McCain on Iowa, NH, the race
Posted: Tuesday, December 18, 2007 3:03 PM by Domenico Montanaro
From NBC’s Bethany Thomas
Coming off a town hall dedicated to economic topics, including the repeal of the alternative minimum tax and addressing the problems of social security and Medicaid, McCain was feisty before he headed off to Washington to vote in the Senate later this afternoon.
In a press conference after the speech, he endearingly told the press corps to “gather around, you little jerks.” There is definitely a noticeable difference between last week’s media entourage and this week’s. The events have had an influx of network camera crews and talent and satellite trucks are becoming a more normal sighting. Most of the national papers also have a presence.
Highlights:
On the Senate Bill, how will you vote?
MCCAIN: “I have not seen enough of the details of it yet.”
Elements that you are worried about?
MCCAIN: “Overspending, and the fact they’ve added on a lot of pork barrel projects.”
How are you doing in NH with Independents?
“In 2000, even at this time it wasn’t clear if Independents would be at the Democratic primary or the Republican. I hope that I can continue to appeal to them. I hope that Sen. Lieberman’s endorsement will motivate them to have a look as well as the endorsements of the Salmon Press, the Manchester Union Leader and the Portsmouth Herald.”
On momentum:
“We do sense more and more turnouts at the town hall meetings on the part of the Independents, and I hope that we can attract their votes. A lot of the Independent voters pride themselves on making their minds up on the last 24 hours.”
Are you concerned about Iowa?
“It’s all the expectation game. If I’m expected to win either up and I don’t-- Frankly it’s up to you; it’s always up to the media to judge these expectations. In history, the people of New Hampshire pay attention to what happens in Iowa, but that isn’t the determining factor in how they are going to vote.”
What are the endorsees seeing?
“A truly great American” [laughter]. I know that they have an impact in this respect -- in that they will give motivation to voters to have another look at the candidate. I don’t think anybody blindly follows an endorsement, but I do believe they say, ‘I respect this newspaper and so I will take a look at the candidate.’”
On the difference between New Hampshire and Iowa:
“I think there is a little more concern over immigration in Iowa than perhaps here, although there is great concern here. There’s great concern all over the country. Ethanol subsidies is not an issue here. The additional challenge in Iowa is who is going to go to the caucuses. We always have a very high percentage voter turnout in New Hampshire. The question is what’s going to be the turnout and who is going to be the turnout in the Iowa caucuses, which obviously makes it a more complicated campaign kind of situation.”
On the reports of an attack mailing in New Hampshire against Romney:
“We responded to several negative mailers that the Romney campaign put out attacking my position and saying that I was in favor of amnesty. It’s simply not true, and it’s happened in several states, and it’s happened several times, so we thought we should at least set the record straight. I don’t respond lightly, but sometimes you just have to respond. His was done by mailers, so we responded with a mailer.”
