GOP Sees Outreach Potential in Agenda

President Bush’s plans to overhaul Social Security and enact other sweeping policy changes are making some Republican lawmakers uneasy about the political risks. But the party’s new chairman said Wednesday that the White House agenda actually could “broaden and deepen” the GOP’s dominance by attracting new voters, including young people and African Americans.

The comments by new Republican National Committee Chairman Ken Mehlman on the eve of Bush’s second inauguration marked a rare acknowledgment that the president’s objectives came with a political goal: GOP control in Washington for years after Bush leaves.

“When we push to save Social Security, we have an historic opportunity to bring more young Americans into our party,” Mehlman said, referring to Bush’s proposal to let workers put some payroll taxes into private accounts. “If you’re 30 years old or younger and you care about a secure retirement, the Republican Party has a plan for you.”

Mehlman also told party leaders that debates over nominating judges, funding faith-based groups, offering school choice and limiting lawsuits added up to potential gains for GOP candidates in the future.

“When we debate who should sit on the judiciary, we have an opportunity to deepen the GOP by registering to vote men and women who attend church every week but aren’t yet registered voters,” he said. “We can bring new African American faces and voices into our party when we debate whether faith-based organizations should have a seat at the table and whether public schools need to be more accountable and parents need more choices.

“We can deepen the GOP by identifying and turning out Americans who vote for president but miss off-year elections and agree with our work for a culture of life, promotion of marriage, and belief in our 2nd Amendment heritage.

“And,” he concluded, “we can bring new Latino doctors, accountants and teachers tired of frivolous lawsuits into our party as we debate lawsuit reform.”

Mehlman takes over a party that set records last year, registering more than 3 million voters and raising nearly $250 million for Bush’s reelection campaign.

The GOP kept the White House and expanded its majorities in Congress by gaining votes among blacks, Latinos, Jews and women -- traditionally Democratic-leaning groups that can be swayed by aspects of Bush’s agenda, party officials said Wednesday.

Hailing the successes of the Bush campaign he led, Mehlman said the party should use the same tactics in pursuing the president’s ideas: “regional media by state parties; volunteers calling into talk radio, writing letters to the editor or attending town hall meetings; petition drives urging action; bloggers separating fact from fiction; surrogates on cable television; citizenship Sundays.”

Party officials also spoke Wednesday of competitive congressional races in 2006 and the need to begin building the presidential campaign for 2008.

The party’s outgoing chairman, Ed Gillespie, announced Wednesday that he would remain a consultant to continue outreach to black voters.

GOP strategists have said that the president’s push to increase funding to faith-based charities -- along with his opposition to same-sex marriage and support for school choice -- helped increase Bush’s share of the black vote from 9% in 2000 to 11% in 2004.

A report in The Times on Tuesday detailed how some faith-based funding was directed to black religious leaders who backed Bush. The rise was sharpest in battlegrounds where the faith-based program was highlighted -- particularly in Ohio, where Bush’s share of the black vote rose from 9% to 16%.

Noting that Abraham Lincoln and other antislavery activists of the 1800s were Republicans, Gillespie said that the party’s performance among black voters could “double or even triple over the next two election cycles.”

“We have come to a point where it is in the interest of the party of Lincoln and African American voters to renew our historic bonds,” he said in his farewell speech.