Monday, Jan. 25, 2010
National Journal’s Congress Daily
by Erin McPike
Senate Republican Conference Vice Chairwoman Lisa Murkowski is using her leadership position to try to make the GOP a big tent party, tailoring her role to focus on outreach to Hispanic communities and women’s groups.
When the 111th Congress convened last January, Senate Minority Leader McConnell conceded Republicans had to do a better job in this kind of outreach. But it was Murkowski’s idea, using the position’s tradition of allowing the incumbent to decide on a portfolio, to pitch to Hispanics and women.
That represents a marked departure from her recent predecessors. When Republican Policy Committee Chairman John Thune of South Dakota had the job, he focused on the business community and conservatives, and when National Republican Senatorial Committee Chairman John Cornyn of Texas had the post before Thune, he focused on messaging and operations on the Senate floor.
Murkowski’s leadership team kicked off its Hispanic outreach program Thursday, gathering nine Hispanic leaders and more than a dozen leadership staffers to review data and discuss what the Republican Conference has done and how it can improve.
“We can, through the network that we build, attempt to get our message out through them as messengers,” the Alaska Republican said in an interview. “We want to encourage our Republican members to build better constituent relations with the members of their Hispanic community.”
Since all senators have Hispanic constituencies, she said, “if we have identified some areas where this really resonates with the Hispanic population, we can then go to our members and say, ‘don’t forget when you’re talking back home, you very likely have Hispanic TV stations, media opportunities, good strong messages to relate.’”
Although Murkowski doesn’t think Florida’s Republican Senate primary between Gov. Charlie Crist and former state House Speaker Marco Rubio, who is of Cuban descent, will turn on Hispanic issues, she is the only member of the Senate GOP leadership who has not endorsed Crist.
Murkowski said the country’s economic situation provides Republicans with a strong opportunity to appeal to Hispanics and draw the voting bloc back to the GOP this year, but she cautioned that a one-size-fits-all approach would not succeed.
“It is so important for us to recognize that the interest of a Puerto Rican who lives in New York might be entirely different than the Mexican-American who is living in El Paso, Texas. And yet we lump them all together in the same community and say a Hispanic is a Hispanic is a Hispanic. And that is so wrong, and it’s so naïve, and we shouldn’t use it that way.”
Specifically on Puerto Rico, which is undergoing a renewed push for statehood, she said, “I know that it has been an issue that has provoked a great deal of stress on both sides, but I think if the people of Puerto Rico believe strongly that they need to become a state, we need to respect that.” She has been to Puerto Rico to look into the issue and has spoken with Puerto Rican leaders in Washington about it.
On a more personal level, Murkowski is positioned to lead the GOP charge in reaching out to women because she is the only woman in the GOP’s Senate leadership team.
“I know that when I’m looking at a group, you’re sensitive as to the make-up. And sometimes I wonder if our male counterparts are tuned into that. That, you know, we don’t have a lot of women represented here. And I think it’s important that we have that consciousness,” she said.
In terms of reaching out to women, she said, “So much of it is just being there and being present. Outside of [Texas Sen.] Kay Bailey Hutchison, we haven’t had a woman in [GOP] leadership. … When you have kind of an all-male, white team, it lends the appearance that that’s who Republicans in the Senate are, and that’s not the way it is, nor the way it should be.
“We need to do better, we need to get more women, we need to get more people of color, we need to get more minorities and encourage them to be part of the legislative process with us back here, but I do think it is important to send the message that Republicans are more than just older white men.”
For her leadership staff, Murkowski hired Tzaicel Hernandez and Ashley Hoy as coalitions directors for women and diversity outreach and Christine Mangi as communications director. Hernandez did Hispanic outreach for former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney’s GOP presidential campaign in 2008 and worked for former Sen. Mel Martinez, R-Fla.
While Murkowski is the only woman in a Senate GOP leadership role, she also serves as ranking member of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee and has earned one of the top seats at the table in critical energy negotiations for being an expert on what’s not often considered in the matrix of “women’s issues.”
In that role, she has attracted bipartisan support for some of her legislative priorities, just last week winning the backing of Sens. Blanche Lincoln, D-Ark., Mary Landrieu, D-La., and Ben Nelson, D-Neb., for her resolution to block the EPA from issuing greenhouse gas emission regulations. Top Democratic aides who were once wary of Murkowski now call her one of the most reasonable Republicans to work with and say she has proved to be, in the words of one, “a very smart legislator.”
While willing to work across the aisle, Murkowski made it clear she wants to win.
“I think the best way to win is to speak to the issues women are concerned about. And I phrased it that way instead of women’s issues, because I think women’s issues can be lumped into abortion, health care, education — what some have described as soft issues. I don’t think they’re soft issues at all. I think the health issues and education issues are some of the most difficult ones that we face domestically.”
Murkowski has been helpful this cycle to the NRSC, which could field up to five women in competitive Senate races this fall. “I’m hopeful that as these months unfold, I’m going to be able to do more for the women candidates out there, whether it’s Kelly Ayotte in New Hampshire or going out to Colorado to help Jane Norton,” she said. McConnell praised Murkowski for spending a lot of time with Norton before the Coloradan decided to run and said Murkowski’s encouragement “may have been decisive” in the successful recruitment.
© 2009 PRFAA |