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| Senate debate: Sen. Pete Domenici hears from colleagues in the elevator. Andy Nelson – staff |
Antiwar forces take aim at GOP lawmakers
'Iraq summer' activists claim credit for certain defections on Bush's Iraq policy. Republicans dispute that.
from the July 16, 2007 edition
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The Iraq Summer campaign is modeled after the 1964 Freedom Summer civil rights project. It claims 100 organizers in 15 states and 40 congressional districts, plus a $9 million budget. The campaign launched July 4, but activists since January have pored over polls and lawmakers' statements to identify 60 members of Congress most likely to break with the Bush administration over the war.
It's too early to know whether it is making a difference, analysts say. "Some of these advertising buys they're doing are so small that I wonder how many voters actually see them," says Jennifer Duffy, who covers Senate races for the Cook Political Report. "They're creating a lot of noise, but I don't know that they can take that victory lap yet."
This week, the focus is on the Senate, where a $648.8 billion defense bill is the vehicle for war-related amendments. On Friday, GOP Sens. John Warner and Richard Lugar proposed one that would require the White House to develop a plan to redeploy US forces out of a combat role in Iraq by October. It does not set a timetable for implementation.
Topping the list of GOP senators whom antiwar groups see as vulnerable in '08 are Sens. Norm Coleman of Minnesota, John Sununu of New Hampshire, and Susan Collins of Maine.
In Maine, activists are stepping up organizing to move their two GOP senators into the antiwar column. Last week, Sen. Olympia Snowe said she supports a timetable for redeployment of US forces.
"If politicians can't see the light, they can feel the heat," says Tom Andrews, national director of Win Without War and a former US representative from Maine. After Snowe's announcement, "the pressure is increasing exponentially on Senator Collins," he says.
Collins notes that she and Senator Warner led Senate opposition in December to Bush's plans to "surge" 30,000 troops into Iraq. "The idea that a public-relations campaign is having some impact is absurd and contrary to the facts," she says.
In Minnesota, Senator Coleman faces a barrage of TV ads from antiwar groups. He voted in support of the amendment to put limits on troop redeployment, bucking the White House position. That vote "had nothing to do with pressure," he says, citing the fact that troops from Minnesota were among the first to see extended tours of duty in Iraq.
The antiwar ads against him "aren't reaching people," he says. "They haven't made any movement in the polls."
In September, after Gen. David Petraeus, the US commander in Iraq, and the US ambassador to Iraq, Ryan Crocker, give Congress a full report on the outcome of the surge, Coleman predicts there will be a shift in mission for US forces. "In September, we're going to make some hard decisions, and I'm prepared to make them then," he says.
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