Rand Paul joins dad on stump in Granite State
WINDHAM, N.H. — The doctors are in.
Ron Paul and Rand Paul, the Texas congressman and his son the Kentucky senator, are campaigning together with just days to go in the New Hampshire presidential primary.
The father-son duo is offering a prescription for the nation’s ills that includes a strict regimen of balanced budgets, low taxes, a sound dollar and a non-interventionist foreign policy.
In doing so, the pair of doctors is giving a glimpse of a possible leadership change in the Tea Party movement — from threetime presidential hopeful Ron Paul to his son, a potential presidential candidate in 2016. “This campaign is fun,” Rand Paul told a raucous Paul rally Friday in a hangar at Nashua Airport.
The Tea Party movement is “equal parts chastisement” to both the Democratic and Republican parties for failed economic, social and foreign policies, the Kentucky senator said.
Rep. Ron Paul, the main attraction, told his supporters, as well as some undecided voters, that he felt momentum gathering. “All I can think is, freedom is popular,” the congressman said.
Leah Wolczko, 45, couldn’t help but think of a dynasty. “I think that’s the new Kennedy family standing up there,” said the unemployed teacher from Manchester, N.H.
“He’s well-spoken, articulate; he’s never caught flat-footed, and he gets a lot of airtime,” Joe Ureneck, 60, a Massachusetts Republican state committeeman from Boston, said of Rand Paul. “This movement is not going away. It’s going to get bigger and bigger. Rand Paul or someone is going to fit into those (Ron Paul) shoes.”
At a stop at Windham High School in Windham, N.H., the Kentucky senator spoke on subjects ranging from foreign policy to amendments to Senate bills to Federal Reserve policy.
The moderator asked him if he was speaking for his father. “As best I can, I’m representing my father,” Rand Paul replied.
In an interview, the senator said he is campaigning for simple reasons. “My dad paid for my college and my medical school, and I owe it to him,” Rand Paul joked. “And he’s my dad,” he said more seriously.
The senator also campaigned for his father just before the Iowa caucuses — part of a wave of about 10 Paul family members. Told of the Kennedy family analogy, the senator smiled and said, “There are certain attributes of the Kennedy family I’m hoping we don’t emulate.”
As for his own presidential run, which he considered last year before his father decided to compete, Rand Paul demurred. “Dad has a great chance” this year, the senator said.
Pressed about 2016 or beyond, he said, “I think that’s a little premature.” He said he would never discuss such a matter publicly without first speaking with his wife, Kelley.
Rand Paul would be the logical inheritor of the Ron Paul movement, said Larry Sabato, director of the University of Virginia’s Center for Politics. Two political figures from the same family campaigning together is rare in politics, he said, adding that the only modern political parallels would be the Kennedys and the Rockefellers. “He’s there (in New Hampshire) years earlier than many people who will end up running in 2016,” Sabato said, adding, “or 2020.”
Rand Paul has a steep hill to climb in mountainous New Hampshire. He’s still “an unknown commodity,” said Andrew Smith, associate professor of political science and director of the University of New Hampshire Survey Center. “It’s not a bad thing for (Rand Paul) to come up here and talk,” Smith said, “but he’s going to have to do a whole lot more than come up over a couple weekends here to get the kind of attention he needs to mount a campaign.”
Other candidates in New Hampshire may be gunning for second place, but the man in second is shooting for first. Ron Paul earned 20% support to Mitt Romney’s 35% in a Suffolk University/7news poll released Sunday. That would be a far better showing than his 2008 fifthplace finish, with 8% of the primary vote.
“That doesn’t mean that (gap) will be the final point,” Paul said Sunday before heading out to an afternoon campaign event in Meredith, N.H. “There’s a very good chance that when people know I’m now the only person who has the strength to really challenge Romney, the others will come over and knock his percentage points down.”
Matt Mcauliffe, 18, of Stratham, a University of New Hampshire freshman, agrees. “There’s still hope,” he said.