U.S. ELECTIONS | Guide to the 2008 Election
16 October 2007
Experts Weigh Value of Endorsements of Presidential Candidates
Importance, impact of celebrity endorsements questioned
Washington -– Political pundits are debating whether newly named Nobel Peace Prize winner Al Gore will endorse one of the candidates for the Democratic Party’s nomination for president. But perhaps an equally important debate is whether such an endorsement would even matter in the U.S. presidential race.
Michael Shea, who heads a Boston political consulting firm for Democrats, told USINFO that casting a ballot for president is the “most personal vote a person makes,” which diminishes the power of an endorsement from a well-known politician. This is especially true, he said, for the very independent-minded voters of Iowa and New Hampshire, which are scheduled to hold the first presidential caucus and primary, respectively, in the 2008 race for the White House.
Citizens of those two states, Shea said, take their vote “very, very seriously, on the level of a jury in a murder trial.” Their vote is not a “frivolous thing,” he said.
Where Gore’s endorsement would have a large effect is with voters concerned about global warming, said Shea.
“Everybody knows Gore’s taken on iconic proportions as an environmentalist,” Shea said. Winning Gore’s endorsement would solidify a candidate’s environmental credentials, he said.
Shea said an endorsement from Massachusetts Senator Edward Kennedy could be important in the Democratic primary race. But Shea said he does not know if any endorsement from the longtime Democratic senator is forthcoming, since Kennedy has close ties to a number of the presidential candidates in his party.
Shea said he has seen Kennedy endorse candidates “that I’ve worked for, and he doesn’t just give you his name -- he goes out and personally” campaigns for the candidate. “Nobody builds up a crowd” of political supporters like Kennedy, said Shea.
Shea weighed the importance of other endorsements from labor unions and celebrities. Labor unions, he said, can offer a campaign volunteers who work night and day knocking on voters’ doors and work in “phone banks” to recruit other volunteers and votes. Labor unions also help a candidate with raising money, which Shea called the “mother’s milk of politics.”
He also discussed the importance of celebrity endorsements. Television talk show host Oprah Winfrey’s endorsement of fellow African American Barack Obama, for instance, has not helped lift Obama’s numbers in the public opinion polls for president.
Shea said Winfrey has succeeded in going beyond the “color barrier” in America and is “venerated by lots of people, not just in the African-American community.” Winfrey’s endorsement, he said, translates into more money and exposure for Obama.
DIFFERENT SITUATION ON REPUBLICAN SIDE
Republican political consultant Brian Donahue agreed that a Gore endorsement would add cachet to a Democratic candidate’s environmental credentials.
Donahue, senior vice president of the Washington-based Jamestown Associates political consulting firm, told USINFO that an endorsement from Gore, as a former U.S. vice president and “authority on a growing issue like global warming, carries a lot of value in the Democratic primary campaign.”
Donahue said a Gore endorsement of Obama definitely would trigger change in the Democratic primary race, meaning it would swing votes to Obama and away from Democratic front-runner Hillary Clinton. How drastic a change, he said, depends on how actively Gore would campaign.
A factor working against the importance of a Gore endorsement, said Donahue, is that climate change is not the highest-priority issue for Democrats.
Donahue said an endorsement from President Bush for any of the Republican candidates is “a little more complicated.” While the Republican president’s support is still high among those in his party, Donahue said, “his long tenure as president has also attracted debatable positions, the most being the war in Iraq.”
Donahue said the matter, however, is moot because Bush will not endorse any of the Republicans until that party’s voters choose their candidate for president, and maybe not even then. Sitting presidents normally do not choose a candidate in their party’s primary, Donahue added.
Celebrity endorsements, meanwhile, create “quick news stories that might have a little pop effect that do not carry over for the long term,” said Donahue. But he added that celebrities can host “extravagant events” that raise significant money for candidates.
PROFESSOR SEES LITTLE VALUE FROM ENDORSEMENTS
Ross Baker, a political science professor at Rutgers University in New Jersey, was more succinct about the value of endorsements.
“I don’t view them very highly,” he told USINFO.
Baker, also a radio commentator, newspaper columnist and author of a new book on the U.S. Congress and Supreme Court, Strangers on a Hill, said an endorsement may reinforce a voter’s decision to support a particular candidate. But he doubted, for example, whether the October 12 endorsement of Clinton by Georgia Representative John Lewis, a former civil rights leader, will cause supporters of Obama or Democratic candidate John Edwards to switch their allegiance to the New York senator.
Baker added that Winfrey’s endorsement of Obama will not have much impact.
“Oprah is much more effective in endorsing books than candidates,” said Baker.
For related articles, see U.S. Elections.
