Mitt Romney Claims Frontrunner Status over Rudy Giuliani
Ya gotta love it!
The Washington Post today reports on page A2 that Giuliani no longer deserves the number one slot in the Republican presidential race. Being that this story is breaking through The Washington Post, this should stir it up for all the Sunday political shows!
A new memo penned by Alex Gage, a senior strategist for former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, argues that his boss, not former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, deserves the distinction.
“Rudy Giuliani continues to lead the Republican field as he has since polling on the race began last year,” writes Gage in a document dated July 20. “However, Giuliani’s support began to ebb in February and has slipped 2-3 points per month since then.”
As evidence, Gage points to a compilation of national polls done by Charles Franklin, a professor at the University of Wisconsin, that seems to show similar negative trend lines in national polls for both Giuliani and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) (For what it’s worth, the Giuliani operation pushed back hard on Franklin’s comparison; “The Giuliani campaign is in a very strong position at this point and is clearly best-positioned to win the primary,” director of strategy Brent Seaborn wrote in a direct rebuttal to Franklin’s argument.) Even if you grant that Giuliani’s slippage in national surveys has stabilized, Gage says, there is ample evidence in polling conducted in early voting states that it is Romney, not Hizzoner, who is in the best position.
Giuliani “is now trailing in four of the five key states that fall before Feb. 5,” Gage writes.
This is my favorite line of the entire article:
The Gage memo is the first full-frontal assault on Giuliani by Romney’s campaign and reflects the way in which the field has changed since the rise of Thompson and fall of McCain.
and then to close with this:
With this memo, Romney is clearly making a play at front-runner status, figuring that if he can establish himself atop the heap, Thompson and Giuliani will fight it out for the chance to be one of the last two standing. Gage asserts that Thompson and Giuliani “may be competing for the same pool of voters” judging by Thompson’s ascent in the polls, and he adds a line from Romney media consultant Alex Castellanos: “If Rudy is the tough mayor of New York, Fred is the guy they would hire to play Rudy on TV.”
Are the gloves coming off now? One thing is for sure: This presidential election season will be fascinating to the end!
~ Vic
Romney Camp Claims Giuliani Is No Longer GOP Favorite
By Chris Cillizza And Shailagh Murray
Sunday, July 22, 2007; A02
Who’s the real front-runner for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination?
A new memo penned by Alex Gage, a senior strategist for former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney, argues that his boss, not former New York mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani, deserves the distinction.
“Rudy Giuliani continues to lead the Republican field as he has since polling on the race began last year,” writes Gage in a document dated July 20. “However, Giuliani’s support began to ebb in February and has slipped 2-3 points per month since then.”
As evidence, Gage points to a compilation of national polls done by Charles Franklin, a professor at the University of Wisconsin, that seems to show similar negative trend lines in national polls for both Giuliani and Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) (For what it’s worth, the Giuliani operation pushed back hard on Franklin’s comparison; “The Giuliani campaign is in a very strong position at this point and is clearly best-positioned to win the primary,” director of strategy Brent Seaborn wrote in a direct rebuttal to Franklin’s argument.) Even if you grant that Giuliani’s slippage in national surveys has stabilized, Gage says, there is ample evidence in polling conducted in early voting states that it is Romney, not Hizzoner, who is in the best position.
Giuliani “is now trailing in four of the five key states that fall before Feb. 5,” Gage writes. The memo goes on to note that the average of public polls conducted in June and July show Romney leading comfortably in Iowa and New Hampshire and more narrowly in Nevada. Former senator Fred Thompson (R-Tenn.) leads the way in South Carolina, while Giuliani is a strong first choice only in Florida.
The former mayor is shifting from a Feb. 5 strategy aimed at running the table of large states set to vote that day to a more traditional approach of lavishing attention on places such as Iowa and New Hampshire, Gage says, pointing out that in the past week alone, Giuliani had eight events scheduled for Iowa.
The Gage memo is the first full-frontal assault on Giuliani by Romney’s campaign and reflects the way in which the field has changed since the rise of Thompson and fall of McCain.
Romney and McCain spent much of the first six months of the year in a largely behind-the-scenes battle. With McCain effectively hobbled — for now, at least — the race looks like a three-way contest between Romney, Giuliani and Thompson.
With this memo, Romney is clearly making a play at front-runner status, figuring that if he can establish himself atop the heap, Thompson and Giuliani will fight it out for the chance to be one of the last two standing. Gage asserts that Thompson and Giuliani “may be competing for the same pool of voters” judging by Thompson’s ascent in the polls, and he adds a line from Romney media consultant Alex Castellanos: “If Rudy is the tough mayor of New York, Fred is the guy they would hire to play Rudy on TV.”
Zing! Over to you, Mr. Mayor.
July 22nd, 2007 at 2:52 pm
National polls mean little right now. The 3rd primary vote is the BIG one. Our friends, the always to be trusted MSM, will write off Romney’s wins in Iowa and NH; No real competition in Iowa and the locality of NH to MA in the 2nd win. But even they(MSM) won’t be able to “explain” 3 in a row! Right now I’m not sure which state will be the 3rd. Does anyone know at this point? Seems to be a lot of doubt here as states keep indicating a change in voting dates. Or did I miss something? South Carolina???!
July 22nd, 2007 at 4:11 pm
Actually Nevada is third and Romney is doing well there, but this is all moot because Feb 5th is such a huge day. The only thing these early victories (if he wins) give to Romney is a ticket to Feb 5th to face Giuliani. But with Florida on Jan 29th, if Romney doesn’t finish in the top two there, he won’t have success going into Feb 5th. The only reason Giuliani may not be considered the frontrunner has more to do with Fred Thompson’s meteoric rise than Romney leading early in the early states. Thompson will challenge Romney in Iowa after Romney’s Ames victory passes. After Ames there will still be almost 6 months between then and the first votes in Iowa. That’s an eternity in politics and if Thompson shows he belongs he can possibly eclipse Romney in Iowa. The good thing though is that Romney’s campaign is so well oiled that its positioned well in the event Thompson’s campaign does peter out. In that case, it is wise for Romney to begin going after Giuliani, in the hopes of weakening his support now, so that in the event Thompson falters, Romney emerges as the only viable candidate. McCain still looms, but has absolutely no money and more importantly no thunder. It is too late for him to retool his campaign and turnaround and be something else. Knowing McCain, he will be his old stubborn self in the end and run as an independent with Bloomberg (though even that is unlikely given his position on Iraq).
July 22nd, 2007 at 5:24 pm
Steven, you mention above, “In that case, it is wise for Romney to begin going after Giuliani…”
With Gage’s comments through the Washington Post here, Romney has done exactly that. He is going after Giuliani now, not later.
July 22nd, 2007 at 7:38 pm
Steven, “all moot because Feb 5th is such a huge day”. I am not sure you explained why you think it is moot. For me, I believe that many of the voters did not do their homework until a few days before their own primary. It has been the case for me for a long time until now. I have talked with people over the years and I found it to be true for many of them, too. So, what is going on between now and primary really does not matter as much as what is happening between the first primary and Super Tuesday. By then, way more people will look at the candidates, and they will be “biased” to vote for the winning candidate, especially when his values are obviously at glance.
July 23rd, 2007 at 12:19 am
SGS I agree with you and too much is being placed on polls right now, especially since you cannot possibly pin down a loyal supporter now. This is why it would not surprise me if Thompson begins to erode Romney’s support in Iowa (after Ames). This isn’t an indictment against the type of campaign Romney is running, it is just simply the reality that primary voters are not buying Romney totally. He essentially is a default candidate as long as he continues to run a stellar campaign. Thompson essentially is the GOP’s last hope as a candidate other than Romney or Rudy. If Thompson proves viable, he will win the nomination. If not, then it will be between Rudy and Romney and that will play out on Feb 5th. Why? Rudy has the the TriStates in the bag (NY, NJ, and Penn) and is leading in CA. Romney has to win the early states in the hope of having momentum going into South Carolina and then use the Key to the South win, to win Florida. In any case, Romney’s fate is in Thompson’s hands…
July 23rd, 2007 at 11:45 am
I agree that the MSM will pooh-pooh MR’s early wins in N.H., Iowa and Nevada. They need to recall that Clinton placed second in N.H. in 1992 and he was also little known at the time and a Southern Gov. with no local ties to the region.
When summer vacation time comes to an end and the voters turn their attention to the campaign, McCain will be pretty much 15 minutes ago, Rudy’s radioactive views on the issues important to the “religious right” will become known and FT will be off to such a late start that he will not be able to close the gap.
The comparisons of FT and Ronald Reagan are, IMHO, not valid. RR made no bones about it that he was running for President. He grabbed the brass ring on the third try. I really believe the electorate respects the dedication and the passion involved in a candidate’s quest for the Presidency that keeps him coming back after a lesser man would walk to the sidelines. FT can play coy until the cows come home. If you don’t want it any more than he appears to, thanks, but no thanks, I’ll vote for the guy that has some fire in his belly!
July 23rd, 2007 at 9:46 pm
Notice how Rudy is just now putting on commercials in Iowa and New Hampshire? I guess he finally got the memo that those two states are important.