POLITICS 88 : Gore Agrees He Is Underdog but Calls It Step Up

Sen. Albert Gore Jr., a virtual nonentity in the Democratic presidential race since his Super Tuesday victories a month ago, admitted Wednesday what others have been saying for the last few weeks.

“I am the underdog in this race,” Gore told small crowds around the state as he kicked off his campaign for the New York primary. Indeed, he acknowledged at a news conference here, “being an underdog is a step up for me.”

Gore says confidently that his showing in New York will be better than his 17% finish in Wisconsin, just as he predicted before Tuesday’s primary that he would outdo his single-digit finishes in Illinois, Connecticut and Michigan.

Building ‘Momentum’

But none of Gore’s aides said they expected him to win in New York, and his declared strategy of building “momentum” that will somehow catapult him to the nomination grows increasingly implausible as time passes, with recent progress measured in small increments and no obvious opportunity for victory in any of the primaries ahead.

Instead, the campaign shows all signs of continuing its monthlong drift, apparently unable to decide how and where to win the battles it must if Gore is to wrest the nomination from the two front-runners.

The campaign had hopes for a victory in Connecticut and far outspent its rivals there, then backed away. It targeted Wisconsin and again spent more than anyone else, but aides privately conceded defeat long before the primary was over.

Now in New York, also initially targeted for a potential breakthrough, the campaign is again likely to outspend the others. But though Gore on Wednesday termed the April 19 primary “the most critical contest thus far,” he again refused to characterize it as make-or-break for his campaign, and aides acknowledge that Gore will have great difficulty finishing higher than third.

Predicts California Victory

Asked repeatedly in recent days when he would again win a primary, Gore has refused to be pinned down other than to suggest that his prospects are stronger in Ohio and Indiana than elsewhere. He does, however, predict victory in California, the nation’s last primary, on June 7.

It is a strategy of postponement that is openly acknowledged by the campaign.

“We’re waiting patiently and strategically for the right opportunity to break through and run all the way to the convention with the momentum necessary to win,” he said at a news conference Tuesday night.

But the great majority of delegates will have been selected after New York, leaving Gore with little room for further delay. And his political strategists concede that even with a strong showing in the remaining primaries, Gore is likely to wind up with fewer delegates than either Gov. Michael S. Dukakis or the Rev. Jesse Jackson, a difficult position from which to win the nomination.

Touted Experience

For the New York contest, Gore hired media consultant David Garth to hone his image, and launched an ad campaign touting his experience in national government.

He has grown disparaging of Dukakis and Jackson for their lack of that background, lumping them together as representative of “naive” views and suggesting that neither knows “what he’s talking about in foreign policy.”

“We don’t need a President who requires on-the-job training,” he told students in Syracuse Wednesday. “Did you get that subtle reference to my two opponents?”