McCain looks to lock grip on Northeast moderates

Returns to region some view as 'his natural strength'

The endorsement of Rudy Giuliani of New York (left) will aid John McCain's quest to win in the Northeast. Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger appeared with them in Los Angeles on Thursday. (Jonathan Alcorn/Bloomberg News)

PHILADELPHIA - When John McCain returns this weekend to the Northeast, strategists say he does so as a de facto native son: The region provided his deepest support during his first presidential campaign and remains the one part of the country where McCain's showy deviations from Republican dogma could actually help him among the party's rank and file.

"He's back to his natural strength," said Adam Geller, a Republican pollster in New Jersey. "Northeastern Republican voters are likely less ideological, and McCain's maverick image and willingness to dispense with the national Republican Party attracts those kind of voters."

Five urbanized states along the Interstate 95 corridor will vote Tuesday, amounting to nearly one-quarter of the total GOP delegates to be awarded that day. In a frenzied weekend fly-around, McCain is to make one stop each in Connecticut, Massachusetts, New York, and New Jersey - a lengthy incursion into what should be a stronghold of Mitt Romney, a former Massachusetts governor.

He will be aided by the recent endorsement of Rudy Giuliani, a genuine native son from New York City whose withdrawal from the race Wednesday offers McCain a new opportunity to consolidate his hold on the party's moderate wing. The region used to be the country's most solidly Republican zone, but the party has trended toward irrelevance there in recent years, failing to claim a single Northeastern state in the 2004 presidential race and losing nearly one-third of its congressional seats during the 2006 elections. Yet in an era when the party's national candidates have failed to connect with the region, analysts say McCain has developed an unusual rapport in the Northeast.

"He doesn't have a Northeastern, preppie, Republican country-club image, but it's his independence and some of his policies that have appeal," said Howard Reiter, a political scientist at the University of Connecticut.

More than half the contests McCain won in his failed bid for the nomination in 2000 were in New England. McCain carried primaries in Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, and Vermont, with only Maine - a caucus dominated by the party establishment - going for Bush in the region. In Massachusetts, McCain beat Bush by a ratio of nearly 2 to 1 - better than he did even in Arizona, his home state.

"McCain has a New England vibe to him, even though he's from Arizona," said Mike Murphy, a strategist who worked for McCain in 2000 but is neutral this year. "There's a certain kind of sophistication to the electorate up there that likes a straight-talk candidate."

McCain's support this year has been strongest among self-described moderate and liberal Republicans and among Democrats and independents who have been allowed to participate in certain primary contests. In 2000, according to exit polls, McCain did well in the Northeast with Jewish and Catholic voters, who have backed McCain in early primaries so far this year as well.

Those were key constituencies for Giuliani, a former New York City mayor whose liberal positions on abortion, gay rights, and gun control matched up well with Republicans in the Northeast.

McCain holds conflicting positions from Giuliani on all those issues, but - unlike his remaining opponents, Romney, Mike Huckabee, and Ron Paul - displays little fervor for pushing his views on those subjects. Both McCain and Giuliani have emphasized national security issues.

"Different Rudy voters go different ways, but I think McCain has the strongest claim on them," Murphy said.

In 2000, however, McCain made a direct appeal for the support of moderate Republicans, positioning himself to the left of George W. Bush on taxes and Social Security. This year, McCain has shown a more conservative bent typical of a modern Sun Belt conservative.

"He's moved to the right to compete for Bush Republicans," said Thomas Schaller, a political scientist at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County. "But McCain is still viewed by the moderate wing of the party as a savior at this point."

Since the 2000 election, McCain has closely identified with the few remaining Northeastern Republicans in the Senate, joining them as a swing bloc on issues from taxes to judges. McCain is also a member of the Republican Main Street Partnership, a dissident group heavy on Northeasterners preaching a "principled but pragmatic" centrism for the party.

McCain will campaign in Boston on Monday morning, part of a visit that will include a fund-raiser and probably an informal Super Bowl viewing party, according to an aide. Advisers point out that voters in Romney's home state have already been exposed to McCain's message through ads he aired in Boston during the New Hampshire campaign and endorsements from the city's two newspapers.

McCain, however, has yet to demonstrate the same appeal in mid-Atlantic states that he has in New England. In 2000, McCain fared poorly in Maryland's primary and did not campaign in Delaware's. New Jersey's was held long after he withdrew from the race.

"The farther south you get in terms of Republican primaries, the more conservative they get," said Geller.

The Northeast is a place where vestiges of past Republican dominance, suburban county machines, and big-city Republican clubs still hold some sway and where McCain's feuds with elements of the party establishment could hurt him. McCain lost decisively in New York in 2000, after facing difficulty meeting New York's complex ballot-access laws with much of the state's Republican apparatus opposed to him. On Thursday, following reports of Giuliani's endorsement, party and legislative leaders rallied to McCain's side.

"Organization is a bigger deal in New Jersey and New York, but the culture is the same," Murphy said.