GOP governors worried about Bush stumbles

updated 4:10 p.m. ET Feb. 27, 2006

WASHINGTON - Republican governors are openly worrying that the Bush administration’s latest stumbles — from the natural disaster of Hurricane Katrina to those of its own making on prescription drugs and ports security — are taking an election-year toll on the party back home.

The GOP governors reluctantly acknowledge that the series of gaffes threatens to undermine public confidence in President Bush’s ability to provide security, which has long been his greatest strength among voters.

“You’ve got solid conservatives coming up speaking like they haven’t before — it’s likely that something’s going on at the grass roots,” said Republican Mark Sanford of South Carolina. “Whether it’s temporary or not remains to be seen.”

President Bush, buffeted by one calamity after another, has struggled to find traction for his second-term agenda. Since his State of the Union address on Jan. 30, the president has traveled several days a week to promote his plans, especially proposals on health care, U.S. competitiveness and energy self-reliance. His 2005 proposals to revamp Social Security and the tax code remain, but on the back burner.

Most of this time, his message has been eclipsed by the controversies raging in Washington.

The unease within the Republican party was apparent from interviews with more than a dozen governors over the weekend, including nearly half of the Republicans attending the winter meeting of the National Governors Association. The annual conference was taking place in a capital enthralled by the political firestorm over government plans to approve takeover of operations at some terminals at six U.S. ports by a company owned by the United Arab Emirates government.

Democrats hopeful
Democrats see opportunity, and even those in conservative states say the administration’s missteps will have a ripple effect politically at home. “I do think there’s a considerable degree of skepticism about what’s been happening at the federal level,” said Democrat Kathleen Sebelius of Kansas. “If you didn’t pick it up on Katrina, you did when you tried to help your parents” get drugs through the new Medicare program.

But it wasn’t Bush’s political opponents alone who saw weaknesses. So did his allies — listing the days of chaos in New Orleans after the hurricane, the nationwide confusion over the drug prescription program that forced many states to step in to help seniors get medications, and the ports security debacle that has drawn criticism from leading Republicans in Congress and the states.

“I don’t think he was well served on the port issue by the bureaucracy,” said Republican Dirk Kempthorne of Idaho, who is leading a united front of governors pushing back on potential reductions to National Guard forces. “He’s at the forefront on national security. When you combine this flap on the ports, and these potential cuts on the military, you need to make sure that issue doesn’t slip away. It’s one of his strengths.”

Bush’s approval was at 40 percent in an AP-Ipsos poll conducted in early February, and most recent polling has shown it at about the same level.

Last week, it was hard to find any U.S. political figure outside the administration, other than former President Carter, ready to defend the port deal.

Kempthorne also said the lack of communication from the administration on the Guard issue has been a problem. “There has been too much we have learned outside the loop. It’s time we be inside the loop.”

Communication problems surfaced earlier in Bush’s decision to direct the National Security Agency to engage in warrantless domestic electronic spying as part of the war on terror.

The government’s handling of Katrina was also criticized by the public and politicians. Republican Bob Taft of Ohio said: “This is hindsight, but it was a mistake to bury FEMA under the Department of Homeland Security.”

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