HRC: State Secrets and the Rebirth of Hillary Clinton (3 page)

Dining with a few friends at Cafe Milano in Georgetown in 2012, Bill Clinton recalled what he considered to be a major rebuke from a junior congressman, Jason Altmire, who had been helped by the Clintons early on in his career. “If you don’t have loyalty in politics,” the former president said, “what do you have?”

If there was a poster boy for the betrayal-and-revenge narrative, it was Altmire, a tall, broad-shouldered former
Florida State University football player who had won his western Pennsylvania House seat in the midterm Democratic landslide of 2006. Altmire had worked for six years as a congressional aide, a stint highlighted by his selection to work on Hillary’s health care reform task force in 1993. It was the only big job he’d had in Washington before winning an election, and he knew it had been an important springboard in his career. He was a prime target for Hillary as she courted superdelegates in the spring of 2008.

Humbling herself, Hillary met with many of these superdelegates in one-on-one sessions in the second-floor conference room of the Capitol Hill building that houses the DNC and the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee (DCCC). When Hillary wanted to elude what she called the “paparazzi,” she held the meetings at the nearby Phoenix Park Hotel. But it wasn’t just the press that Clinton wanted to avoid at the DCCC. The House Democrats’ campaign arm was controlled by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, a technically neutral power whose private leanings had been made clear when her entire inner circle of House members jumped on the Obama bandwagon in late January and early February. Brian Wolff, an Arkansas native and the executive director of the DCCC, worked with Balderston and Elrod to redirect lawmakers who were in the building into meetings with Hillary and also to keep tempers cool. At least once, at a time when the tension was running high, aides to Clinton and Pelosi had to scramble to keep the two women from encountering each other. “It would have been a problem,” said one source. Some of Pelosi’s friends chalked up her hostility toward Clinton’s groundbreaking run as motivated partly by jealousy and partly by a desire to tap into Obama’s base. “I think it was very calculated, that support,”
said one friend of both women. “It was obvious that was going to bring in a whole new constituency of voters that were important to the Speaker, and that’s politics.”

The DCCC and the Phoenix Park Hotel, both within walking distance of the Capitol, were chosen in part so that it would be harder for the almighty superdelegates to say they didn’t have time to meet with Hillary. It was telling that a former first lady, New York senator, and onetime presidential front-runner had to worry about members of Congress avoiding her. It was also telling that Hillary’s heavy push for superdelegates, particularly those like Jason Altmire who hardly registered on the Washington power meter, didn’t begin in earnest until after Super Tuesday in February. She had thought the nomination would be hers by then, and in any case, she detested asking lawmakers and donors for votes and money. She preferred to be the magnanimous one, dispensing favors rather than collecting them.

Hillary had begun to lose Altmire long before she realized she needed to compete for him. While it took her until the spring of 2008 to get her delegate outreach into gear, Obama had first approached Altmire in the summer of 2007. By October of that year, the junior Pennsylvania congressman was invited, along with Representative Patrick Murphy, to attend a speech that Michelle Obama gave to a group in Philadelphia. After the speech the two congressmen spent the better part of an hour backstage with the future first lady, who sat on a couch and sipped a bottle of water as she explained her husband’s strategy for beating the Clinton juggernaut. Even though he had slipped far behind Hillary in the national polls, Obama would win Iowa and New Hampshire, turning the race into a three-way fight with Clinton and John Edwards. Edwards would drop out of the race soon thereafter. “When it’s a one-on-one battle, that’s when Barack’s going to shine,” Michelle told the two junior Democrats. “She’s not going to know what hit her.”

Four years later Altmire was still impressed with Michelle Obama’s presentation. “She called exactly what happened,” he said. “She was wrong about New Hampshire, but she called exactly what was going to happen.” Murphy, a close friend of Altmire, already
had
endorsed Barack Obama, joining the future president at a time when the outlook for his election was bleak. Altmire, rumored to be ready to join up, too, held off—he would keep his powder dry. Obama made another appeal on the floor of the House of Representatives during President George W. Bush’s 2008 State of the Union address, asking Altmire if he was “ready to come over,” then made contact every six weeks or so to check in and see if an endorsement was forthcoming.

Hillary finally reached out to Altmire on February 29, 2008. She called his house and left a voice message. “The momentum’s on our side,” she said, alluding to the Texas and Ohio primaries set for the following Tuesday. From a public relations standpoint, they were must-win contests. If she failed to at least win the popular vote in either state, her campaign was over. The delegate count was a different matter because the general public, and even many experienced political journalists, didn’t really get how important it was. Win or lose in those states, Hillary couldn’t catch Obama in the national delegate math without an implausible wave of superdelegates rushing to her side. But she wasn’t ready to give up on flipping them into her column, and neither was Bill.

Altmire got a phone call from one of Bill’s aides on the morning of March 4, the day of the Ohio and Texas primaries. He was told to hold for the former president, but Bill never came on the line. The races were still too close to call. Once it was clear that Hillary was going to capture the popular vote in both states, Altmire got a second call. This time Bill was ready to make the pitch.

“He comes on the phone. He is flying, you can hear it in his voice,” Altmire recalled.

“We really need you,” Bill told him.

But Altmire worried that Hillary would fail to connect with the conservative voters in his Pennsylvania district. Bill pushed back, citing the margins of his own victories in the district in 1992 and 1996. He knew the voters there as well as Altmire did. Hillary, Bill argued, had been a popular state-level first lady in rural, conservative Arkansas and had won her Senate seat twice in part because she
had done better than expected in conservative upstate New York. Calling an old favor to mind, the former president also thanked Altmire for his work on the 1993 health reform task force. As he had with Obama, Altmire told Clinton he didn’t like the superdelegate system or the idea that his vote would carry more weight than those of each of his constituents. He didn’t plan to endorse anyone, he told the former president.

But the Clintons didn’t give up easily. Altmire was one of about a dozen Democratic superdelegates invited to a cocktail party on March 12 at the Clintons’ multimillion-dollar Washington house, nestled among foreign embassies and a stone’s throw from the sprawling vice president’s residence. At the party, Altmire asked Hillary a pretty simple question: You’re way behind. What’s your path to victory? “You all are superdelegates,” she told the group, “and the purpose of superdelegates is to make up your mind and make a decision that might be contrary to what the voters have decided.” That didn’t make much sense to Altmire; nor did it appear to sway many of his colleagues.

On St. Patrick’s Day, Obama visited a community college in Altmire’s district and invited the congressman to join him. Like a football recruit at a major Division I university, Altmire was given a window into what it was like to hang out with the cool crowd. Accompanied by David Axelrod, he watched Obama deliver the speech, give a press conference, and sit for an interview with Gwen Ifill of PBS.

Then he clambered into the senator’s SUV for a ride to Pittsburgh International Airport. Avoiding the primary elephant in their midst, Obama and Altmire talked about their daughters, who are about the same age. When they got to the airport, Obama signaled to his security detail to get out of the car and leave the two pols alone in the back of the SUV.

“I’m going to win this election,” Obama said bluntly. “I’m going to be your president, and I want you to be on our team.… You don’t have to commit right now, but I want your support.”

Altmire said he was in a tough spot, with Clinton on the verge
of winning his district by a big number. Obama reiterated his confidence and his desire to get Altmire on board, and then he signaled for a Secret Service officer to open the door so he could go to his plane.

But Altmire still had something to say. He wanted Obama to know that they had made a connection, and he blurted out his good wishes for Obama’s upcoming speech on race in Philadelphia. “Hey, Senator, I know tomorrow is a very important day for you. Good luck,” Altmire said.

Obama turned to the officer to signal that the door should be closed again. He leaned over toward Altmire with a look of determination on his face, brow furrowed, eyes squinted. “We’re going to be fine,” he said. “They told me I wasn’t going to be able to beat Hillary Clinton, and I’m going to beat both Clintons.… This is just one more hurdle. Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine.”

The difference between the two campaigns struck Altmire as remarkable: while Hillary was begging for help, Obama didn’t need it. As Obama delivered his speech on race the next day, Altmire thought, for the first time, “This guy is special. There’s something about this guy that’s just different than anyone else.” It was Obama, not Clinton, whom he would endorse if he were pushed into that corner. Though he didn’t tell anyone yet, Altmire had made up his mind—he wanted Obama to win. He felt as if he were actually doing Hillary a favor by keeping his thoughts to himself. In Hillaryland, he would soon be regarded as an opportunist because he had extracted so much face time from the Clintons—and then as an outright traitor.

In April, Altmire got word that Bill wanted to talk to him again. The congressman told Hillary’s team that the two men could travel together between events at venues about an hour apart, a ride that Hillary’s aides would later recall as another delicious plum they had given an ungrateful backbencher. Altmire got the full backstage and onstage treatment from the former president. Bill praised him in his speech at the first event, then put his hand on the congressman’s shoulder and whispered in his ear, classic Clinton moves for conveying intimacy to an audience. When the event wrapped up, Altmire got in the car. Bill followed, cell phone to his ear, making it clear
that he was talking to Hillary. In the SUV, Altmire gave the former president his now-practiced spiel about disliking the superdelegate process.

“I think you know as well as I know that Hillary is going to win in your district, and you should support the people of your district by supporting Hillary,” Clinton said.

If there was anybody who knew what it took to be president, it was Bill Clinton, and the Clintons had been suggesting Obama wasn’t ready to be president. That had caught Altmire’s attention. What did he mean by that? What were his concerns?

“Why do you think that Senator Obama is so not qualified to be president?” Altmire asked.

Clinton looked up. “I didn’t say he was not qualified,” he explained. “I don’t want to say that, but when I became president, when I look back, I made some mistakes early because of inexperience. I was not as prepared to be president as I thought I would be. This guy is not nearly as ready to be president as I was in 1993.” Then Clinton turned bitter, saying Obama’s “buddies in the media” would just “cover it up anyway” if he did make mistakes.

When the votes were tallied on April 22, Hillary won Pennsylvania by 10 points and Altmire’s district by 31 points. The result increased the pressure on Altmire, who had been saying all along that he didn’t like the idea of reversing the will of his own constituents. Now, having spoken, they had shouted, “Hillary!” Where they had once been a convenient shield, protecting Altmire from having to make a decision, they now became the point of Hillary’s spear.

A miscommunication made the inevitable showdown even more painful than necessary. Through the union grapevine, Hillary’s aides got the erroneous message that Altmire was ready to endorse her. They invited him to meet with her one morning later that week at the DNC’s Washington headquarters. Clinton, weary from a six-week marathon of campaigning in Pennsylvania, rose early to meet with Altmire at eight a.m. Coffee and bagels were the standard fare in the small conference room that Hillary used to court superdelegates. There was a table in the room, but two chairs had been pulled
away from it so that Hillary could talk to him face-to-face, at close range, with nothing separating them. She had previously told staff that pleading for superdelegate votes felt beneath her, beneath what the Clintons had accomplished, and beneath what they had become accustomed to in terms of treatment from fellow politicians. But now she had no other options. Clinton, expecting to get Altmire’s endorsement, and Altmire, knowing she wouldn’t get it, locked eyes.

Hillary started. President Clinton had enjoyed meeting Altmire, and she had enjoyed running up the score in his district. Now there was nothing standing in the way of Altmire endorsing her, just as the Democrats in his district had. Altmire said he was impressed by just how well she had done with them. Dispensing quickly with the small talk, Clinton pressed him on his decision as a superdelegate. Altmire retreated to familiar territory, explaining for the umpteenth time why he didn’t like the system.

For the first time, Hillary realized that he wasn’t going to endorse her under any circumstances. She had hit her limit. She didn’t let him finish. She stood up, put her hand out to shake his, and said she appreciated his time. Pleasantries included, the exchange had lasted about seven minutes. For Hillary, that was seven minutes too long.

When Altmire was gone, she lashed out at her aides. “Such a fucking waste of time,” she fumed, her voice full of disgust and frustration. “I thought you said he was going to endorse me.”