Wavering Lawmakers May Have the Cover They Need : Trade: They could try to capitalize on Gore’s presentation in debate to explain their votes for NAFTA. One undecided has now lined up for pact.

It was great politics and even better theater.

The vice president of the United States, armed with a litany of facts and anecdotes in support of a controversial trade agreement, faced off on live television against an often defensive Texas billionaire trying to scuttle the complex three-way pact.

The 90 minutes of debate produced a shower of sparks, angry interruptions, sarcasm and incredulity, nasty quips and accusations of lying, head shaking and posturing for the camera. The two men’s mutual contempt was undisguised at the outset and appeared to grow as the debate wore on.

But did the dust-up between Al Gore and Ross Perot over the North American Free Trade Agreement sway the minds of the American public and the critical undecided members of Congress?

That won’t be known definitively until a week from today, when the House of Representatives is scheduled to vote on the trade pact.

But to the extent that Gore was able to answer most of Perot’s objections to the agreement and convincingly articulate the Administration’s best arguments in its favor, it could provide wavering members of Congress with the cover they need to face angry and anxious constituents.

One previously undecided lawmaker, Rep. Jim Bacchus (D-Fla.) announced immediately after the debate that he will support the trade pact.

“I’m hoarse because I found myself rooting for Al Gore,” Bacchus said. “He didn’t appear to need any help.”

While that announcement was almost certainly orchestrated by the White House, it may be the first of many in coming days as lawmakers seek an excuse to do what many appear inclined to do any way--support the treaty. They can tell nervous voters who have heard about the evils of the trade deal from unionists, environmentalists and Perot that Gore seemed to get the better of the debate.

As of Tuesday night, the Clinton Administration was about 25 votes shy of the 218 needed to assure passage in the House and it remained unclear whether this event alone could push them over the top.

The White House was ecstatic about Gore’s performance. The vice president achieved “more than we could have ever expected,” said U.S. Trade Representative Mickey Kantor, the Administration’s point man on the trade agreement.

While offering few new arguments, Gore sought to convince the American public that it must face the future with confidence, while painting Perot as a fear-mongering demagogue selling America short.

Perot, for his part, hammered away at the theme that the trade pact is a sweetheart deal for American elites and the Mexican oligopoly, a direct assault on American jobs and the American way of life.

It may be several days before the debate settles into the public mind as a victory or defeat for the Administration. But it was a gamble that President Clinton believed he had to take as he approaches one of the most important votes of his first year in office.

The White House hoped that the debate would give the Administration momentum moving into the final week before the vote and officials clearly believed that they had gotten a major bounce from it. If the trade agreement passes, the debate will be seen as the turning point and it could mark the beginning of at least a temporary eclipse of Ross Perot as a major figure on the political scene.

Gore made a conscious effort to appeal to those whom he repeatedly referred to as “the working men and women of America” who are the most anxious about the trade deal and whose fears Perot echoes. Gore cited several individuals, including a tire maker in Illinois and a textile worker in North Carolina, who would benefit from passage of the agreement, seeking to answer Perot’s charge that the trade pact was cooked up by corporate executives merely to fatten their balance sheets.

Gore repeatedly confronted Perot on his figures, on how much he was spending to kill the accord, on how he stood to profit from it through his and his family’s various business ventures. Perot responded as he usually does when challenged--with a sarcastic retort or a change of subject.

Perot saved one of his best shots for the final round--a naked threat to use his money and his United We Stand, America organization to defeat any lawmaker who votes for the trade deal.

During the debate, Perot returned again and again to his fundamental argument, that Mexicans are too poor to afford American products and that the deal would cause a flood of American manufacturing jobs moving to Mexico where labor costs are vastly lower. He engaged in stereotyping of striving Mexican laborers by saying that their “dream in life” is an outhouse or running water.

Gore countered that, poor as they are, Mexicans eagerly buy billions of dollars worth of American goods and want more. He said that American firms wishing to relocate south of the border can do so now.

Perot won concessions from Gore on Mexico’s horrible environmental record, on its undemocratic political system and on distortions in trade figures.

But just when the two locked into a substantive argument, they quickly returned to their taunts.

Perot: “That wouldn’t make sense to anyone over 6 years old.”

Gore: “Could we please talk about NAFTA?”

Perot: “Again he throws up propaganda, he throws up gorilla dust.”

Gore: “I don’t know of any single individual who lobbies the Congress more than you did.”

Perot: “You’re lying now.”