Presidential endorsements from members of Congress may not usually lead directly to voter support, but I nevertheless believe it’s worth paying attention to how many endorsements the Dem candidates pick up as the campaign moves on.
The process I call the Endorsement Primary is obviously helpful in demonstrating what kind of support a presidential candidate has earned, but this isn’t just an academic exercise. These endorsements can validate key support from the party “establishment,” provide candidates with additional outlets for campaign fundraising, and produce large numbers of “super”-delegates who can influence the outcome of a convention fight.
In the 2000 campaign, for example, Bush showed that congressional endorsements can play a large role in winning a nomination. Bush generated dozens of key endorsements from high-profile Republican lawmakers in Congress shortly after entering the race. There was an implicit message in these endorsements: the GOP establishment in Washington wanted Bush — not McCain — to get the nomination.
Bush’s support on Capitol Hill paid off. As the LA Times noted last week, “The congressional solidarity for Bush gave him a deep base of influential party support that helped him withstand a strong primary challenge.”.
This year, there is no genuine “establishment” candidate within the Dem field, and with five of the nine Dem candidates serving in Congress right now, there’s fierce competition for endorsements from other lawmakers.
With this in mind, the Endorsement Primary is already in full-swing. The totals thus far:
Dick Gephardt — 32 endorsements
John Kerry — 18 endorsements
Joe Lieberman — 13 endorsements
Wesley Clark — 12 endorsements
Howard Dean — 10 endorsements
John Edwards — 8 endorsements
Carol Moseley Braun — 2 endorsements
Al Sharpton — 1 endorsement
Dennis Kucinich — 1 endorsement
(Bob Graham had 7 endorsements — mostly from Florida lawmakers — before dropping out)
Note: these totals are only reflective of endorsements from current members of Congress. Many candidates have also earned support from members of state legislatures, state attorneys general, former members of Congress, etc.
The top two leaders of the Endorsement Primary aren’t surprising. Gephardt has been in the House for about 30 years, and has been in the Democratic leadership for 14 years, helping recruit Dem lawmakers as candidates, and then helping them raise money and win re-election in their districts once in the House.
In fact, I’m not surprised Gephardt is leading the way so far with 32 endorsements, I’m surprised he doesn’t have more. Shortly after announcing his presidential campaign, Gephardt quickly picked up a couple dozen endorsements from fellow House members. Since May, however, Gephardt has only garnered two. The fact that he hasn’t generated more excitement and support from members has to be disappointing for his campaign.
Similarly, Kerry has been in the Senate for almost 20 years, longer than the other two senators running for president — Lieberman and Edwards — combined. As such, Kerry is well positioned to win support from Senate Dems, and he has, picking up endorsements from members such as California’s Dianne Feinstein.
I think the two candidates with the most interesting endorsement totals are Clark and Dean. Some might assume that Dean’s surprising success thus far in polls, fundraising, and enthusiastic grassroots supporters might make him more popular with Democrats on Capitol Hill. Clearly, this is not the case.
I think there are a few reasons Dean isn’t enjoying more support from Dems on the Hill. First, many congressional Dems, particularly those in the South, don’t believe Dean has broad enough appeal to beat Bush in the general election. Second, Dean has been in politics for over two decades now, but he’s made little effort to create relationships with Dem leaders in Washington. A lot of Dems, for example, remember all-too-well that when they were battling Newt Gingrich and the GOP over Medicare, Dean announced from Vermont that he supported the Republican plan, not the Dems’ opposition.
And lastly, Dean has done everything possible to tell party leaders that he doesn’t actually care about what Democrats in Congress think. Dean may claim to be from the “Democratic Party wing of the Democratic Party,” but that hasn’t stopped him from railing against so-called “Washington insiders” from both parties. In fact, as I noted last week, Dean made no distinction between Dems and Republicans when he compared members of Congress to “cockroaches” in a recent appearance in Iowa.
Clark’s endorsement totals, meanwhile, are fascinating. Here’s a man with no history as a Democrat or a politician, yet less than a month after announcing his candidacy, Dem lawmakers in Congress quickly offered 12 endorsements — with more on the way.
Oddly enough, Clark’s support is unusually strong in geographic balance. Among the 12 are Charlie Rangel from New York, Rahm Emanuel from Chicago, Jim Matheson from Utah, Betty McCollum from Minnesota, Mike Thompson from California, and Gene Taylor from Mississippi.
Not only are Clark’s endorsers from all over the country, they’re also from all over the ideological spectrum. Matheson and Taylor are from the more conservative wing of the party, while Rangel and Emanuel are from the more progressive side.
In addition, Clark backers on the Hill are suggesting his endorsements are likely to grow by quite a bit. Rep. Marion Berry, a fellow Arkansas Democrat, told the AP a few weeks ago that “more than 30” members of Congress have told him they will back Clark in the primaries. If these come through, Clark’s endorsements will soon rival — if not surpass — Gephardt’s.
For Clark, these endorsements suggest a remarkable opportunity. Remember the old Will Rogers joke? “I don’t belong to any organized political party. I’m a Democrat.” That’s the trick of national Dem politics — it’s incredibly difficult to bridge the chasms within the party. One candidate has to do everything possible to draw support from liberals in the North and West, conservatives in the South, labor in the Midwest, grassroots activists on the ‘net, establishment players on the Hill, and fundraisers everywhere. It’s not easy.
Clinton did it and he became a Dem icon. As evidenced by the use of his name by the nine Dem candidates on the campaign trail, Clinton remains the one figure who is popular with all of the various factions of the party.
Looking over the current field, and their totals in the Endorsement Primary, I can’t help but wonder which candidate is best positioned to bridge the party’s gaps. It’s not Dean, who is as widely disliked by the party as he is liked. It’s not Lieberman, for the same reason. It’s not Gephardt, who seems to have limited support outside of Labor. It might be Kerry, but his support seems limited to the North for now.
And it very well may be Clark, who appears to be uniquely well positioned to appeal to all of the various (and competing) constituencies of the party. Outside of party identification, there isn’t a whole lot that liberals like Charlie Rangel and conservatives like Gene Taylor agree on. The fact that both want to see President Clark speaks volumes about the General’s broad appeal.