DeWine too moderate for Tea Party crowd?

Feb 8, 2010 — The Columbus Dispatch

Jack Torry

Feb. 7, 2010 (McClatchy-Tribune Regional News delivered by Newstex) -- WASHINGTON -- To understand the difficulties that former Republican Sen. Mike DeWine has with Tea Party activists, just check with Bonnie Oleksa.

Oleksa, a Tea Party organizer who lives about 20 miles north of Mansfield, describes herself as a conservative. She looks back fondly on President Ronald Reagan's two terms. She knocked on the front doors of neighbors, imploring them to vote in 2006 for Republican gubernatorial candidate J. Kenneth Blackwell.

But DeWine? She derisively dismisses him as "recipe boy," a reference to the baking recipes frequently distributed by DeWine's wife, Fran. Oleksa refused to vote for DeWine in 2006 when he lost his re-election bid to Democrat Sherrod Brown. And she will not vote for him in November in the race for state attorney general against Democratic incumbent Richard Cordray.

"Why do you think we have Sherrod Brown?" Oleksa said. "Because DeWine was such a loser. An F rating from the National Rifle Association. He voted with Ted Kennedy. He screwed up conservative court nominees. True conservatives loathe Mike DeWine."

In an election year in which Republican candidates in Ohio and across the country are performing well in polls against Democratic opponents, GOP hopefuls such as DeWine and U.S. Senate candidate Rob Portman are groping for the right notes to convince the conservatives who dominate the Tea Party that they are one of them.

DeWine has traveled across the state to meet with Tea Party activists. Just last week, he distributed a two-page summary of what he calls his "conservative voting record" as a member of the U.S. House and Senate.

"They've been good meetings, and I intend to have more of them," DeWine said. "Their message is essentially less regulation, keep taxes low and keep spending down. I certainly agree with those goals for state government."

Portman, too, is energetically trying to win the same voters in his Republican primary race against Tom Ganley, a Cleveland auto dealer. Portman said he has "a lot of friends who are Tea Party people. They're not going to agree on everything. But they do share a belief that Washington has overreached and our federal government has gotten too intrusive."

The people who make up the Tea Party and similar organizations are a loose coalition of economic conservatives, social conservatives and libertarians. Oleksa, for example, backed social conservative Patrick Buchanan in his unsuccessful 1996 campaign for the Republican presidential nomination, while Jason Rink of Columbus, who helped found the Ohio Liberty Council, supported libertarian congressman Ron Paul for the 2008 Republican presidential nomination.

"The GOP doesn't really understand this movement," said Rink, whose Liberty Council leadership team includes Tea Party members. "We're not completely Republican. We're not looking to preserve the Republican power structure."

But in their zeal to win the backing of Tea Party conservatives, Portman and DeWine run the risk of alienating moderate independents crucial to deciding the general elections. Tea Party activists are enthusiastic and committed, but analysts warn that they represent a small slice of voters in Ohio.

"There's obviously a loud outcry from the far right in terms of the Tea Party," said Greg Haas, a Democratic consultant in Columbus. "But pandering to that group is not unlike a Democratic officeholder pandering to the extreme far left. It doesn't play well with the vast majority of people."

Political analysts suggest that DeWine has a more daunting task than Portman, even though DeWine is staunchly opposed to abortion rights and backed President George W. Bush's tax cuts in 2001 and 2003.

Many conservatives have not forgiven DeWine for joining six other Republicans and seven Democrats in 2005 to forge a compromise that made it more difficult for the Senate to kill judicial nominations with a filibuster. Instead, conservatives wanted Senate Republicans to use their muscle to change rules and confirm their favorite judges by simple majority rather than 60 votes required to overcome a filibuster.

Conservatives also sharply objected in 2004 when DeWine supported an extension of a ban on the sale and production of 19 military assault weapons.

In his letter to conservatives, DeWine tried to assuage their worries. He pointed out that the judicial compromise cleared the way for the Senate to confirm the U.S. Supreme Court nominations of Chief Justice John Roberts and Justice Samuel Alito -- both among the court's most conservative members.

At first glance, Portman, a former congressman from Cincinnati, is everything Tea Party activists dislike -- an establishment Republican who served as Bush's budget director and trade representative.

But Portman reminds them that he supported the 1997 budget agreement that transformed years of deficits into four consecutive years of surpluses. He receives strong marks from the NRA and backed the 2001 and 2003 tax cuts.

"Rob Portman is being embraced more by the Tea Party movement because he's good on most issues that Tea Party conservatives find important," Rink said. But Rink conceded that "Tom Ganley is sort of an ideal candidate for the Tea Party movement."

Unlike Portman, Ganley is cast as the political outsider. He has never run for office, prompting an admiring Oleksa to say that "he's not a slick, polished politician," while Portman to her "is just a re-tread."

Ganley has aggressively sought their votes. To Ganley, the Tea Party activists and other conservatives are the key to defeating Portman. Ganley's campaign manager, Jeff Longstreth, said, "The numbers are huge, and the energy is through the roof."

jtorry@dispatch.com

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