Townsend Starts Bid for Governor
Democrat Pledges 'Renewal' for Md.

By Lori Montgomery
Washington Post Staff Writer
Monday, May 6, 2002; Page A01

Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend formally launched a campaign yesterday to become the first female governor in Maryland history and the first Kennedy to hold executive office
since her uncle captured the White House more than 40 years ago.

Townsend (D) staged her kickoff rally on a plaza beneath the slender dome of the State House in Annapolis, where she has spent seven years as second in command. She touted her
record as an experienced insider but cast herself as a visionary leader with fresh ideas to "shape and change the future."

"I pledge to you today that I will dedicate myself to make sure that every Marylander reaches her or his indispensable destiny," Townsend said, ad-libbing from handwritten notes. "I will
do this . . . by making sure our citizens have the tools they need to make their dreams come true."

The afternoon rally drew more than 2,000 sign-waving supporters, many with children in tow. Townsend was introduced by her husband, David, a professor at St. John's College, who
praised his wife's "rare combination of wisdom and warmth." She has, he said, "the moral maturity" of Harriet Tubman and Thurgood Marshall, as well as a "great and good heart."

Though the crowd was packed with elected officials, none spoke, not even Gov. Parris N. Glendening, who plucked Townsend from relative obscurity to serve as his running mate in 1994
and groomed her as his successor. Glendening -- who has never been personally popular with voters and, at 59, has a pregnant new wife -- is not expected to play a major role in the
campaign.

Glendening left the rally before Townsend's speech because of a family emergency.

Townsend aides said she thought a parade of politicians would be boring. But their absence underscored her emergence as an independent figure who, though the darling of the state's
insular, old-boy Democratic establishment, has never quite fit in.

Instead of governors and senators, police officers and teachers stood to attest to Townsend's leadership. Police Chief Ronald Forest praised Townsend's community policing initiative
for providing the funds to chase drug dealers out of Seat Pleasant. Principal Marilyn Dobyns credited Townsend's character education program for training "good citizens" at Milbrook
Elementary School in Baltimore County.

And Randall M. Griffin, chief operating officer of Corporate Office Properties Trust, a billion-dollar corporation in Columbia, thanked Townsend for listening to business leaders. "She is
absolutely the right person to lead Maryland for the next four years," Griffin said.

Then Townsend spoke for herself, charting a course that would veer from Glendening's liberal legacy toward more centrist themes of personal responsibility and economic growth.

"I believe government works best not when it does things to people or even for people. . . . It works best when it works with people," she said. "So I ask you to join me in a mission of
rededication and renewal."

Townsend said she would bring accountability to public schools and foster a dialogue about "what works" as the state embarks upon a precedent-setting plan to increase school
spending.

She vowed to expand character education, a longtime passion, so children in every school learn right from wrong and conceive "larger dreams."

She proposed to encourage adults to volunteer to help their communities, much as Maryland high school students must do to qualify for a diploma.

And shepromised to create a form of family leave so parents can get involved at their children's schools.

Townsend has not ruled out new taxes. But she vowed to practice fiscal responsibility. She said she would spur a sluggish economy by relieving congestion on the state's gridlocked
highways and with old-fashioned salesmanship.

"People don't know how good we are," Townsend said in an interview before her announcement. Maryland has the nation's highest family income and high school graduation rate and
the lowest child poverty rate, and it is among the nation's leaders in job creation, she said. "We have to make sure that's the image of ourselves: We are a smart, forward-thinking,
innovative state."

Townsend, 50, the eldest child of Robert F. Kennedy, enters the race as the undisputed frontrunner with virtually universal name recognition and nearly $6 million in the bank -- three
times as much as any other candidate. Much of it comes from outside Maryland, where enthusiasm for Townsend is spilling into the campaign coffers of other women, Democratic
fundraisers said.

Over the past eight years, Townsend and Glendening have pursued dozens of popular policies, including cutting taxes, expanding health care for the poor, nearly doubling school
funding, spurring economic development and conducting a nationally acclaimed battle against suburban sprawl.

Polls show Townsend holding substantial leads over U.S. Rep. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr., the likely Republican nominee, and Baltimore Mayor Martin O'Malley, a potential challenger for the
Democratic nomination.

The most recent survey for news organizations, a Mason-Dixon poll in late March, showed Townsend leading Ehrlich 49 percent to 36 percent. She led O'Malley 48 percent to 34 percent
among Democrats.

Ehrlich and other critics say Townsend's strength is superficial, a function of incumbency and a glamorous family name. Most polls show her under 50 percent support, and Ehrlich
contends that voters are looking for an alternative.

Yesterday, as Townsend unveiled her campaign in Annapolis, Ehrlich and O'Malley were stumping in vote-rich Montgomery County, a critical battleground. Ehrlichattended a fundraiser
for U.S. Rep. Constance A. Morella (R-Md.), while O'Malley performed with his band, O'Malley's March, in Bethesda.

During her speech, Townsend jabbed subtlely at Ehrlich. She criticized Congress for failing to provide prescription drug coverage for the elderly. She derided "some people who vote
against raising the minimum wage."

Afterward, she said Ehrlich "has voted against any kind of gun restrictions. And he voted -- to me, which I find so terrible -- he voted against gun restrictions on Saturday night
specials."

Ehrlich campaign spokesman Paul Schurick said Ehrlich has voted for "a number of gun control measures," including bills to require trigger locks and to ban high-capacity magazines.

But "Ehrlich did vote against some of the bills that he felt did nothing to curb gun violence," Schurick said, such as a ban on assault weapons.

Though Townsend seemed ready to go toe-to-toe with Ehrlich, she declined to discuss O'Malley.

O'Malley is hoping for an opening, banking on Townsend's reputation for goofy screw-ups. In 1999, she spoke of hiring more people who speak "Hispanish"; at last year's Super Bowl,
she praised the Baltimore Ravens for scoring a "football."

Those incidents fed some insiders' view of Townsend as a political lightweight -- earnest but unpolished and naive. But Townsend has improved enormously since 1986, when she
jogged door-to-door in running shoes during an unsuccessful race for Congress.

In 1998, she was credited with saving the gubernatorial election after Glendening alienated two of the state's most prominent black politicians, snubbed President Bill Clinton and
produced boring TV ads. Townsend mended fences and brought in her family's media strategist, Robert Shrum, who is returning for the 2002 campaign.

And over the past year, Townsend has cleared the Democratic field for governor of several heavyweights, including Montgomery County Executive Douglas M. Duncan, Baltimore
County Executive C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger and Prince George's County Executive Wayne K. Curry.

The conventional wisdom holds that Townsend's celebrity and phenomenal fundraising ability scared the men off. But Townsend also has built a formidable political organization across
the state.

"What she has done quite well is create a sense of inevitability," said former House majority leader Bruce Poole.

Townsend is one of 29 women running for governor across the nation -- a record. If she wins, she will become the first Kennedy to claim a governor's mansion. She is already the first
female Kennedy to hold political office.

"This is a glorious day. Kathleen is sensational," said Ethel Kennedy, who watched her daughter from a front-row seat between former Maryland governors William Donald Schaefer and
Marvin Mandel.

Born on the Fourth of July, 1951, Townsend is the eldest of 11. When she was 10, John F. Kennedy Jr. was president, her fatherwas attorney general and the family lived on a rambling
estate in McLean. When she was 12, her uncle was assassinated in Dallas. And when she was almost 17, her father was assassinated in Los Angeles.

Townsend graduated from Radcliffe College, where she met and married her literature tutor. She received a law degree and bore four daughters, three of them at home.

The family moved to the Baltimore area in 1984 to be closer to David Townsend's parents. After her failed bid for Congress, Townsend worked in the Maryland Department of Education,
where she lobbied successfully to create a community service requirement for high school seniors.

She also began work on character education, originally a conservative Republican idea and now a central part of her campaign.

"If you teach kids the importance of courage and bravery and leadership, if you give them new language to describe who they are . . . they see themselves differently. They have larger
dreams," Townsend said.

In 1993, she moved to the U.S. Justice Department, where she pushed another community service idea: the police corps. Maryland isnow one of several states where volunteer police
officers earn money for college.

The program is a direct descendant of the Peace Corps, a Kennedy legacy. Townsend sees herself as her father's philosophical heir.

So do many others. And that constitutes a large part of her appeal. But supporters say Townsend's political savvy turned that advantage into frontrunner status.

"While the name might get her the first meeting, it doesn't get her the enthusiasm and it doesn't get her the checks," said Ann Lewis of the Democratic National Committee.

Al From, founder of the moderate Democratic Leadership Council and a longtime friend, said Townsend gets a "bum rap that she hasn't really done anything."

"The honest truth is she has always been an idea person," From said. "Her ideas reflect pretty core traditional American values, and ideas are what inspire people."

But Townsend's most potent asset may be her intense sincerity. When she works a room, people feel a connection. She grabs their arms. She asks questions that are sometimes
surprisingly personal.

"I think people do want to know that their governor knows them, knows the challenges they face, knows the struggles they go through and also knows that each of them has a dream,"
Townsend said. "I want to help them reach that dream."

© 2002 The Washington Post Company