Updated below

The 140-page gameplan for former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani’s 2008 bid for the presidency was leaked to the New York Daily News by a “source sympathetic to one of Giuliani’s rivals for the White House.”

Part of Giuliani’s plans for the upcoming primaries is to raise $100 milliion in 2007 and $25 million in the first three months alone. The plan also predicts spending $21 million this year.

When whispers of a Giuliani candidacy began, there was talk of his personal life scuttling his chances for the nomination. It is an obstacle that Giuliani’s inner circle are well aware of, according to Giuliani’s papers.

The remarkably detailed dossier sets out the budgets, schedules and fund-raising plans that will underpin the former New York mayor’s presidential campaign – as well as his aides’ worries that personal and political baggage could scuttle his run.

[...]

One page cites the explicit concern that he might “drop out of [the] race” as a consequence of his potentially “insurmountable” personal and political vulnerabilities.

The plan outlines Giuliani’s weaknesses in bullet-point format.

On the same page is a list of the candidate’s central problems in bullet-point form: his private sector business; disgraced former aide Bernard Kerik; his third wife, Judith Nathan Giuliani; “social issues,” on which is he is more liberal than most Republicans, and his former wife Donna Hanover.

The initials “AD” are circled on several pages — apparently referring to Giuliani’s chief fundraiser, Anne Dickerson — which NYDN says is most likely to have prepared the contents of the binder. Dickerson, the deputy to the chief fundraiser during President Bush’s 2004 campaign, included “confidential” memos from the ‘04 election in the binder.

Giuliani’s “prospective leadership” is outlined in the recovered documents. Possible backers floated include Lew Eisenberg and Larry Bathgate, two major fundraisers from New Jersey, and FedEx CEO Fred Smith, all of which have already backed Senator John McCain, of Arizona.

As the Giuliani campaign scrambles to do a damage assessment, the question will be asked: Whodunnit?

Sunny Mindel, a Giuliani spokeswoman, called the leak’s timing “suspicious.” Mindel cites Giuliani’s standing in recent Iowa and New Hampshire polling as the reason for the leak. The American Research Group poll showed Giuliani ahead by 2 points in Iowa and trailing McCain by four in New Hampshire.

Some may point to the McCain campaign — to embarrass Giuliani, and to show that they have the fundraising edge over the former NYC mayor — but with Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney’s intended day to file paperwork initially scheduled for January 2, before the death of President Gerald R. Ford delayed him until tomorrow, and his lackluster showing in early polling, perhaps he had the most to gain.

Whoever did it, Giuliani’s campaign blunder is in line with his incompetence over his support for Bernie Kerik as the first Homeland Security secretary. In 2008, Republicans will be looking to move away from the incompetence of the Bush administration, and not prolonging it.

(Hat tip: Justin Gardner, Donklephant)

Updated 1/2/07, 4:42pm: Mindel says the binder was stolen.

Also, McCain aide, John Weaver, knocks Giuliani over the binder bungle.

“Referring to Giuliani’s private sector business, Weaver said, “I thought it was a security company.”

Posted by Matt Ortega
Tuesday, January 2, 2007 at 6:29 pm

6 Responses to “Giuliani ‘08 Playbook Leaked to Press by “Source Sympathetic to Rival””

Something to say?

Name (required)

Mail (will not be published) (required)

Website