Fate of US Congressional control on the line

[Timber Loftis]

There's an election about to go on in LA that could determine the political makeup of the Senate. The Repugs hold 51 seats - and are vying for the 52nd.

http://www.nytimes.com/2002/12/04/politics/04BUSH.html

Election Near, Bush Stumps in Louisiana
By ELISABETH BUMILLER

HREVEPORT, La., Dec. 3 — President Bush swooped into Louisiana today to try for one last Republican prize, a 52nd Senate seat, to show off the political prowess of the White House and extend his control on Capitol Hill.

At a huge Republican rally at the state fairgrounds here and then later at a $1.25 million fund-raiser at the Fairmont Hotel in New Orleans, Mr. Bush campaigned for State Elections Commissioner Suzanne Haik Terrell, the Republican who faces a first-term Democratic incumbent, Mary L. Landrieu, in a runoff election on Saturday. No candidate got 50 percent of the vote in the Nov. 5 election, an outcome that brought on this tight, nasty race that has become a vessel for the money and ambitions of both parties.

Mr. Bush, for one, stayed above the recriminations that spilled over in a televised debate last month when Ms. Terrell appeared to question how Ms. Landrieu could be a good Catholic if she supported abortion rights and Ms. Landrieu shot back at Ms. Terrell, off camera, that "this will be your last campaign." Today a jovial Mr. Bush simply bestowed on Ms. Terrell the praise of a president with a 65 percent job approval rating, plus an additional appearance with him at the top of the stairs of Air Force One after it landed with both of them in New Orleans.

"One thing about Suzie, she's got a good record," Mr. Bush said as Ms. Terrell grinned behind him on a stage in the fairgrounds' coliseum. "She's proven herself to be a competent soul, somebody who can get the job done."

The trip was Mr. Bush's first political foray since his five-day, 15-state, 10,000-mile campaign marathon before the midterm elections. Polls taken after Nov. 5 strongly suggest that his popularity and onerous campaign schedule contributed to the Republican sweep of the House and the Senate, a showing to which the White House is eager to add in Louisiana.

So today the president dusted off his favorite lines from the political stump speech that aides say he could give in his sleep. Before a roaring crowd of thousands of invited flag-waving supporters in Shreveport — part of a Republican-leaning district along the Texas border that supported him in 2000 — the president called for Congress to make his 10-year, $1.35 trillion tax cut permanent. He also called on lawmakers to add a prescription drug benefit to Medicare and to confirm his judicial nominees. He wove Ms. Terrell's name throughout his speech, saying at each turn that she would work with him to get what the White House wanted.

Although the Republicans already control the new Senate, with 51 seats, Ms. Terrell would add some cushion to their margin, allow them to press for more committee assignments and make it easier for Mr. Bush to push his agenda.

The president was only the most powerful member of the Republican firmament to drop into this Senate race. Vice President Dick Cheney campaigned in the state last month, and Mr. Bush's father was here on Monday, asking voters to help the president by voting for Ms. Terrell, a family friend who was co-chairwoman of Mr. Bush's successful Louisiana campaign in the 2000 presidential race.

Ms. Landrieu, the daughter of a New Orleans mayor who became secretary of housing and urban development under President Jimmy Carter, has called the Bush administration's attention to her opponent "overkill." On Capitol Hill, she has voted in support of the president nearly 75 percent of the time, a record that political analysts say has alienated some of her core supporters, black voters, whose turnout on Saturday is considered essential to victory. The crowd Mr. Bush spoke to in Shreveport today was almost entirely white.

Ms. Terrell would be the first Republican elected a senator from Louisiana since 1877. She would serve with John B. Breaux, a Democrat who is a good friend of Mr. Bush and whom the president obliquely acknowledged today. "It makes sense to have one in one party and a senator in the majority party if you want to get something done," he said.

In his remarks in New Orleans, broadcast around the state, Mr. Bush praised Ms. Terrell as a "mother of three fabulous young girls." The president, who has 21-year-old twin daughters, added that "anybody who can raise three teenage girls," then stopped and continued, "if you know what I mean."

The trip was Mr. Bush's first to Shreveport since Sept. 11, 2001, when Air Force One touched down at Barksdale Air Force Base here on a daylong secret course to keep the president out of what the Secret Service thought was harm's way before returning to Washington.

Mr. Bush, who was criticized then as having been too slow to get back to Washington after the terrorist attacks that day, said today that "since that time, the world has seen the resolve of the United States of America."

Landrieu Attacks on the Trade Front

NEW ORLEANS, Dec. 3 — While Ms. Terrell basked in Mr. Bush's glory, Senator Landrieu looked today for ways to distinguish herself from a president she most often supports.

Speaking in a half-empty union hall, Ms. Landrieu highlighted one of the few differences between herself and Mr. Bush by saying the administration was close to an agreement that would allow Mexican farmers to double their exports of sugar to the United States. Such an increase would further hurt Louisiana's sugar industry, already crippled, and word of the proposed accord, reported in the Mexican press, offered Ms. Landrieu a handy issue for her struggling campaign.

"They're going to dump tons of sugar to destroy an industry that's been 200 years old, that our rural communities depend on," Ms. Landrieu told the few dozen people at the hall.

A United States trade official said later, however, that no deal had been reached. "Talks are still continuing," the official said, noting that they had gone on for months.