Fond memories of the primary race between Carter and Kennedy
He was the man who “stumped” Ted
Kennedy.
At least that was the headline of The
New York Times obituary of Roger
Mudd, the longtime CBS and NBC television news reporter and anchor who died the other day at age 93.
That stumping came in a 1979 interview with the Massachusetts senator on Kennedy’s plan to challenge incumbent Democratic President Jimmy Carter who was seeking re-election in 1980.
Beset with gasoline shortages, a weak economy, and the Iranian hostage crisis, Cater was in deep trouble and it looked as though Kennedy could knock him off at the Democratic convention.
However, when Mudd asked Kennedy, “Why do you want to be president?” Kennedy was practically incoherent and unable to give a focused answer.
Kennedy replied: “Well, I’m uh, were I to make the announcement to run the reasons that I would run is because I have a great belief in this country… I would basically feel that it’s imperative for this country to move forward, that it can’t stand still, for otherwise it moves backward.”
Mudd’s obit brought back memories of that 1980 primary campaign against Carter. Kennedy was favored to win — before he blew it, that is.
Kennedy was foggy that interview morning. That is because he and Mudd had allegedly been drinking the night before and Kennedy had a hangover.
I covered that campaign for the Herald, then temporarily the Herald American. Don Forst, the new editor, expected me to be all over Kennedy, whom I knew and had covered before. But Kennedy was not talking to me.
He was displeased after I broke a story about then Massachusetts House Speaker Tom Mcgee and his Democrat leadership team spurning Kennedy and endorsing Carter. It got a lot of attention.
“Why did you turn on Kennedy? “I asked one of Mcgee‘s lieutenants. “Because he made a pass at my wife,” he said.
While Kennedy and his campaign aides were openly friendly and cooperative with the fat Boston Globe — which showered Kennedy with favorable publicity — he froze out the lean and underdog Boston Herald.
This led me to cultivate the Carter people. I began calling Jody Powell, Carter’s press secretary, seeking an interview with Carter. Powell gave me the standard line that Carter was not leaving the White House to campaign. Nor was he granting any interviews.
He was too tied up with the Iranian hostage crisis. It was Carter’s Rose Garden strategy. It was later copied by Joe Biden hiding out in his basement in Delaware.
I told Powell that the primary campaign, after the Iowa caucus, was coming to Maine and New Hampshire, Kennedy’s backyard, where people read the Boston papers.
And while the Globe was in the tank to Kennedy, I told him that the Herald would give him a fair shake. ALI I wanted was an exclusive interview with the reclusive president to beat the Globe. He scoffed. “He’s not talking to any reporters.” I persisted.
“I told you so,” I said to him after Carter lost the headline in the Globe to Kennedy even though Carter had won the Feb. 10 Maine caucus. Next was the important New Hampshire primary, the first primary in the the front page of the Boston Herald american a day after Peter Lucas interviewed President Jimmy carter during the 1980 presidential primary campaign.
nation, Feb. 26.
If Carter could beat Kennedy among Democrats in neighboring New Hampshire it would be a big deal. A day later Powell called. The exclusive interview was on. We would beat the Globe.
The next morning Powell ushered me into the Oval Office where President Carter was waiting. A photographer took pictures and then left with Powell. I was alone with Carter. The interview lasted for a half hour.
The next day, Feb. 15, the page one headline above the Herald story read: “A talk with the President.” There was also a photo of me talking to Carter. I have it framed. The story went national. The Globe was livid and that was great
That morning I was astonished and moved by being greeted with a spontaneous round of applause from the 20 or so hard-nosed fellow reporters in the State House Press Room, all of them my peers. It was the best award ever, a prize better than the Pulitzer.
Carter beat Kennedy in New Hampshire by 11 points. He went on to defeat Kennedy at the convention only to lose the election to Ronald Reagan.
Kennedy did not speak to me for a long time, but later he did.
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