By Dan Balz
Wednesday, September 13, 2006

After months of behind-the-scenes infighting and public name-calling, leaders of the Democratic National Committee and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee reached agreement yesterday on a funding program to underwrite get-out-the-vote operations in the November elections.

The national party agreed to put $12 million into voter-mobilization efforts this fall, with $2.4 million of it earmarked for 40 key House districts that are seen as competitive. The rest of the money will go to help candidates for Senate and governor and for outreach to the party's key constituencies.

"Democrats are unified and prepared to win up-and-down the ballot, all across America this November," DNC Chairman Howard Dean said in a statement.

"We feel good," said DCCC spokesman Bill Burton. "We're going to have the money we need to get out the voters we need in the places we need them."

Dean said the national party is making an unprecedented investment in the fall elections, but other Democrats said the $12 million figure is roughly the same as what it spent on House and Senate races in 2002. That year, the DNC spent millions more on gubernatorial races and redistricting and lent the DCCC close to $5 million in the final weeks of a losing campaign.

Dean and Rep. Rahm Emanuel (D-Ill.), chairman of the congressional campaign committee, have clashed throughout the year over the DNC's spending priorities. Dean has staunchly defended his "50-state" program, aimed at rebuilding state parties across the country. Emanuel has argued that the national party should target its resources this fall on those states and races that will determine who controls the next Congress.

Emanuel has engaged in expletive-laden shouting matches with Dean, walking out of one meeting with the former Vermont governor. But the DNC leader has rallied state party leaders, who are appreciative of the national committee's financial assistance, to defend his approach.

DNC officials talked about trying to include a clause in the agreement that would have provided additional assistance if Emanuel stopped bad-mouthing Dean, the blog Hotline reported yesterday, but a party source said it was never a serious proposal.

The Democratic Senate Campaign Committee also has pressed Dean to put more money into the fall campaigns. Sen. Charles E. Schumer (N.Y.), the committee chairman, said in a statement he remains hopeful that an amicable agreement for more money can be achieved.

The saga of how California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger's private comments about a Latina legislator became public took another turn yesterday when the campaign manager for his Democratic challenger admitted the campaign had leaked the tape to the news media. But she denied hacking the Schwarzenegger computer system to get it.

"No one hacked," Cathy Calfo, campaign manager for California comptroller Phil Angelides, told reporters, according to the Associated Press. "They accessed information that was accessible to the public."

Schwarzenegger spokesman Adam Mendelsohn said the information was in a private area on the governor's Web site. Another gubernatorial official, legal affairs secretary Andrea Lynn Hoch, said the file was protected by a password.

It was all reminiscent of the 1988 presidential campaign, when then-Massachusetts Gov. Michael S. Dukakis (D) admitted that his campaign manager had leaked a tape damaging to Sen. Joseph R. Biden Jr. (D-Del.) to the New York Times. His campaign manager, John Sasso, was forced to resign.

Schwarzenegger apologized for his remarks after they were published in the Los Angeles Times. They came in a private meeting, during which he and a top aide were speculating whether Republican Assemblywoman Bonnie Garcia's heritage was Cuban or Puerto Rican.

"They are all very hot," Schwarzenegger said. "They have the, you know, part of the black blood in them and part of the Latino blood in them that together makes it."

Calfo said Angelides did not know that two of his staffers had passed the file on to the newspaper and said she was unhappy they had acted without her knowledge.