The White House Sends the Wrong Signal to the Hill

A battle plan was drawn. Weeks, even months of preparations were made. The opposition was divided, tentative and often on the defensive. Allies were recruited from the opposition. Ronald Reagan, the great communicator, sallied forth on national television and in person. Still, on Thursday the Administration failed by 12 votes to gain congressional approval of $100 million in military and economic aid to the Nicaraguan contra rebels. What went wrong?

To hear it from some conservative Republicans, the White House should never have offered a last-minute compromise, as they did on Wednesday. “Once they said they were willing to deal, they destroyed the momentum,” complained one House Republican.

Until the compromise offer, Washington odds-makers thought the Administration could pull it off. The White House was using all its assets to win the vote, with everyone from the President on down working the phones, calling on wavering Republican loyalties and promising White House help in coming political campaigns. Rumors circulated of offers made to Democrats involving greater agricultural price supports or increased road building in their congressional districts. All this prompted one House Democrat to declare early last week, “If you’re undecided, it’s time to make a deal.”

But the compromise, instead of assuring victory, undermined the effort, according to many Republicans. One White House official said “We sent the wrong signal. We created an opening for Tip (House Speaker Thomas P.) O’Neill to argue for future compromises--and future votes.”

The last-minute concessions were aimed at attracting Democrats who agreed in principle to military aid for the contras but wanted some strings attached. However, these were the very Democrats unmoved by the offer. “We have been meeting with (Assistant Secretary of State) Elliott Abrams since December. It’s hard not to be skeptical about 11th-hour compromises,” said one.

Another reason offered for the White House defeat--one definitely not subscribed to by conservatives--centered on the harsh rhetoric employed by White House Communications Director Patrick J. Buchanan, and by the President himself. “We spent two weeks digging ourselves out from under Buchanan,” said one congressional Republican. “Commie bashing,” he explained, “doesn’t carry a lot of weight up here.” Other congressional Republicans and a number of Administration officials disagreed. “We were dead in the water until Buchanan came along,” said one White House official. This official argued that by raising the specter of a communist advance through Central America that would result by a vote against contra aid, Buchanan and the President made it “politically costly to be on the other side.”

Buchanan’s imprint was all over the White House strategy. In addition to penning a vitriolic piece in the Washington Post, Buchanan oversaw many of the Administration’s key efforts. “Pat has only one speed,” commented a White House colleague. “In this case he had a clear run, since he had with him the heart and mind of the President.”

Buchanan also oversaw the preparation of the President’s prime-time television address last Sunday. Partly to avoid repeating the turf battle waged over the last major Reagan speech, the State of the Union address, Buchanan and White House Chief of Staff Donald T. Regan arranged for chief speech writer Bentley T. Elliot to talk with the President before drafting this crucial speech.

However, Elliot produced what one White House insider dubbed, a “just the facts ma’am” draft. Buchanan rejected this in favor of a separately commissioned and more emotive one drafted by another writer, Anthony R. Dolan. It was this speech, replete with what Administration insiders labeled the “tortured cleric” story, about an evangelical pastor mutilated and left for dead by the Sandinistas (but not including, according to one White House official who read Dolan’s original draft, “the bayoneted little girl” story, considered too strong) that was broadcast last Sunday night.

According to the White House, the speech provoked strong response, both positive and negative. Congressional offices, conservative and liberal, recorded a similar pattern in their constituents reaction. “The President turned up the heat and the response on both sides” said one congressional observer.

But it was in turning up the heat on O’Neill that many Administration strategists believe Buchanan and the President made their mistake. For, it was clear the tough language enraged the Speaker.

“It caused the Democratic leadership to see the issue as ‘do or die.’ ” said one White House insider. It was then, this official asserts, that O’Neill, “began to play real political hardball,” threatening and cajoling recalcitrant Democrats.

What was particularly frustrating to some Administration officials about the backlash generated by Buchanan’s harsh rhetoric was that the opposition, unlike last year, had become increasingly leery of identification with the Sandinista regime. As one liberal Democratic House member said, “I can’t stand the Sandinistas. They have betrayed the revolution.”

Administration officials were aware of Democratic discomfiture. To some, the official Democratic rebuttal, given by Tennessee Sen. James R. Sasser, epitomized the opponents’ dilemma. “It was quintessential Jimmy Carter” argued one Senate Republican. “Well meaning, but wimpish”--a charge at least one liberal House Democrat ruefully conceded was difficult to dispel. “We have been left arguing subtleties” he admitted.

But Democratic subtleties clearly carried the day over Republican rough-house rhetoric and last-minute dealing. And if anything, the future looks even brighter for O’Neill and his colleagues.

In an effort to regain the initiative, almost immediately after the vote Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole (R-Kan.) said he may schedule a vote after next week. Long before Thursday’s House vote, Senate Republicans were already predicting that the Administration would, if necessary, return to the House for another try. As one congressional staffer said, only half in jest, “They are going to vote until they get it right.”

But some dispirited Administration officials were not as sanguine. They noted the starting point for the Senate would be the last minute concessions offered to House Democrats. More important, scheduling and debate the next time will be governed by O’Neill. And the Speaker apparently intends to attach contra aid to an urgent supplemental appropriations bill due to be considered by April 15.

What this means is that the Speaker will have even more of a whip hand over fellow Democrats. It will be O’Neill’s turn to offer political goodies to undecided Democrats, not the White House’s. He will be able to fashion a contra bill to his liking that the Administration will be forced to accept as part of an essential money bill. “Tip will be able to put anything he wants into the supplemental,” said a White House legislative expert, “He will really have us over a barrel.”