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Sunday, October 16, 2005
GOVERNOR'S DEATH ROCKED POLITICAL WORLD
Anniversary of deadly crash
By STEVE KRASKE
The Kansas City Star
A horrific plane crash five years ago tonight seemed to upend everything.
It saw the death of a Missouri governor, and the defeat of a U.S. senator.
The deadlocking of Capitol Hill and the naming of the next U.S. attorney general.
A Democratic triumph in Jefferson City in the face of ballooning Republican muscle.
“The legacy of that night is just amazing, isn’t it?” said Rick Hardy, a University of Missouri-Columbia political scientist.
Gov. Mel Carnahan’s wife, Jean, was sent to Washington, but she stayed only two years. Defeated Republican John Ashcroft was asked to take over President Bush’s Justice Department just in time for 9/11.
Tipping over a half century of Democratic political scenery, Republicans claimed majorities in both houses of the General Assembly.
The ripples of the crash rocked many Missouri personal and political lives in late 2000. The aftershocks lingered for the next two elections, and the effects linger still.
***
Many of the key participants in the 2000 Missouri elections recall the moment they learned of Gov. Mel Carnahan’s death on this day five years ago with instant clarity.
“It’s one of those moments that will always be frozen in time,” said state auditor Claire McCaskill.
The saga of how a dead man came to win a U.S. Senate race and be replaced by his widow remains one of the great political stories in Missouri history. To this day, the antipathy between the Carnahan and Ashcroft camps, which had clashed in fierce and bitter political wordplay for months before the crash, remains only barely hidden.
What follows is a recollection with many of the key political players, several speaking for the first time, about that night and those days. Titles indicated are what they were at the time of the plane crash that killed Carnahan.:
T he plane flown by Randy Carnahan disappeared from radar around 7:30 p.m. Oct. 16. Besides the governor, the other passenger was Chris Sifford, a long-time Carnahan aide.
MARC FARINELLA (Carnahan campaign manager): That night, I didn’t have a political reaction. I was simply stunned by the tragedy. The next morning, I picked up the phone and called our lawyers and said, “What is it that I’m supposed to do now? I have a campaign committee with several million dollars in the bank. What is it you want me to do?”
That morning, my assumption one way or the other was we were to shut down the campaign. It was all over. John Ashcroft had won.
DAVID AYRES (Ashcroft campaign manager): As soon as we found out what was going on, even before we even had a confirmation (of the governor’s death), John decided to suspend the campaign. So we just stopped.
Yes, we thought the race was over … and thought it appropriate to not do any campaigning and have any activity. It was a matter of courtesy and respect.
STEVE HILTON (Ashcroft adviser and spokesman): I got there (Ashcroft’s farm near Springfield) very early in the morning. We spoke about life as the Creator’s gift, its uncertainty, the terrible loss for the governor’s family, and the certain comfort of the Bible. He was very reserved and reflective, quiet, introspective.
ROY TEMPLE (Carnahan deputy campaign manager and close friend of Chris Sifford): I just remember standing in New Madrid. … I had just talked to (wife) Stacie two hours before. Stacie asked if she should fly down with them. She was worried about me driving back from New Madrid late at night. But she got busy and decided to stay up there (at home).
I remember thinking, it was a split-brain thing, “I can’t believe Mel, Randy and Chris are gone.” The other half of my brain was saying, “I can’t believe how lucky I am right now.”
DALE SIFFORD (father of Chris Sifford): My sister called me at 9:30 that night and said, “Where is Chris?” I said, “He’s in New Madrid tonight.” And she said, “Ohhhh. Well, I’ll talk to you later.”
It seemed suspicious. I had his pager number, his cell phone and home number. I started calling him. He didn’t answer his cell phone. Didn’t answer his pager, didn’t answer his home phone.
So Roy Temple called me about that time and said, “What are you doing?” I said, “I’m not doing anything.” He asked if I had the TV on. I said yes. He said turn it off, he would be there in a few minutes.
The plane crash occurred on a Monday night. The memorial service on the south steps of the Missouri Capitol took place the following Friday with President Clinton, Vice President Al Gore, Cabinet secretaries and a host of senators, the biggest political assemblage in the state since the death of Harry Truman in 1972. Sandwiched between those days was a world of strange emotions.
TEMPLE: I was going over to the (governor’s) mansion to talk to Jean about something. I walked through the gate of the mansion and my cell phone rang. It was (Associated Press reporter) Libby Quaid asking me who the (Senate) nominee was going to be, what the Senate race was going to look like. She was just doing her job. That was the next logical question.
The hearse had just pulled up with Mel’s coffin in it. I had looked in at Jean, and she was working on plans for Randy’s funeral. It was just very difficult to convey to this reporter how little of a concern this was to us at this moment.
FARINELLA: Next morning, just to give you a sense of how extraordinary it all was, Al and Tipper Gore and half the Clinton Cabinet came by (the St. Louis campaign office) to pay their respects and to see how we were doing. They were in town, of course, for the first presidential debate.
We all joined hands and stood in a circle and prayed. It was a clandestine visit. His staff knew that if his visit became public, people would ascribe political motives to what he was doing. He just felt he needed to do it privately, and the campaign team really appreciated his visit.
The next day, I picked up the phone, and it was one of the Eagles, Don Henley, who said he wanted to come do a benefit concert. It was just surreal.
AYRES: They (Democrats) didn’t show signs of really giving up. They didn’t concede.
I didn’t expect much at first. Everybody was focused on other things. But then I began to get a sense that it might not be over and began looking for signs that they were going to try to continue the campaign.
Our staff was assembled watching the state funeral. … When Robin Carnahan offered the don’t-let-the-fire-go-out analogy, I told everybody that was their campaign theme. I was surprised to hear it at a state funeral.
HILTON: Within two or three days, I reached the view that Gore and the Clinton White House had to choose between ceding the race to Bush or pressing for a new Senate candidate.
Missouri in 2000 was a must-win state, unlike 2004. The critical point for Gore and the White House was that Democratic turnout losses from not having a Senate race would be severe and Missouri would be ceded to Bush, meaning that Gore would lose the White House. No Gore win map was credible without Missouri.
I decided that Gore and the White House would make every effort to have a Senate race.
FARINELLA: There was no pressure from the Gore campaign at all. None. Zero. This is the first time I’ve heard that suggested.
We were concerned that if (Ashcroft) came to the service, he would wind up being a sideshow. Instead we asked him to come and pay respects to the family before the service, and the family could put out a statement saying how much they appreciated him coming.
He came anyway. He did become a sideshow. There was a big picture in the (St. Louis) Post-Dispatch of John Ashcroft sitting in the crowd. It was a spectacle. It could have been avoided, but he didn’t want to avoid it.
AYRES: I recall that very clearly. They sent signals through an intermediary that John would not be welcome at the state funeral.
I couldn’t think of anything more inappropriate for him than not attending the funeral. He needed to go show his respect. They would have used that (in the campaign), if he’d not attended, as a snub. There was no chance he was not going to attend.
Eight days after the crash, the new governor, Roger Wilson, announced his choice to serve in the Senate should the late Mel Carnahan win the November election — Jean Carnahan. Speculation about the widow as the likely replacement surfaced just days after the crash, although she had not publicly addressed the possibility.
WILSON: Probably one of the most appalling things that happened, which was within 10 hours (of Carnahan’s death) — I was getting calls and advice about what to do about the U.S. Senate race. I just politely told people we weren’t dealing with that now. Call me back in a few days.
It never occurred otherwise to me to put anybody in that slot if Jean wanted it. I think that’s something people expected.
I called Jean two days after the funeral and said … if Mel should receive the most votes, I wanted to make it clear to the people of Missouri that my selection would be her. She said it was kind of me to offer: “I can’t say now what I would do, Roger.” “I said, ‘Jean, not a hurry. You decide in your time.’ ”
JEAN CARNAHAN: I can’t say there was any one moment (when I decided to run). I talked with the family. They were convincing me that I could certainly do this. That decision was up to me. I never felt any pressure on me at any point. It was a process.
But I couldn’t have lived with myself had I walked away with what Mel had invested his life in. I at least had to give people the chance to vote for him knowing I would go and represent him.
Would people actually would go out and vote for Mel knowing I would be going in his place? It had never been done before. Was it something foolish?
FARINELLA: Because of some of the events of that week involving Ashcroft, I pretty well by the end of the week was determined to go run a campaign regardless of whether Jean or anyone else was to be the candidate.
It was a number of things. There was an episode where Ashcroft went to the floor of the Senate to offer his condolences, and he wound up talking about how he and Mel were so similar and how they shared the same values. It just seemed very exploitive to many of us.
The main reason we went forward was because there was this huge difference between John Ashcroft and Mel Carnahan in terms of philosophy and values and priorities. We felt that despite Mel’s death, people still deserved a choice.
By the end of the week, we’d really had it.
AYRES: What can you say? We were trying to give him the respect that he was due for his life’s work and achievements. Clearly they didn’t always see eye to eye on the issues, but there was no doubting the man’s sincerity and commitment and service. You try to respect that and give honor to that.
Two weeks to the day after the crash — and just eight days before the election — Carnahan told an assemblage of reporters at her Rolla home that she would accept the appointment. The campaigns for the U.S. Senate and all statewide races were re-engaged for the home stretch, a politically treacherous task for campaigns seeking to win important offices while respecting grieving Missourians.
AYRES: In a situation like that, it’s important in a setting where somebody has died and there’s a lot of pain and people are struggling with it. … You want to do the right thing, and that was our focus regardless of what the political consequences were.
I did have a sense that they (Democrats) were looking for a provocation that would enable some of the high emotions to be channeled against us. We were trying to avoid that. That made it a difficult environment.
BOB HOLDEN (Democratic candidate for governor): It was difficult on two levels. I was emotional myself. I’d be giving a speech and become emotional.
Then as a campaign organization, it was important to pick yourself up, pick up the organization, and get people to understand the importance of this at a time everybody is continuing to grieve over the losses.
I tried to emphasize that we had to win this election because that would be an even greater tragedy for Mel, to have lost his life and have the values he had stood for also be lost.
JIM TALENT (Republican candidate for governor): Nobody wanted to be aggressive. Then the question was, what should you do? You want to show respect, of course. You also have obligations you feel to the people who worked for you. You don’t know what to do.
On the night of Nov. 7, a dead man won election to the U.S. Senate. Ashcroft, the losing candidate, weighed a legal challenge to the outcome. Talent also was swept away by the emotion-fueled Democratic wave.
CARNAHAN: We were home there in Rolla, just sitting on the sofa watching the TV. I was just flooded with so many different emotions at that time. It’s hard to isolate any one. I was sitting there next to (youngest son) Tom, nothing really happening. So I said, “I’m going to bed.”
I was thinking if it (victory) happens, great. If it doesn’t, that’s fine, too.
Just then, Tom called me back and said there was a new report out, and we all got quiet. The man on the news said, “This just in, Mel Carnahan has been declared the winner in Missouri” and that it was quite unusual.
There were no cheers. There were only tears.
I never regretted what we did. I knew that’s what Mel would have wanted me to do.
TEMPLE: Though she never said it out loud, she spent a fair amount of time wondering if she measured up to what he would have been able to do.
JOHN HANCOCK (former Missouri GOP chairman): The next morning, (Ashcroft) was taking calls from other senators. Many of them were urging him to contest the election.
AYRES: We just ran out of time. We were closing the gap rapidly, digging ourselves out of the hole in the aftermath of the crash. And we just ran out of time. We thought we’d made it. And we didn’t get there.
We knew what the legal grounds for a challenge would be. We had looked at the process and the law, and had people do research to make sure we knew what our rights were.
It just wasn’t the right thing to do. It would have been bad for the state. It would have been tough on everybody involved. It was time to end it.
A few weeks later, (Andy) Card called (Ashcroft) and said to bring a clean suit and his wife to Austin. “Governor Bush would like to visit with you.”
Five years later, the debate over who would have won continues.
AYRES: We felt like the week going into his death that we finally had the campaign pretty well under control. Internal polling had us up by about 10 (points).
TEMPLE: No doubt in my mind Mel was winning. They’ve tried to rewrite history of that thing. I’ve seen copies of our polls, their polls. The trend was getting worse, not better, for them.
FARINELLA: We had a poll back on the morning of the plane crash that had us up by 3.
GEORGE CONNOR (Missouri State University political scientist): My gut tells me that Senator Ashcroft would have won the Senate race and Holden would have lost.
Leading Democrats continued to go down to defeat. Talent knocked Carnahan out of the Senate in 2002. Holden was swept aside in a 2004 party primary, the same year the Carnahans’ daughter, Robin, was elected Missouri secretary of state and son Russ went to Congress. The players and the politics are very different.
HILTON: The disorientation that accompanied the tragedy slowed or deflected things for a time, but did not have lasting effects. Missouri has been trending steadily Republican at least since the 1980s.
RICK HARDY (University of Missouri-Columbia political scientist): The GOP tide had been building since the Reagan years. It had been accentuated through redistricting and the fact that Republicans were picking off special election seats.
In the late ’80s and early ’90s I saw outstate Democrats feeling very uncomfortable with the liberal nature of the party and particularly with regard to abortion and gun control. Those two issues keep coming back to be a thorn in the side of Democrats in the state of Missouri. Whenever you have a leader (Carnahan) who is very adamant about something, it does tend to galvanize the opposition.
TEMPLE: It was an enormous shock to the Missouri political system. People can argue whether it had a positive or negative impact. It caused a dramatic reordering of relationships.
In February 2001, Jean Carnahan voted against Ashcroft for attorney general. The Senate voted 58-42 to confirm him.
HILTON: The right thing to do was to vote for confirmation … in light of Senator Ashcroft’s abilities and gracious conduct in a very challenging election. He didn’t wait seven days to concede, and he didn’t gripe about jammed voting machines in some places.
When she voted no … I was disappointed in her. I assumed she based her conclusion on the basis of her political interests, which were mistaken, and unresolved hostility.
TEMPLE: At the end, ultimately, it was because she concluded that the country had just been through an incredibly divisive presidential election, and George Bush had made the decision he was gong to divide the country further (by picking Ashcroft).
Clearly that proved accurate.
And, as with many sudden tragedies, there are always the what-ifs.
FARINELLA: There’s another side to this. Roy (Temple) and I told Mel, don’t run for the Senate. Stay put. You could be Al Gore’s running mate.
Mel was seen as a senior statesman. He was a popular Democratic governor from a battleground state. There was no one else like that on Al’s list. Mel had great (poll) numbers. And Gore needed someone who looked mature and stable coming out of the Clinton years. He would have been on the short list.
If he had been Al’s running mate, Mel never would have been on that plane. Mel clearly would have carried Missouri for Gore, and Al would have been president. Gore needed one more state anywhere, and Missouri quite conceivably could have been it.
But Mel was a humble guy. His response was, “No one is going to pick me for vice president.” He was 66. He wanted to run for Senate. He felt he was the only guy in a position to beat Ashcroft.
WHERE ARE THEY NOW?
■ John Ashcroft, 63, heads The Ashcroft Group, which provides strategic consulting to major corporations and helps them deal with the law enforcement and homeland security communities. Ashcroft declined comment for this story. He lives in northern Virginia.
■ David Ayres, who has been with Ashcroft since 1994, is chief executive officer of The Ashcroft Group.
■ Jean Carnahan, 71, lives in Clayton. “I tell people I’m happy. I’m here with my family. I’m at a very good point in my life.” She and supporters will ride a train today from St. Louis to DeSoto to commemorate the 2000 barnstorming trip that her husband greatly enjoyed.
■ Roy Temple runs the Democratic blog firedupmissouri.com and is a Democratic consultant based in Jefferson City.
■ Marc Farinella is with Murphy Putnam & Shorr, a Democratic media firm. He lives in Melbourne, Fla.
■ Bob Holden teaches in the School of Business and Technology at Webster University in Webster Groves, Mo.
■ Roger Wilson is a senior executive at Rockwood Capital Advisors, a St. Louis area bond investment firm.
■ Jim Talent is running next year for his second term in the U.S. Senate.
To reach Steve Kraske, call (816) 234-4312 or send e-mail to skraske@kcstar.com .