Daley pumps up Gore candidacy, downplays CNN/Time poll

June 19, 2000
Web posted at: 11:00 AM EDT (1500 GMT)

WASHINGTON (CNN) -- William Daley, the incoming chairman of Al Gore's presidential campaign, took to the airwaves Sunday to champion his candidate and dismiss a new CNN/TIME poll that indicates most Americans still have doubts about the vice president's leadership abilities.

Daley, who plans to leave his post as commerce secretary by July 15, appeared on five political talk shows to praise Gore as the kind of leader Americans want and need in the White House next year -- something he said voters will realize as they turn their attention to the presidential campaign.

"People will begin to see the strength that's in Al Gore," Daley predicted on CNN's "Late Edition" Sunday. "The American people really aren't focused on this race," he added, noting that that single factor is Gore's "biggest problem" at the moment. "And the fact of the matter is, with the selection of running mates, with the convention, with the three debates -- those are the events, those are the occasions where the American people really do begin to look at the two candidates and decide who they want to be the next president for four years."

He downplayed the significance of the poll released Friday indicating that only 44 percent of likely voters view Gore as a "strong and decisive" leader -- compared to 62 percent who believe that is true of Texas Gov. George W. Bush, the vice president's Republican rival.

"I think that 'strong' and 'decisive' are never words that are used for any vice president," Daley said. "A vice president's role is to play the second position."

But, Daley said that as Americans compare the two candidates and Gore "lays out his programs," voters will flock to the Democrat's camp.

The CNN/TIME poll of 1,218 Americans also found that among likely voters, 48 percent support Bush, 42 percent support Gore, 4 percent support Green Party candidate Ralph Nader, and 3 percent support Pat Buchanan, a Reform Party candidate. It has a sampling error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

News of Daley's appointment to the Gore campaign came just as Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott (R-Mississippi) signaled that he was in no rush to bring the China trade bill to a vote prior to the July 4 congressional recess.

That means that Daley, who was the Clinton Administration's point man on the trade pact that would grant permanent normalized trade relations (PNTR) to China, might be focusing his attention on the vice president when the Senate takes up the bill.

Passage of the trade pact seems all but assured in the Senate, and the commerce secretary said Sunday he was untroubled by such a scenario.

"Well, look the votes are there in the Senate to pass this if the leader would call it. There's no question the votes are there. Plenty of Democrats and Republicans. And they shouldn't play politics with this issue." The only worry he had, Daley said, is that "somebody may want to play politics with it. I'm not worried about the final outcome," he told CNN's Wolf Blitzer.

Daley also sought to allay concerns from organized labor leaders, who sharply criticized his appointment as campaign chairman because of Daley's active support for new trade deals they oppose.

Labor leaders lobbied unsuccessfully against last month's House vote on PNTR to China, and 1993's North American Free Trade Agreement, arguing that such accords cost American jobs.

"l can give them the assurance as I work with them that this campaign will be sensitive to their issues and their concerns," Daley said of labor. "They're a major piece of this campaign. More important than what I can do, they know that Al Gore represents working men and women."

"They really don't care about who is the chairman of the campaign; they don't care about who's the campaign manager," Daley added. "They care about who's going to be the next president."

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