Q&A: GARY HART
Transcript: Gary Hart On His Decision To Support Barack Obama

© National Journal Group Inc.
Friday, April 11, 2008

National Journal On Air with Linda Douglass
Gary Hart

National Journal's Linda Douglass sat down with former Sen. Gary Hart, D-Colo., for the April 11 edition of "National Journal On Air." This is a transcript of their conversation.


Q: I want to welcome Senator Gary Hart. He was the Democratic presidential candidate in 1984 who gave a ferocious challenge to the eventual nominee, Walter Mondale. So, welcome, Senator Hart.
Hart: Great pleasure, thank you.
Q: Well, thanks so much for joining us. And let's talk about this year's presidential primary campaign, starting with the fact that you have endorsed Barack Obama. You told me an interesting story about what it was that sort of pushed you over the edge to make the endorsement of Obama. Talk about that a little bit if you would.
Hart: Well, I had been trying to help the campaign behind the scenes prior to Iowa and New Hampshire, and when things began to turn ugly after the Iowa caucuses, Senator Obama emerged and his principal opponent began to use phrases like, "throwing the kitchen sink at him" -- or at least her supporters -- and she used a phrase which is infamous to me, called "where's the beef." That pushed me over the edge, and so I came out publicly.
Q: Well, you know, obviously, Democratic leaders are anxious for this contest to end. Even though it's pretty clear that at the end of the primary process, neither of the candidates is going to have enough pledged delegates, and there is talk about a mini-convention of superdelegates or having party leaders get together and make some kind of a decision. What do you think should happen?
Hart: Well, first of all, I think what the party leaders are urging is less acrimony. I don't think anyone wants to deny the remaining half-dozen states or so their right to be heard. Mrs. Clinton is perfectly within her rights to want the matter to spin out -- it shouldn't wind down before its natural course. So if both sides, and their supporters particularly, will tone down the attacks and the acrimony, and particularly, not provide ammunition to the eventual opponent in the fall, I think it's fine. It can go on as long as it wants to; sooner or later, the elected officials, the automatic delegates, and party officials will have to make a decision. I think many of them are on the fence hoping someone will decide for them, but I think that will not happen.
Q: So you yourself were in a bruising fight with Walter Mondale in 1984, and you stayed in all the way to the end -- as your supporters very much wanted you to do. She is talking about going to the convention if necessary, and fighting this out on the convention floor -- with fights about whether to seat Michigan and Florida, and how, and so forth. Should she?
Hart: That would be very destructive. My campaign did not do that in 1984. We held out hope against very long odds that there would be a movement of superdelegates in the last couple of weeks before the convention our way, or perhaps we could combine forces with Reverend Jesse Jackson and come up with a majority. And those were, again, long odds but possibilities. But it was not, at that stage, acrimonious, and I was on a winning streak going into the convention. I won 11 of the last 12 primaries, including, as you may remember, a sweep of California. So this was not a fading or failing campaign.
Q: I guess that's sort of the question: If she's on a winning streak in these last few primaries but doesn't have enough delegates to catch up with him in terms of having the most delegates, doesn't that give her an argument to go to the convention floor and see if she can make it happen there?
Hart: I think any candidate who has demonstrated the breadth of appeal that she has all the way through, frankly, deserves to have their name placed in nomination. That, again, does not have to be an antagonistic action. There is no rule that says, if you do not have a majority of the delegates, you have to give up. You mentioned the years past -- in my case, my supporters felt very strongly. They wanted a chance to have their candidate nominated and voice their support on the floor of the convention, which they did. And I think, you may also recall, that the next night when the roll was called, Vice President Mondale went over the majority. I was recognized and moved his nomination by acclamation, and that was a gesture of goodwill and unity, and that was the way we went into the fall campaign.

So I think people have to distinguish between fighting and being recognized. And I can see a situation where she and hopefully those around her say, we may not have a majority -- we don't know, because there is going to be almost 90 days between the last primary and the convention, anything can happen -- but at the very least we believe we have earned the right to have our candidate go through the process of being nominated, and we can voice our support for her, she can then support the majority candidate, and we can then go forward.

Q: Let me just go back to what you said about how the convention could unfold if it did unfold in the way that it did in 1984. So in other words, what you are envisioning is, they get to the end of this primary season, she does well in many, perhaps most, of these primaries. She doesn't have enough delegates to catch up with him, but she is close. So it is your hope that she goes to the convention, allows her name to be put in nomination, and graciously cedes it to him?
Hart: That would be the best scenario, and that makes everyone happy. Her supporters get the satisfaction of her being nominated for president -- which is what they are after, after all -- seeing that a majority of the delegates at the convention did not vote for her, and she then joins the parade. That's the best scenario. Whether that is going to happen that way remains to be seen.

There has been a lot of talk in the media, as you know, about power brokers and Al Gore and others stepping in to manipulate this scenario. That is so kind of 19th century -- it's not going to happen. But I can see Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid and Howard Dean getting representatives of the two candidates together and say, OK, here is the scenario we the party leaders want to happen -- it should satisfy everyone -- are you willing to play out this drama in this way? And if she or her supporters say no, we are going to dig in our heels, we're going to fight to the end, we are going to make floor fights out of Michigan and Florida -- then she must bear the condemnation of risking electing a president in the fall.

Q: You mentioned that one thing that worries you in a primary like this is that one of the candidates will be giving ammunition to John McCain that can be used against the other one in a general election. Has that happened?
Hart: I think Senator Clinton came very close two or three weeks ago with the statement that she and John McCain were prepared to be president. Obviously, by implication, her principal democratic opponent was not. There are rules in politics, largely unwritten, and one of them is that you do not, in your own party, disqualify your competitor by a more favorable comparison to the other party's nominee, and I think she violated that rule.
Q: You know the pundits and the political operatives are all saying that Obama's prospects have been badly damaged by the Reverend [Jeremiah] Wright controversy -- and that whites are less comfortable with him than they used to be. So if Pennsylvania has a racially polarized outcome, and then if North Carolina, which Obama is expected to win, has a racially polarized outcome, does that reveal a general election vulnerability that the Democrats should consider about him?
Hart: I think it would, but on the other hand, as a supporter of his, I hold out a remote hope that he might win Pennsylvania. Now, I'm probably alone in that prospect. But the polls are narrowing. And you could reverse that question and say, in spite of the sort of psychodrama -- I think overinflated -- about Reverend Wright, endlessly looped for a week or two on the cable networks, what if he proves that the damage to white voters' support was not affected -- that there was no damage, and went ahead to demonstrate strength across the racial boundaries? I think all that says is, many people in the media overplayed that story.
Q: But if the reverse is true, that is, if it is racially polarized?
Hart: Then it's a problem. Then it's a problem.
Q: OK, well, thank you so much for your thoughts and insights, Senator Gary Hart. It is a pleasure to talk to you, as always, and I hope that you will join us again.
Hart: Any time, Linda. Thank you very much.