby who has registered polling numbers so low they are breaking records. Little known throughout the state, Mr. Schlesinger received attention this summer following reports in The Hartford Courant that he had gambled under a fake name and once had gambling debts. He has dismissed the accounts as irrelevant.
Mr. Schlesinger has reacted bitterly to the rejection by his own party, dismissing calls for him to leave the race. He maintains he can win by conveying his conservative platform to voters.
"Washington and the media have attempted to hijack this election and turn it into a referendum on the future of the national Democratic Party," Mr. Schlesinger said in an interview yesterday. "Their interest is not in electing a Republican in Connecticut, or anyone in particular in Connecticut."
Republican doubts about Mr. Schlesinger were crystallized when the White House spokesman, Tony Snow, pointedly refused on Monday to say the White House would endorse him.
Ken Mehlman, the chairman of the Republican National Committee - whose job is to champion Republican candidates everywhere - pledged to "stay out of this one."
All the major national Republican groups are withholding their fund-raising and organizational support for Mr. Schlesinger, creating a vacuum for Mr. Lieberman, as the centrist in the race, to fill.
"The right thing for people who believe the world is deeply dangerous is to re-elect Lieberman," Mr. Gingrich said. That is especially true, he said, because "the Republican Party's own candidate does not have any possibility of winning."
Initially, in the days after Mr. Lamont's victory, Republican officials had feelers out for a stronger Republican candidate than Mr. Schlesinger, according to strategists with close ties to the party and the White House.
One strategist said the fear was that a hard-fought race between Mr. Lamont and Mr. Lieberman would spur Democratic turnout, which in turn, he said, could harm vulnerable Republicans in the state, like Representatives Christopher Shays and Rob Simmons.
While Republicans were always pessimistic about finding a replacement who could win the Senate race outright - Connecticut is a largely Democratic state - the hope had been to find someone who could excite Republican voters enough to offset a feared surge of Democratic votes in November.
But in the days since the primary, concerns about a Democratic surge have subsided; Mr. Lieberman appears to be creating enthusiasm, even among Republicans, helped in part by the lack of institutional fervor for his Republican rival.
Senator McCain, who was one of the few who has said he would support the Republican nominee in the race, has no intention of campaigning with Mr. Schlesinger, his advisers said.
His nominal support for the party candidate has more to do with wanting to avoid alienating conservatives, one adviser said, than with actually supporting Mr. Schlesinger.
As Mr. Schlesinger's popularity has waned from a minuscule 9 percent in July to an almost invisible 4 percent in a Quinnipiac University poll released Thursday, the question for Republicans has shifted to whether to embrace Mr. Lieberman.
Senator Norm Coleman, Republican of Minnesota, said that from a political perspective, having Mr. Lamont triumph in Connecticut would be "good for Republicans because that's not mainstream America."
"So from that perspective, a Lamont victory shows the extreme nature of the Democratic Party," said Mr. Coleman, who is not making a formal endorsement in the race. "On the other hand, Joe Lieberman is a good senator. And from America's perspective, it would be a good thing for Joe Lieberman to be back in the Senate."
Others cited Mr. Lieberman's support of Mr. Bush's foreign policy.
"For me, it's an uncomplicated decision," said William Kristol, the editor of The Weekly Standard and a neoconservative who is helping Mr. Lieberman through an independent group called Vets for Freedom, which is helping to raise funds and providing strategic advice for the senator.
"Partisan Republicans may be ambivalent; they see a partisan advantage to Lamont," he said. But, he said, "Foreign policy hawks and Bush doctrine believers and prowar types, we want Lieberman to win."
The Lieberman campaign has largely downplayed the Republican support, aware that the Lamont campaign will try to use it to alienate Democrats and independents.
"Part of the problem here is that everyone outside of Connecticut wants to glom onto this race, wants to put their own spin on it and wants to use it for their own advantages," said Dan Gerstein, a Lieberman adviser. "We are not interested in being anyone's political football."
Republican officials said they had hoped to drive him out, but worried that pressuring him further would only antagonize him and possibly create sympathy for his candidacy, drawing attention away from Mr. Lieberman and Mr. Lamont.
On Friday, Gov. M. Jodi Rell distanced herself from Mr. Schlesinger, saying only that he was the "endorsed candidate of the Republican Party," but that she had not spoken with Mr. Schlesinger and had no plans to campaign with him.
Last month, Mrs. Rell called for Mr. Schlesinger to drop out of the race, but Friday she told reporters that "he has given every indication that he intends to stay there."
According to polling experts at the Quinnipiac survey, Mr. Schlesinger's current poll numbers are lower than that of any other major party candidate in the history of the poll.
The same August survey showed Mr. Lieberman leading with the support of 49 percent of those surveyed compared with 38 percent for Mr. Lamont. The poll had a margin of error of plus or minus 3 percent.
"Based on the public polling, this isn't a competitive race at this time, so we're going to use our resources elsewhere," said Brian Nick, a spokesman for the National Republican Senatorial Committee, which is in charge of recruiting and electing Republican candidates to the Senate.
The White House took an even more passive approach this past week. Mr. Snow, the press secretary, said the administration had been advised by the state party in Connecticut not to make an endorsement, and insisted this was not unusual.
Mr. Snow said the administration had taken a similar course in past races where candidates "didn't meet the expectations of the local parties," although he could not immediately think of any.
Later, the White House issued a statement citing a number of examples dating to 1970.
"I read Tony's comments and it immediately jumped out at me what he was doing," Ari Fleischer, the former White House press secretary, said about the strikingly noncommittal remarks made by Mr. Snow.
"It would be far better for Republicans if Joe Lieberman won than Lamont," Mr. Fleischer continued. "There are enough liberals for Republicans to point to - from Russ Feingold to Hillary Clinton to Nancy Pelosi - that we don't need another one to make our case. But what kind of message would it send if a strong defense, pro-Iraq senator won in this environment? It would prove you can be for what George W. Bush is doing in Iraq and still win, even in the Northeast."
Jennifer Medina and Jim Rutenberg contributed reporting for this article.