‘92 POLITICAL PERSPECTIVE : Gaffes, Bad Breaks Hobbling Yeakel Bid

For five months, a bitter newspaper strike has left this city without its two major dailies, the Press and the Post-Gazette. So when Democratic Senate contender Lynn Yeakel called a news conference recently, she was banking heavily on television coverage to relay her message to voters.

Her campaign had planned everything for maximum effect. The site was just across from the long-closed Homestead steel mills, one-time employer of thousands of workers in Pittsburgh’s “Steel Valley.” With the sprawling, shuttered plant as a backdrop, she intended to give her stump speech, blasting her Republican rival, two-term Sen. Arlen Specter, for his support of the White House’s economic policies.

What is more, her remarks were to be liberally sprinkled with statistics from the state’s latest unemployment report, due for release the same morning.

But that morning also turned out to be the same one in which a far bigger local story unexpectedly broke--an announcement by the owners of the strike-bound Press that they were putting the paper up for sale. Not a single TV camera was there for Yeakel’s appearance. And of the three print journalists there, two were from out of state.

The political misfortune that struck Yeakel at the old Homestead plant was nothing new for her campaign. Since blazing to an upset victory in a five-way Democratic Senate primary contest last April by ignoring her challengers and aiming her guns at Specter, the wealthy Main Line Philadelphian and political novice has been plagued by a series of bad breaks, campaign blunders and political gaffes.

On a previous campaign stop in Pittsburgh in July, for instance, she visited an employee-owned bakery and praised it as a shining example of how workers and government can join forces to save precious jobs. She called the public-private effort “a model for the role I will play in the U.S. Senate.”

Her campaign suffered no little embarrassment when it was revealed that Specter had been instrumental in capturing a $500,000 federal grant to help the bakery go into business.

In any ordinary election year, Yeakel’s political obituary might already have been written. Indeed, she had committed so many fumbles and was so low in the polls that at one point in her campaign, a Philadelphia newspaper columnist labeled her “Michael Dukakis in a skirt,” referring to President Bush’s ill-fated 1988 Democratic challenger.

But in Pennsylvania, as in most of the nation, this is no ordinary election year. Angered by the state’s weak economy and the failure of the White House and Capitol Hill to effectively do something about it, the state’s voters are primed for political change.

And much as it did in her primary bid, when she made Specter’s harsh grilling of Anita Faye Hill at Clarence Thomas’ Supreme Court confirmation hearings the symbol of everything wrong in Washington, the electorate’s frustration is redounding to Yeakel’s benefit, despite her campaign’s pitfalls and fierce competition from Specter’s well-heeled reelection machine.

A statewide poll conducted by Millersville and Pennsylvania State universities and released last week showed that Specter’s once commanding lead over Yeakel had narrowed to where the two candidates were in a virtual tie. The survey also found that 20% of the voters were undecided. A competing poll, released this week, put Specter ahead but Yeakel within striking distance. The survey found the incumbent leading, 49% to 42%, with 9% undecided.

The new results reversed a trend that had seen Yeakel go from leading Specter by 6 percentage points in July to trailing him by 16 points in mid-September.

Her slide corresponded with an unchallenged barrage of Specter commercials, including an “attack” ad that targeted Yeakel’s failure to pay more than $17,000 in back taxes to the city of Philadelphia until the day before announcing her candidacy.

Yeakel’s campaign, strapped for cash, did not begin running its ads until the end of September.

The first--and so far only--debate between the candidates was on Oct. 3, and most observers believe it provided her a boost.

Specter continued to stress his record and argued that his seniority in the Senate has been crucial to winning aid for programs benefiting the state. But he often seemed tense and defensive.

Yeakel sounded broad themes and sought to link Specter with what she decried as the failed economic policies of Republican Administrations during his tenure.

“That (GOP) leadership has left us with a staggering deficit, with an economy that is stagnant, with an education system that is failing us and with a health care system that is out of control,” she said. “My opponent says that he will fix all these things, but he has been in the Senate for 12 years and he hasn’t fixed them.”

Analyzing the debate, Penn State political science professor Michael Young said Yeakel “regained her balance and made the race a horse race again.”

But a look at the recent Millersville-Penn State poll reveals part of the challenge ahead for her.

While Yeakel enjoyed broad support across the state, that support was largely composed of an anti-Specter backlash and suggests that she has not made a strong case among voters to replace him. If she hopes to win in November, analysts contend, she must work harder on defining her political persona so voters have a more positive sense of who she is and what she stands for.

Pennsylvania Republican leaders, meanwhile, are concerned that the name at the top of the GOP ticket--George Bush--could cost Specter a large percentage of votes. The recent state polls have shown the President running well behind Democrat Bill Clinton.

Specter has studiously separated himself, where he can, from the Bush Administration and pointed out the places where he has stood in defiant opposition to it.

The Senate contest could come down to turnout. Specter’s support is disproportionately higher among upscale voters, who tend to turn out in strength. Yeakel’s support is dramatically better among less-affluent voters. If the turnout on Election Day is high, that might not augur well for Specter.

“The two parties are bellying up to the bar now and getting ready to have themselves a good contest,” said Penn State’s Young. “This is a state where statewide elections like this usually come in tight. It’s coming down to fundamentals and partisan support is crucial. Yeakel still has to close the sale and Specter still has a lot of voters sitting on the fence.”