Dole Handily Wins S. Carolina Primary; Buchanan Takes 2nd

By RONALD BROWNSTEIN

March 3, 1996 12 AM PT

TIMES POLITICAL WRITER

WASHINGTON —

Senate Majority Leader Bob Dole won a commanding victory in South Carolina’s primary Saturday, gaining critical momentum as the GOP presidential race hurtles into a potentially decisive phase.

With the bulk of the vote counted, Patrick J. Buchanan was finishing well behind Dole in second, Steve Forbes was a distant third and Lamar Alexander trailed a few points further back in fourth.

Dole, whose campaign had stumbled out of the starting gate, exulted over the results. “I think it means we’re getting a fresh start again,” he told reporters as he flew from a day of campaigning in New England to a victory celebration in South Carolina.

With 99% of the South Carolina vote counted, Dole had 45%, Buchanan 29%, Forbes 13% and Alexander 10%.

Dole’s strong showing in South Carolina, traditionally a pivotal state in the GOP contest, is likely to provide him a powerful burst of acceleration heading into the 10 states--including Georgia, New York and most of New England--that hold primaries and caucuses later this week. Public or private polls already show Dole leading in all of those contests, as well as in Puerto Rico, which votes today.

From the start, the Republican presidential race has been marked by unexpected twists and turns, and few observers are willing to label any single contest decisive. But Dole’s victory Saturday night could prove a turning point.

Exit polls from VNS, a polling consortium of the four major television networks and the Associated Press, showed that Dole demonstrated strong appeal across the board: the 72-year-old Senate majority leader battled Buchanan to a standstill among conservatives, including religious conservatives; ran up a large margin among moderates, and carried every income group except the relative handful of primary voters who earn less than $15,000 a year.

Dole won all 37 delegates at stake in South Carolina. He won four more delegates from caucuses held Saturday in Wyoming. Together, his two victories Saturday placed Dole in the lead for the 996 delegates needed for nomination at the GOP convention next August in San Diego.

Even more important, by winning so convincingly in the first Southern state to vote, Dole has dramatically shifted the playing field--and thrust his rivals onto the defensive.

Recalling his defeat to George Bush here eight years ago, Dole said at his South Carolina victory party: “I waited eight years to say, ‘Thank you, South Carolina,’ ”

Flanked by Gov. David Beasley and former Gov. Carroll A. Campbell Jr., who spearheaded his campaign in South Carolina, Dole declared that “no one in their wildest dreams thought it would happen by 15 percentage points, but that’s what it is.”

Saturday’s result significantly set back Buchanan, who had hoped that his double-barreled message of cultural conservatism and economic nationalism could slingshot him past Dole in Georgia and the other Southern states coming up. Instead, Buchanan’s defeat in South Carolina, following his third-place finish in Arizona last Tuesday, suggests he may face a ceiling on his vote at around 30%. Though South Carolina is one of the most conservative states in the union, fully half of GOP primary voters said they consider Buchanan “too extreme,” according to exit polls. Those voters preferred Dole over Buchanan by 10 to 1.

“We need a breakthrough, one big breakthrough,” Buchanan acknowledged at an appearance in Maine Saturday night.

The South Carolina vote represents an even greater body blow to former Tennessee Gov. Lamar Alexander. Alexander insisted Saturday night that he would remain in the race despite a showing that left him just barely above the 10% threshold he needs to remain eligible for federal matching funds.

But Alexander’s weak showing in a Southern state where he hoped to capitalize on his regional affinity could increase pressure on him to withdraw. Already Saturday, House Speaker Newt Gingrich told the Associated Press that Alexander and Sen. Richard G. Lugar of Indiana should consider quitting the race.

Lugar received less than 1% of the vote, as did businessman Morry Taylor. Alan Keyes won 2%. Rep. Robert K. Dornan (R-Garden Grove) was not on the ballot.

For Buchanan and Alexander, Saturday’s results raise the stakes even higher in Tuesday’s primary in Georgia.Polls there show Dole leading but more narrowly than in most of the states voting next week.

Forbes, who claimed after the vote to be “happy” at his “respectable showing,” did not have as much political capital invested in South Carolina as Buchanan or Alexander. But his meager vote suggested that despite his victories in Arizona and Delaware, he still has not yet regained the allure that propelled him toward the head of the field earlier this winter.

For Forbes, the key event is likely to come Thursday in New York, where contentious campaigning already has begun. On Saturday, Sen. Alfonse M. D’Amato (R-N.Y.), Dole’s leading supporter in the state, slammed Buchanan with an open letter that accused him of “incendiary fear-mongering.”

“Your rhetoric . . . denigrates women, bashes gays, criminalizes immigrants, insults African Americans and politicizes religion,” D’Amato wrote.

Buchanan, in Boston for a rally at Lexington Green, responded by referring to D’Amato’s efforts to deny New York ballot access to all of Dole’s rivals--including Buchanan himself, Alan Keyes, and Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.), who has already quit the race.

“This year we’ve had one traditional Catholic running for president from the Republcian Party for the first time, one African American and one Jewish American,” Buchanan said. “And Sen. D’Amato and his legal folks have tried to keep all of us off the ballot in New York. That does not appear to me to be the politics of inclusion.”

Speaking to reporters Saturday night, Dole attributed his victory to his recent efforts to focus the debate on which candidate could beat Bill Clinton, and his own recent efforts--underscored most dramatically in a powerful Thursday night speech to the Christian Coalition--to talk more about his early days.

“I’m experimenting,” Dole said. “There’s a lot of cynicism out there about politics and politicians. I didn’t just show up in a blue suit and a necktie, and I haven’t been majority leader all my life. I’m trying to get people to understand that I’m pretty much like the rest of them out there.”

The exit polls showed that in South Carolina Dole finally shattered the campaign dynamic that had knocked him off his stride through the first several primaries. In the first major contests--Iowa, New Hampshire and Arizona--Dole had consistently found himself caught in a two-front squeeze, as Buchanan captured a plurality of conservatives, and Alexander, Forbes and even Lugar peeled away moderates.

In South Carolina, with Forbes and Alexander attracting only minor support and Lugar virtually none, Dole captured almost half of all moderate voters, almost double his percentage in New Hampshire.

Even more tellingly, Dole successfully challenged Buchanan’s dominance of conservatives, two-thirds of South Carolina’s electorate.

Buchanan carried a plurality only of the one-fourth of voters who call themselves “very conservative.”

Most striking was Dole’s success at denting Buchanan’s hold on religious conservatives, who constituted just over one-third of the South Carolina electorate.

In previous contests, Buchanan won that vote. But in South Carolina, Dole, who benefited from the backing of many local leaders in the influential Christian Coalition, battled Buchanan almost to a dead heat among religious conservatives.

Buchanan did lead Dole by a striking 50 percentage points among voters who said abortion was the principal consideration in their vote, but they represented only an eighth of the electorate.

Among the much larger group of voters who said the GOP platform should ban abortion (just over 40%) Dole ran only slightly behind Buchanan; Dole led Buchanan among the two-thirds of voters who said moral, not economic, concerns were the most pressing problems facing the country.

Dole even penetrated Buchanan’s base among voters with less education, while continuing to run well among those with college degrees.

The exit poll also found a mixed response to Buchanan’s attacks on foreign trade partners. In a state that has lost 60,000 textile jobs over the past 20 years but also flourished with over $8 billion in foreign investment since 1986, half of GOP primary voters said trade created jobs in the state, while just over one-third said it had cost jobs.

Voters who said trade had created jobs gave Dole a nearly 3-to-1 advantage over Buchanan.

Not surprisingly, Buchanan’s best audiences were those responsive to both his cultural and economic message. Voters who said both that trade lost jobs and that they were religious conservatives gave Buchanan a 24-point advantage over Dole. In stark contrast, even religious conservatives who believe trade benefits their state gave Dole a 23-point advantage over Buchanan.

Times staff writers Marc Lacey, Eleanor Randolph, Edwin Chen and Bob Sipchen and Times Acting Polling Director Susan Pinkus contributed to this story.

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March Madness

The road to the Republican nomination now leads inexorably toward California and its March 26 primary, passing through more than 20 states en route. In theory, a candidate could still clinch the nomination before California’s vote, but doing so would be very difficult.

MARCH 5

* Massachusetts and Connecticut are the main prizes among New England contests. Georgia is a virtual “must win” for Lamar Alexander.

Georgia (CD): 42

Mass. (W): 37

Maryland** (CD): 32

Colorado** (W): 27

Connecticut** (W): 27

Washington* (P): 18

Rhode Island (W): 16

Maine** (W): 15

Vermont (W): 12

MARCH 7

* Crucial showdown between Bob Dole and Steve Forbes, the only two candidates on the ballot statewide. State GOP officials are pushing Dole hard. Patrick J. Buchanan is on the ballot in parts of the state.

New York** (CD): 102

MARCH 12

* Florida and Texas account for more than 60% of the delegates at stake among these “Super Tuesday” contests. Florida could be a decisive factor in the race.

Texas (P): 123

Florida** (CD): 98

Oklahoma** (CD): 38

Tennessee (CD): 38

Mississippi (CD): 33

Oregon** (P): 23

Louisiana** * (P): 9

MARCH 19

* Kansan Dole brings a regional advantage to these Midwestern contests, but Buchanan’s protectionist trade message could resonate, especially in Michigan.

Illinois (CD): 69

Ohio (CD): 67

Michigan** (P): 57

Wisconsin (CD): 36

March 26

* California’s importance has grown as the GOP race has become more fractured. With its 165 delegates, the state could determine whether a presumptive nominee emerges. Buchanan long has been a favorite of conservatives here; Dole enjoys the support of party leaders while Forbes could appeal to suburbanites.

California** (W): 165

Washington* (P): 18

Nevada** (CD): 14

The Delegate Race

Dole: 76

Forbes: 60

Buchanan: 37

Alexander: 10

Delegates available on these five dates in March: 1,116

Delegates needed for nomination: 996

Key

W: Winner takes all