Republicans bring brawl to Washington this week

A divided Republican Party will be on display in Washington this week, as the party’s leading presidential candidates bring their intensifying battle for the nomination to key Washington groups.

{mosads}The candidates will try to make their case in front of groups ranging from party establishment to fiscal conservatives to the religious right. The effort follows a weekend that saw the top contenders battle each other over who is the “real Republican” in the race.

Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani has already traded charges in recent weeks with former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney over who is the true fiscal conservative. And this weekend saw a noticeable uptick in the harshness of criticisms being exchanged by the leading contenders.

This week’s events present opportunities for Romney, Giuliani, former Sen. Fred Thompson (Tenn.) and resurgent candidate Sen. John McCain (Ariz.) to carve out an edge with the Republican base, which has been largely unsatisfied with its choices.

The leading candidates will appear Tuesday morning before the Republican Jewish Coalition, each speaking for 45 minutes in a question-and-answer session. They will then address the Republican National Committee on Tuesday night, when they have five minutes each to speak to the committee’s Presidential Trust Dinner and fundraiser.

On Wednesday, Giuliani and Thompson are scheduled to address the Club for Growth’s (CFG) Fall Economic Policy Conference in person, while Romney will speak by satellite.

The CFG conference represents one of the many potential pitfalls the candidates face this week.

“We expect to hear all the candidates put forth a bold, pro-growth agenda that includes tax cuts and market-based entitlement reform,” CFG spokeswoman Nachama Soloveichik said Monday. “We would also like to hear Fred Thompson renounce his previous support for McCain-Feingold and recognize the First Amendment implications of anti-free speech legislation.”

McCain, having turned down an earlier invitation to address the group, was not invited to the conference.

The rest of the field faces a test at the end of the week, when they go before socially conservative voters at the Family Research Council’s (FRC) Washington Briefing on Values Voters.

Socially conservative leaders have continued to voice their mistrust of Giuliani, but his decision to attend the summit could provide an opportunity for him to change some minds.

Last week, FRC head Tony Perkins indicated he might join other conservative leaders in offering limited support for Thompson and Romney. While that backing has been tepid at best, it is more than the rest of the field has won from leaders of the religious right.
But James Dobson, head of Focus on the Family and the honoree of the summit, has blasted the notion that Thompson is a true social conservative. Thompson might find himself in a situation similar to Giuliani’s.

This past weekend’s scuffle was ignited when Romney claimed to speak for “the Republican wing of the Republican Party.” The ensuing war of words likely will serve as a preview of this week’s remarks.

Romney’s comments led his rivals to hit the former governor for some of his past donations to Democratic candidates. One Republican strategist said Romney will likely regret having made the “very thin and misguided” statement, as it only unified his opponents in attacking him.

Indeed, McCain and Thompson joined Giuliani in jumping all over Romney’s comments. The former New York mayor has been locked in a battle with Romney, who is considered to be the early-state leader.

“In 1994, Mitt Romney accomplished what people had long thought was impossible — he ran for Senate to the left of Ted Kennedy,” Thompson spokesman Todd Harris said in a statement. “I didn’t know there was any room there. For him to now claim to represent the Republican wing of the Republican Party is yet another Mitt Romney flip-flop.”

Thompson and McCain continued their seemingly unified assault on Romney Monday.

Without naming Romney, Thompson said in a speech to the Conservative Party of New York that Republicans cannot beat Democrats by acting more like them.

“This is not a time for philosophical flexibility; it is a time to stand up for what we believe in,” Thompson said in remarks provided by his campaign.