About a month ago, some of Glenn Poshard’s closest allies held a closed-door meeting and implored the Democratic gubernatorial candidate to step up his campaign to avoid playing catchup to well-funded Republican George Ryan.
There was a reason for the anxiety.
Democrats dearly want to end 22 years of Republican ownership of the Executive Mansion and they see a nominee who, despite five terms in Congress and a primary victory in March, was a relative unknown in most of the state.
Since the meeting, attended by top campaign aides, union officials, and representatives of House Speaker Michael Madigan, Poshard’s campaign has run a few weeks of television commercials and made some high-profile campaign appearances.
But in an effort to move his campaign forward, Poshard also has had to take some steps backward as he tries to win over Democratic voters who supported other candidates in the primary.
“What we’ve done since the primary is not a lot of high visibility things, but I believe very strongly that this campaign will come down to organizational effort,” Poshard said last week.
“We had a very contentious primary, and it has taken two or three months for me to go all over the state and build back bridges that you always have to build once a primary is over,” he said.
There are the bridges to the African-American community, which overwhelmingly backed Roland Burris for governor. There are the bridges to the liberal community, which supported John Schmidt’s primary bid. And there are always bridges to potential donors who recognize that Poshard is likely to be outspent by Ryan by upward of 3-1.
Poshard knows that what might seem to be problematic political crossings in July could become chasms by the time the general election campaign is in full swing after Labor Day.
In recent weeks, Poshard has purchased advertising time on radio stations with a predominantly African-American audience, including commercials featuring Burris. And after originally opposing a south suburban airport project heavily supported by Rev. Jesse Jackson and his son, U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., as well as Ryan, Poshard has slightly softened his stance. He now says he would await the results of environmental studies before making a decision on the airport.
But the socially conservative Poshard was conspicuously absent at last week’s Gay and Lesbian Pride Parade on Chicago’s North Side, a point that Ryan’s campaign, which was in attendance, sought to exploit. And calls from Lakefront and North Side Democrats for Poshard to moderate his views have yet to be addressed.
“I have not seen any real movement by the campaign on the issues that I would like to see addressed,” said Rep. Carol Ronen of Chicago, a member of the Democratic State Central Committee. “There have been some discussions, but he is still not moving forward on some key issues, like child care, like human rights. My fear is the longer he waits, the more opportunity he gives to his opponent.”
Still, some of Poshard’s closest supporters are satisfied, at least for the time being, by the Democratic candidate’s efforts to improve the quality of the campaign, especially in straightening out the way it responds to the media and in stepping up its fundraising.
“My feeling is there are a lot of significant things happening for this time in the campaign. If this was October, I wouldn’t feel this way,” said Don Johnson, president of the state AFL-CIO, which endorsed Poshard in the primary and is expected to do so this month for the general election.
In contrast to Poshard, who had to defeat three major challengers to win the Democratic nomination, Ryan had an easy primary. That gave him plenty of time to raise money. Now his campaign is rolling out a series of position papers, forcing Poshard to respond anew to many issues, including several that he addressed during his bruising primary.
Poshard’s decision to follow self-imposed donation limitations, an effort to portray himself as a politician who cannot be bought, also has created more work for the Democrat’s campaign in an effort to stay competitive with Ryan.
Poshard’s refusal to accept money from political action committees has forced the Democrat to rely more on independent expenditures made on his campaign’s behalf, such as commercials bought by the state AFL-CIO that were aired in the primary. Such expenditures have also drawn criticism that they are no different than PAC contributions.
Scott Fawell, Ryan’s campaign manager, said, “If you set a standard and take the high ethical ground, the worst thing you can do as a candidate is set the bar high and not be able to cross it.
“We’re going to raise money to the best of our ability, and we disclose it for everyone to see.”
When campaign disclosure reports are filed by the candidates this month, Poshard expects to show that he raised about $1 million during the reporting period that ended on June 30. Ryan anticipates having raised $6 million during that time and still has $5 million in the bank.
For the entire general election campaign, Poshard has estimated spending $5 million.
But Poshard has been forced into some early spending. His purchase of television time was an effort to placate criticisms that his campaign was sitting on its hands while Ryan gained publicity through $1.3 million worth of state-funded ads promoting organ-donor awareness.
And with Ryan expected to take to the airwaves this month for his first campaign-financed commercials, Poshard knows that eventually he will be forced to respond.
The Ryan camp is likely to attack Poshard’s early interest in higher gasoline taxes and his still-generic plan to raise the state’s personal income tax in a dollar-for-dollar swap to lower real estate taxes.
Fawell said the Ryan campaign has not decided whether to begin its television campaign with a soft biography spot on the GOP contender or attempt to use Poshard’s position on taxes in an attempt to define the Democrat in much the same way that Republican Gov. Jim Edgar blasted Dawn Clark Netsch out of the 1994 race. Several TV commercials have been taped, Fawell acknowledged.
But Poshard said he is not surprised to be trailing in the fundraising race.
“It’s a situation where our opponent did not have a primary of any substance at least, and was able to save the money and not have to spend it, so that widened the gap. But, that’s OK. We knew that was going to happen,” Poshard said.
Instead, Poshard continues to believe that Ryan’s financial advantage is a hindrance to the Republican rather than something that will drive the campaign.
“People are more interested in debates,” said Poshard, who won his congressional seat and the gubernatorial primary as an underfunded underdog. “They’re more interested in seeing opponents side by side and articulating their different visions and issues about which they’re concerned. And I’m hopeful that’s the tack this campaign will take eventually, rather than trying to bludgeon everybody through the media.”
