Bush Makes House Calls on 2 Ailing GOP Candidates

Rep. Don Sherwood shouldn’t have needed President Bush’s help in his reelection campaign. Sen. George Allen shouldn’t have, either.

But there was Bush on Thursday, first in the small town of La Plume, Pa., and then in Richmond, Va., raising money and rousing the faithful -- each appearance illustrating the difficulties Republicans face as they seek to hold on to what in the past have been safe seats.

Sherwood won 92% of the vote in his northeastern Pennsylvania district two years ago, just as he did two years before that, each time with no Democratic opposition. Allen, a former governor of Virginia seeking a second Senate term, only a few weeks ago was anticipating a run for the 2008 GOP presidential nomination.

Now, each presents unique challenges to the Republican Party as it tries to keep its majorities in Congress on Nov. 7: Sherwood is trying to survive a race in which accusations that the long-married lawmaker tried to choke his much younger mistress have become a central focus. Allen has committed a series of miscues that have raised suggestions of racism and efforts to hide his Jewish heritage.

Each race has put Bush in the awkward position of lending the prestige of the presidency to a candidate whose personal or political conduct is difficult to defend.

But that’s just what he did, using the symbols of his office -- and, in the case of Sherwood, an ice cream parlor -- to convey his support.

Sherwood, accompanied by his wife, Carol, and daughter Maria, flew to Pennsylvania with Bush, offering a portrait of family togetherness as they stepped off Air Force One at the Wilkes-Barre-Scranton airport.

After a fundraising reception at Keystone College, they stopped for five minutes at Manning Ice Cream & Milk in Clarks Summit. The president made sure the message was clear; he told photographers to record “a little family-style, eating ice cream,” according to a pool report from Bush’s motorcade.

In between, the president used the example set by Carol Sherwood to bolster the case for her husband’s reelection. Responding to commercials raising the adultery issue by the Democratic candidate, college professor Chris Carney, she wrote in a mass mailing last weekend to district voters: “I am certainly not condoning the mistake Don made, but I am not going to dwell on it either.... We do not believe in flogging dead horses or living in the past. It is time to move on, and that is exactly what we are trying to do.”

“I’m glad Carol’s here with us today,” Bush said at the reception, which the Republican National Committee said raised $375,000. “I read Carol Sherwood’s letter.... I was deeply moved by her words. Carol’s letter shows what a caring and courageous woman she is.”

White House Press Secretary Tony Snow, who said Oct. 13 that Bush would stick to his commitments to campaign for Sherwood and Allen, was not quite as effusive Thursday.

Asked whether Bush had concerns, “personally and morally” about the controversies swirling about the two candidates, Snow said: “I’m just not going to comment on it.”

Democrats gleefully pointed out that Bush was campaigning for Sherwood and Allen in the midst of what he declared Oct. 13 as “National Character Counts Week.”

Sherwood’s problems became public in May 2005, when the Wilkes-Barre Times Leader newspaper reported that District of Columbia police had responded to a 911 call from his Capitol Hill apartment the previous September. The woman who placed the call initially said Sherwood had choked her but then withdrew the complaint. In November, Sherwood settled a lawsuit she had filed, accusing him of physical abuse, after admitting a five-year affair.

Allen’s difficulties emerged over several weeks this summer and autumn: During a rally, he referred to his opponent’s dark-skinned campaign worker as “macaca”; he was reported to have repeatedly used a racial slur when referring to African Americans in the late 1970s; and he wrestled awkwardly with the disclosure that his mother’s parents were Jewish.

At the Richmond fundraiser, which Republicans said brought in $530,000, Bush did not directly address the issues that have brought Allen into a tight race against former Navy Secretary Jim Webb, for whom former President Clinton was campaigning during the day.

james.gerstenzang@

latimes.com