RICHMOND, Va.–The most admired fresh face in the presidential race once belonged to Sen. John Edwards, who downplayed being anointed People magazine’s “sexiest politician in America” while telling Democrats that his charisma and Southern roots could win back the White House.
But the ascending candidacy of former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, as well as a crowded field of nine contenders, has complicated the political path for Edwards. Suddenly, after spending a year convincing party leaders that he was presidential material, the North Carolina senator is fending off suggestions that his campaign has gone dormant and that he is having second thoughts about the race.
“It’s a fantasy. It’s not true,” Edwards said in an interview, exasperated by reports he might shelve his presidential ambitions and seek another term in the Senate next year. “I am 100 percent committed to this race for the presidency and I am in it to the end.”
The lifeline for Edwards may rest in Virginia and a collection of other Southern states, which for the first time are playing a pivotal role in the presidential nominating season. The traditional early-balloting states of Iowa and New Hampshire are followed by primary elections in South Carolina, Virginia, Tennessee and Oklahoma, where Edwards hopes he can build a February firewall that would sustain his campaign until a nominee is chosen.
So this week, between the conclusion of a six-day bus tour in Iowa and the opening day of a similar journey across New Hampshire, Edwards made a quick visit to Richmond to pursue a Plan B strategy. He hopes to gain ground on rivals who so far have edged him out of the first, second and third positions in the opening states of the 2004 presidential campaign.
Southern states are vital
“If he’s going to make the argument that he’s going to win, he has to show that he can take Southern states,” said Jim Nachman, a Richmond lawyer who heard Edwards speak at a Capital Club breakfast reception Wednesday. “It’s not lost on me that the past three Democratic presidents were from the South.”
The fact that Edwards hails from the same side of the Mason-Dixon Line as Lyndon Johnson, Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton has been one of the strongest selling points of an otherwise unlikely presidential bid for Edwards, who has yet to complete his first term in the Senate. In fact, among the Democratic candidates, only Al Sharpton has less experience in elective office.
But after raising more money than any other candidate during the first three months of the year, Edwards now has embarked on an aggressive plan to introduce–and in some cases reintroduce–himself to voters in the early states. To regain its footing, the campaign has purchased more than $1 million in advertisements in Iowa, New Hampshire and South Carolina, telling his son-of-a-millworker-makes-good tale.
The aggressive television push, coming before Labor Day when political campaigns traditionally intensify, underscores the urgent concern for Edwards. Polls routinely show him near the bottom of the field, registering only 2 percent in a New Hampshire survey last week and 5 percent in the Iowa Poll in late July.
While Edwards disagrees that there is an 11th-hour urgency to his campaign, he concedes that the coming months are critical if his presidential aspirations are to continue.
“My job is to make sure they touch me and see me,” Edwards said last week, as Iowa corn and soybean fields passed by the windows of his campaign bus. “Over the next three months–August, September, October, maybe into November–I need to be moving.”
Few voters and Democratic activists are paying careful attention to the candidates or the campaign this early in the race. But several of Edwards’ admirers said privately that the momentum built by Dean, Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts and Rep. Richard Gephardt of Missouri are troubling and may be difficult to overcome.
This month, Edwards launched a campaign schedule more aggressive than most any other candidate. He packed his wife, Elizabeth, and three children into a 45-foot tour bus dubbed the “Real Solutions Express” and passed through small towns and neighborhoods, telling voters about his plans to require health coverage for children and to pay for college for students who work.
Edwards, with his boyish haircut and youthful face, appears far younger than his 50 years. He is the only candidate who routinely tells audiences he just celebrated his half-century birthday, a milestone that many would prefer to keep to themselves.
For him, though, his age speaks to one of the central questions of his campaign: Is he experienced enough to be the commander in chief during a time of such global challenges?
In a back-yard speech one evening in Iowa City, Edwards sought to prove his experience by diving into one of the most divisive issues in the Democratic Party without being prompted or provoked. Many candidates steer clear of the controversial subject of war, but Edwards mentioned it at stop after stop on his recent campaign trip.
“You deserve to know I voted for the congressional resolution in Iraq,” Edwards told the crowd of liberal activists, many of whom shook their heads in displeasure at his words. “I stand by it. I take responsibility for it. I’m not walking away from it.”
When asked about Wednesday’s truck bombing at the UN headquarters in Iraq, however, the senator grasped for an answer. Told by a reporter than more than a dozen people had been killed, he offered no apologies as politicians typically do. Instead he recited a few lines about Iraq policy from his stump speech.
Hours later, his Senate office released a statement expressing the senator’s regret at the loss of life in Baghdad.
A rich ordinary Joe
Edwards’ strength, say the people who know him, is an ability to connect with regular people. Indeed, he rarely mentions his prepolitical life as a multimillionaire trial lawyer and instead harks back to his childhood as the son of a millworker or the brother of an electrician.
“I really didn’t pay any attention to this guy, but after I heard him I’m pretty strong on him. He sounds just like an old country boy!” said Clarence Gillihan, a 70-year-old retired schoolteacher who met Edwards last weekend in Independence, Iowa.
“But we’re in real trouble in this country,” Gillihan said. “I’m not so sure who can pull this off.”
Even some committed followers concede that now may not be Edwards’ time.
“He has a bright future ahead for him,” said Rosemary Schwartz, an insurance agent in Vinton, Iowa. “You’re going to hear from him down the road.”
