Giuliani Gives Pep Talk To Newer Lawmakers

Friday, July 25, 2008

GOP'S 'YOUNG GUNS'

Giuliani Gives Pep Talk To Newer Lawmakers

Former New York mayor Rudolph Giuliani trekked to Capitol Hill on Thursday morning to talk about the future of the Republican Party in front of a group of younger GOP lawmakers who are likely to become the party's next generation of leaders.

Giuliani, who recently opened a new political committee and attended a New York Yankees game with John McCain, tried to rally House Republicans who have started the "Young Guns" fund -- a group of lawmakers committed to raising money for 20 candidates who will face Democratic incumbents this fall.

Led by Reps. Eric Cantor (Va.), 45, Paul Ryan (Wis.), 38, and Kevin McCarthy (Calif.), 43, the lawmakers running the Young Guns fund hail largely from the ranks of relative newcomers to the Capitol who are trying to finance challengers from their generation. Giuliani spoke on a day when the Republican lawmakers were holding a breakfast fundraising event at the Republican National Committee's Capitol Hill Club to benefit Chris Hackett, a 45-year-old from northeastern Pennsylvania running against Rep. Chris Carney (D-Pa.).

"It's a tough national environment, but we can win if we individualize races," Giuliani told the Republicans, according to participants at the meeting. The former mayor stressed the importance of staying "positive" and unified, while also urging the younger House Republicans to get on the campaign trail as surrogates for McCain's presidential campaign.

Giuliani, whose presidential campaign fizzled when he bet his race on the Florida primary, was speaking to a group of Republicans who have watched their party's status on Capitol Hill disintegrate over the past two years. Other than the current, largely unified calls for more domestic oil drilling, House Republicans have been split into factions for most of the spring and summer as Democrats scored a series of key victories on domestic legislation.

House Republicans lost three straight special elections in March and May in districts the GOP had held for several decades, and their campaign committee has only about 14 percent as much cash on hand as its Democratic counterpart.

In addition, participants in the meeting said, the GOP lawmakers told Giuliani that they will need him out on the trail stumping for Republican candidates for the House. "We won't be bashful about asking you to come campaign for us," Cantor said.

-- Paul Kane

LOWERED PROFILE

Fannie, Freddie Quiet About Industry Parties

Mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac have decided to remove their names from the invitations to industry receptions at the Democratic and Republican national conventions, though they will still help pay for them.

Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac were among the sponsors of parties in Denver, where the Democrats will be gathering, and in the Twin Cities, where the Republicans will be holding their nominating convention. But under fire from fiscal conservatives and others, the mortgage companies have decided against putting their names on parties where housing industry lobbyists mingle with members of Congress, who approved a massive rescue plan for the taxpayer-funded companies this week.

"We will no longer be participating in the housing industry receptions at the conventions, but will fulfill our previous financial commitment," Fannie Mae spokeswoman Amy Bonitatibus said in a statement.

-- Mary Ann Akers

INSIDER RALLY

Obama to Address House Democrats

Barack Obama will address the House Democratic Caucus on Tuesday at the group's weekly closed-door strategy meeting, a chance to rally rank-and-file lawmakers before the campaign revs up this fall.

A senior Democratic aide said the senator's appearance at the session will represent his first as a Democratic candidate. The last time he showed up in the House, Obama was mobbed on the floor of the chamber -- and more than a few of the glad-handers were Republicans.

This time, Obama will presumably have plenty to report from his world travels, but Democrats are thinking locally as well as globally and will be looking to their presumptive nominee for assurances of the strongest possible party infrastructure heading into November.

-- Shailagh Murray