Reports that Secretary of State Colin Powell has decided to resign at the end of President Bush’s first term could pose a political problem for a White House that has long relied on his moderate voice and popularity with centrist voters.
The mere suggestion that he might not be in the Cabinet if Bush is re-elected could expose the president to Democratic charges in 2004 that a Bush second term would veer to the right, especially in foreign policy, political analysts said Monday.
The president’s spokesman and the secretary of state denied a Washington Post report Monday that Powell’s deputy, Richard Armitage, had notified National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice of their intention not to serve during a second Bush term,assuming the president wins re-election.
“The story has no substance,” Powell said of that report, adding he had not talked to Bush about leaving after the election. Yet neither the White House nor the State Department would say whether the secretary of state would stay on for a second term, and reports of a Powell resignation after the election have been circulating for weeks.
Political analysts said that the next election would chiefly be an up-and-down vote on Bush’s handling of war, terrorism and the economy, but a Powell departure could add complications to the president’s effort to paint himself as a moderate who is not a captive of the Republican Party’s right wing.
Powell’s departure “would raise a question about his replacement,” said Merle Black, political science professor at Georgia’s Emory University. “I think Colin Powell has a lot of credibility that goes beyond party lines.”
For that reason, the report prompted questions concerning who might replace Powell and whether Bush would seek to assure voters before the election that he would name someone with moderate views on foreign policy similar to Powell’s.
Powell pushed hard for the administration to get the blessing of the United Nations before invading Iraq and has taken a more internationalist approach to postwar efforts. On Liberia, his statements about the urgency for intervention have sometimes been at odds with others in the administration.
Rice seen as safe choice
Most analysts said that if Bush were to name Rice as his choice for secretary of state in a second term, it would help ease concerns among some voters that he might turn to a more conservative choice, such as Paul Wolfowitz, the No. 2 official at the Defense Department.
If Wolfowitz, a hawk who pushed for the Iraqi invasion, were the nominee, it would ignite a major political firestorm in Washington, said Stephen Wayne, a political science professor at Georgetown University. He said that before the 2004 election, Bush should at least say he would appoint someone who would “carry on in Colin Powell’s tradition.”
Black suggested Bush should tap Rice for the post.
“She is not nearly as visible as Colin Powell, and there is not the same degree of public awareness about her. But I think she would be viewed very favorably,” he said.
Beyond foreign policy, analysts said, Powell’s presence has helped signal to centrist voters key to any presidential election that the administration would not veer too far right, despite Bush’s efforts to please the GOP’s conservative base on a number of issues.
Mark Mellman, a Democratic consultant, said a Powell resignation would take away a “symbol of moderation in an administration that badly needed symbols of moderation. With Powell gone, it is not clear that Bush could wrap himself in that [moderate] cloak in the campaign . . . Colin Powell helped him seem like a moderate.”
Democrats could use a Powell departure as a campaign issue in an effort to allege that Bush has moved away from centrist voters, he said, and “if he is not seen as a moderate, he’s going to be in serious trouble.”
When the Bush administration announced its opposition to affirmative action in the University of Michigan case before the Supreme Court earlier this year, Powell issued a statement–apparently with the White House’s blessing–declaring that he personally supported affirmative action.
“It stamped again in the mind of the public the sense that Colin Powell is above politics and that he is going to say what he thinks,” said Michael Genovese, a political science professor at Loyola Marymount University in Los Angeles.
“It also may have reassured some people who said, `Well, at least the president is hearing both sides of the story,'” Genovese added. “It may have created the impression that the administration is open-minded about some things. It was useful to Bush, he certainly has not suffered a thing for it, and it certainly helped Powell.”
`No shortage of talent’
But Republican political analyst Whit Ayres said that Powell’s importance to the administration stems from his credentials and outstanding career, not “his appeal to any slice of the ideological electorate.”
While the secretary of state “has been an enormous asset to this administration,” Ayres added, “there’s no shortage of talent in this administration. If he chooses to leave, I am sure the president can find a good replacement.”
Powell is no ordinary Cabinet officer. He has a distinguished military career and served as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff during the 1991 gulf war. He was once considered a strong potential candidate for the presidency. In a CNN poll in June, 84 percent of respondents said they had a favorable view of the secretary of state; only 13 percent had an unfavorable view.
Powell was an asset to Bush in the 2000 campaign, as Bush announced early in the race that he intended to ask him to join his administration. Genovese said Bush gained credibility by associating himself with Powell, and that reassured voters “who were uncertain about Bush’s lack of experience.”
But he and other analysts said Sept. 11 had largely erased doubts of many voters about Bush as a foreign-policy leader, and in many respects Powell’s importance had diminished, with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld rising to the fore.
“In one sense, there is no one Bush could pick who could replace Powell,” said Black. “On the other hand, that’s life. The Bush administration is not depending on Colin Powell.”
Coincidentally, Powell and Armitage are to fly to Texas on Tuesday for dinner with Bush at his ranch in Crawford and for talks Wednesday on foreign-policy issues, the White House said, adding these meetings were scheduled weeks ago.
