Would-Be First Lady Dole Tells O.C. Voters State Is Key

Elizabeth Dole told an enthusiastic crowd at Leisure World here Thursday that they hold the key to her husband’s final drive toward the Republican nomination for president.

“California can put Bob Dole over the top,” she said to about 500 people at a neighborhood clubhouse. “He’s about there, but you can do it for him. We need to unite this party against Bill Clinton.”

Dole, who stopped first in Orange to tour Children’s Hospital of Orange County, warmed the audience with a nearly 45-minute talk, which she delivered without notes while wandering through the throng and shaking hands.

On leave from her job as president of the American Red Cross, Dole touched on most of the local hot buttons--illegal immigration, preserving the aerospace industry and saving Medicare--while praising the character traits of her husband, who will appear in Yorba Linda and Little Saigon on Sunday.

The theme of her talk, less than a week before Tuesday’s California primary, seemed to be to hone the Senate majority leader’s image while attacking his oft-perceived lack of charisma and vision.

Bob Dole “is without a doubt the strongest person I have ever known,” she said. “He is a person who is driven to make life better for other people. . . . He’s a polite man, he’s a modest man, so he’s not going to tell you these things, but I will because I want you to know him better.”

Her relaxed manner seemed to charm much of the audience, which interrupted her several times with applause. Many of the people had waited in line for more than an hour to hear her.

“I think we should elect him just to get her,” said Elizabeth Barnum, a 20-year Leisure World resident.

Dole said her husband, unlike former congressman and Housing Secretary Jack Kemp and other prominent Republicans, supported Proposition 187, the anti-illegal immigrant measure passed by California voters in 1994, and believes “we should beef up the Border Patrol” and “be more aggressive” in enforcing deportation laws.

Southern California’s aerospace industry “is crucial here. We are the leaders in aerospace technology and that must be preserved,” she said.

On Medicare, Dole said her husband and his colleagues in the Senate “saved Medicare. Don’t ever let anyone tell you Republicans are against Medicare, it’s not true.”

The crowd, most of them members of the Republican Club of Leisure World, left singing the would-be first lady’s praises.

“She was wonderful,” said Marie McDonald, 80, a Leisure World resident for five years. “I knew she was good, but she has such an amazing way about her. I’m going to vote for both of them.”