Bush’s Port Action Puts Economy on the Front Burner

When President Bush invoked a rarely used labor law to force the reopening of West Coast ports this week, he struck a double blow: one against what government lawyers argued was a threat to economic and national security, and a second against what pollsters said could be a threat to Republican political security.

Bush’s first use of the Taft-Hartley Act in nearly a quarter-century followed a carefully choreographed process in which business groups and administration officials ratcheted up warnings about the economic and military dangers of the shutdown while the president stayed above the fray.

Even when he finally acted, Bush was careful to appear even-handed, noting in an executive order, for example, that the shutdown was the result of a management “lockout” rather than a strike by workers.

But a close look at the president’s actions suggests that they were motivated by more than the immediate effects of the shutdown.

Recent polls show that even as official Washington is riveted by the prospect of war with Iraq, ordinary Americans are more concerned about the fragile state of the economy. By putting an end to the shutdown, Bush was able to act decisively on both issues, and to present himself as addressing voter worries.

Bush “may have legitimate concerns about the shutdown, but his actions have the happy side-effect of making him look like he’s doing something about the economy,” said American University political scientist James A. Thurber.

The economy “is the thing that did in [Bush’s] father: the public feeling that this was a foreign policy president,” said GOP political consultant Frank Donatelli. Administration officials “don’t want to leave the impression the president is not interested in the economy.”

References to the economy have been winning more prominent billing in the president’s speeches in recent days after more than a month of intensive focus on Iraq. On Saturday in New Hampshire, Bush opened his remarks by declaring, “I worry about people being able to find work in America.” It was New Hampshire’s economic woes in 1992 that started the first President Bush’s long slide from office.

The most recent poll on voters’ concerns, a survey by the nonpartisan Pew Research Center for the People and the Press released Thursday, found that 55% of people questioned identified the economy was the single issue they most wanted candidates to address in the fall elections, up from 20% in June and far ahead of the 22% who are most concerned about the war on terrorism.

“People recognize the importance of the war; they’re concerned about terrorism,” said center director Andrew Kohut. “But if you think politically, the economy is closer to home for most people.”

The ports shutdown itself has contributed to the economic anxiety in California, according to Republican pollster Stephen M. Kinney. “We’re beginning to see the same thing we saw in the early ‘90s,” Kinney said. “People are worried, but it’s not about taxes or the fear of big government, it’s more ‘Am I going to lose my job?’ ”

In entering the fray and putting a stop to the shutdown, the president had to traverse some tricky political terrain, according to aides and observers. He had to reassure the GOP’s traditional business base that he would act, yet hold off until the damaging consequences of the lockout were widely apparent. He had to hang on to what few labor allies the Republican administration has, especially those in the Teamsters union, and not anger pro-labor Democrats in Congress whose backing he needs on Iraq and other issues.

The administration handled its business base by intervening early in contract talks between the Pacific Maritime Assn., which represents shipping companies and terminal operators, and the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, which represents the 10,500 workers who man the docks, and threatening drastic action if no settlement was reached.

More recently, the White House provided a private briefing for business lobbyists seeking presidential intervention in advance of Bush acting Tuesday.

The White House tried to hold onto labor support by having top Bush aide Karl Rove and Chief of Staff Andrew H. Card Jr. call Teamsters President James P. Hoffa and AFL-CIO President John J. Sweeney to tout the president’s evenhandedness.

“The president’s approach [to the shutdown] has been one that played it down the middle,” asserted an administration official acquainted with the White House handling of ports dispute.

When Bush went before the TV cameras Tuesday afternoon to announce he would seek a court-ordered end to the labor standoff, he highlighted the shutdown’s economic damage to individual Americans. “The work stoppage is hurting our entire economy. It is hurting truckers and rail operators.... It’s hurting farmers and ranchers and manufacturers, retailers and consumers.... ,” he said.

By contrast, the president made comparatively little mention of the shutdown’s effects on the issues that have consumed him this fall, national security and the case against Iraq.

But it was quite a different story in the legal briefs the administration filed in U.S. District Court in San Francisco, successfully seeking a court order ending the shutdown. In these, government lawyers went to great lengths to portray the country as effectively at war and argue that the ports shutdown stands in the way of the war effort.

Citing an affidavit from Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, the lawyers said that the September 2001 terrorist attacks “mark the onset of uncommon wartime strains and requirements placed on the nation’s military systems ... “

They charged that these could be “significantly compromised” by the shutdown.

“If the work stoppage continues,” the lawyers said, “it may degrade military readiness, hinder the department’s ability to prosecute the global war on terrorism, and undercut other defense needs and worldwide commitments.”

The administration’s focus on national security was partly tactical. Under Taft-Hartley, mere economic damage is not grounds for court action. The government can intervene only if labor disputes “threaten the national health or safety.” That makes the national security argument the administration’s trump card.

But analysts said that the White House’s public emphasis on economic consequences of the shutdown and their courtroom emphasis on national security damages is part of a grand political strategy.

“With Wall Street still soft, plants shutting down” and 401(k) accounts losing value, “people could easily focus on the economy,” said independent political analyst Stuart Rothenberg.

“Maybe you can get along with just flag-waving in the South, where patriotism is part of the old, traditional values,” but in the rest of the country, the fragile economy poses a political danger, Rothenberg said.

“It’s wise for the White House to inoculate itself,” he said.