Democrats Lose Their Voice in Wake of GOP Takeover

Call it the “Silence of the Dems.”

With incoming House Speaker Newt Gingrich of Georgia, Senate Republican leader Bob Dole of Kansas and a host of other GOP victors from last week’s elections saturating the airwaves, the virtual soundlessness of the Democratic leadership on Capitol Hill has been deafening.

To some extent, the silence reflects a conscious tactical decision by Democratic leaders on the Hill and at the White House, according to sources who requested anonymity. Democrats hope that the flurry of hard-edged Republican rhetoric will frighten the public. Why join the debate, the thinking goes, if the GOP is doing the job for them?

“There is an interest in them manufacturing enough rope” to hang themselves rhetorically, said one Clinton Administration official.

In addition, many Democrats said they are ceding center stage because they want to make clear that Republicans now “own” Congress. They said that widespread public dissatisfaction with the institution will now reflect poorly on the GOP, rather than on them.

But their choice of silence over sound bites underscores several fundamental problems facing a Democratic Party that suddenly finds itself in the minority in both houses of Congress for the first time in four decades.

One is that congressional Democrats are effectively leaderless and there is a noticeable lack of enthusiasm about the leading candidates for minority leadership positions in both houses.

Another is that many Democrats are still in a state of denial and shock in the aftermath of last week’s Republican landslide, making it difficult for them to mount an effective counterattack.

Finally, and perhaps most damning in the view of high-ranking party strategists, Democrats in Congress have not yet crafted a coherent alternative to the Republicans’ aggressive legislative agenda.

“The problem is the message itself,” conceded one senior Democratic official.

Many Democrats--including some senior White House officials--fear that the silent treatment is already hurting their party and President Clinton.

“Many have just laid down and rolled over; they just cannot get over the fact we’ve lost control of the House,” said Rep. Kweisi Mfume (D-Md.). “We’ve got to energize our party. . . . We should set up a stage just to communicate we are alive and well.”

In the days since the election, the newly ascendant Republicans have dominated the public debate. Gingrich, in particular, has given a series of high-profile speeches outlining his vision of a GOP-led transformation of American politics, beginning with a dramatic restructuring of the House.

But during the first full week after the midterm elections that swept the Republicans to power, not a single leading Democrat called a press conference to rebut the Republican onslaught.

On Thursday, a few congressional Democrats made the first tentative effort to break the silence, promising cooperation with the new GOP majority but warning that some conservative Republicans appear to have misread the mandate they received.

Some congressional Democrats acknowledged that they have been too shellshocked by the drubbing they suffered and too preoccupied with their own minority leadership battles to plot a unified new course for the party.

Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.) alluded to the Democrats’ sheepishness on Thursday, telling reporters as he took the podium: “I’m Chris Dodd and I’m a Democrat. I know you haven’t seen many of us lately.”

Rep. Charles W. Stenholm (D-Tex.), who is challenging Rep. Richard A. Gephardt (D-Mo.) for the position of House minority leader, conceded that he is having difficulty rounding up supporters among elusive House Democrats. “It’s been very hard to find them,” he said.

So far, only Dodd in the Senate and outgoing House Majority Whip David E. Bonoir (D-Mich.) have stepped forward to wave the tattered Democratic flag. “We will stand tall and make our case for middle-class and working families,” Bonoir said at a Thursday briefing.

The Hill’s most powerful surviving Democrat, House Majority Leader Gephardt, is giving no interviews. “It’s not appropriate right now” said Gephardt spokeswoman Laura Nichols. “It is not an accident that we are not answering everything.”

Times staff writer Melissa Healy contributed to this story.