Sens. McCain and Obama fail with firefighters’ union

Sens. John McCain (R-Ariz.) and Barack Obama (D-Ill.) failed to win the hearts or minds of the International Association of Fire Fighters at its presidential forum in mid-March, according to a survey taken at the time, IAFF President Harold Schaitberger told The Hill.

Meanwhile, Sens. Joseph Biden (D-Del.), Hillary Rodham Clinton (D-N.Y.) and Chris Dodd (D-Conn.), former Sen. John Edwards (D-N.C.) and New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson (D) all rated very highly, according to Schaitberger.

{mosads}Though Schaitberger said details of the survey results are confidential and used only for internal purposes, he did say that Obama was thought to be “less on-point on our issues,” and that McCain lacked the “passion” the union members expected.

Schaitberger, in an interview with The Hill, said Obama came across as too “somber,” and “just didn’t fire them up.”

McCain, he said, was “disappointing,” because he seemed to be going through the motions in his defense of the Iraq war troop surge, “and [the members] were surprised by it.”

“They felt like he literally read word-for-word his comments,” Schaitberger said.

In fact, McCain fell behind Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Calif.) in the scoring.

Dodd and Biden “connected” with the crowd, Schaitberger said. Clinton’s presentation was also well regarded.
“I thought Chris did a terrific job,” Schaitberger said. “He connected.”

Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kan.) did not make that connection, and former Virginia Gov. Jim Gilmore (R) failed to register one way or the other.

But no one did as poorly as Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.).

Hagel, the only person invited to speak who has not announced a run, committed a faux pas in his opening remarks when he showered praise on volunteer firefighters, drawing some boos from the crowd of professionals.

Right after those remarks, Hagel said he admired all firefighters, be they professional or volunteer, and didn’t want to get involved in their politics.

Union officials explained that in suburban communities, volunteer firefighters often are used to supplant uniformed firefighters — whose funding is at times cut — but because of their status or other jobs, they can be unreliable in emergencies.

“I don’t think he really understood the significance as it relates to our membership,” Schaitberger said. “If nothing else, he didn’t do his homework very well.

“I don’t know of anything else he could have said that would’ve gone over worse.”

As for Hunter, Schaitberger said he couldn’t “put him up there with Edwards or Dodd or Biden, but he did very well.”
The survey was conducted at the end of an exhausting day of speeches from candidates from both sides of the aisle. Union members were given the forms at the beginning of the day and asked to hand them in after all the speeches had been delivered.

The union members were asked to judge each candidate’s speech on overall opinion, how good a job the candidate would do as president, how likely the member would “consider supporting” the candidate, how likely the local membership would “consider supporting” the candidate and, on a scale of 1 to 10, how “qualified” the candidate is to be president.

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani (R) was noticeably absent from the forum. The firefighters’ union was set to send a letter to its members just prior to the forum blasting the mayor for what it said were callous and disrespectful actions following the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001. The letter was never sent, but The Hill obtained a copy just before the forum was set to kick off.

Giuliani’s campaign said at the time that scheduling conflicts prevented him from attending.

The results of the survey are the preliminary step in the union’s endorsement process.

Round two of that process kicks off today, as some of the candidates who spoke at the March forum will meet one on one with IAFF officials in New Hampshire.

As of now, only Democratic candidates are scheduled to meet with those officials. They have continued to seek the IAFF endorsement aggressively, an official said.

“We haven’t gotten any calls back from Republicans saying they want to meet with our leaders,” union spokesman Jeff Zack said. “It really is a two-way street. We’re not going to go begging anybody to endorse them.”

Of the Republicans, only McCain has continued to pursue IAFF support, but his schedule wouldn’t permit a meeting this week, Schaitberger said.

The endorsement is one coveted by the candidates. The firefighters worked tirelessly for endorsed candidate Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) in 2003 and 2004.

Even as Kerry trailed in the polls to former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, the firefighters never hinted at thoughts of slowing down or changing their endorsement. Many credited the firehouse chili tour Kerry conducted as key to his resurgence in the primaries.