Ehrlich declares 'opportunity ticket' with party chief

Michael Steele in bid for lieutenant governor, never held elected office; Emphasizes modest roots

By David Nitkin and Howard Libit
Sun Staff

July 2, 2002

Rep. Robert L. Ehrlich Jr. picked state Republican Party Chairman Michael S. Steele as his gubernatorial running mate yesterday, declaring that two self-made candidates were joining
forces to form an "opportunity ticket" crossing racial and geographic boundaries.

Steele, 43, is a Prince George's County resident and former corporate attorney who has spent two years trying to rebuild a teetering GOP organization shut out of statewide office since
Charles McC. Mathias left the U.S. Senate 16 years ago.

He has never held elected office but is credited with engineering the party's most recent victory, a decision last month by the state Court of Appeals to overturn legislative district maps
drawn by Gov. Parris N. Glendening and other top Democrats.

Ehrlich, 44, said he chose Steele because the two men are friends who share issue positions and similar backgrounds.

Both emerged from working-class roots to attend top schools and forge successful careers, Ehrlich said, reinforcing a prominent campaign theme that contrasts his modest background
with the affluent upbringing of Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend, his likely Democratic opponent.

Steele's mother worked 45 years earning minimum wage in a District of Columbia laundry. His father, who died when Steele was 4, once tended gardens at John F. Kennedy's Georgetown
home. His stepfather earned extra money as a limousine driver, sometimes shuttling Robert F. Kennedy -Townsend's father - to events.

"Today is born the opportunity ticket in the state of Maryland," Ehrlich said. "It's history standing before you today. Working together, Republicans, Democrats, independents, black,
white - it doesn't matter. The old lines are gone. This is a new era. It's a new generation."

Known for his pointed jabs, Steele wasted little time before training attacks on the Democratic ticket of Townsend and retired Adm. Charles R. Larson, the former Naval Academy
superintendent tapped by the lieutenant governor as a running mate last week.

Sweating under a blazing Annapolis sun at a morning news conference, Steele stripped off his suit jacket and announced: "This race just got a little bit hotter."

"I know that Bob Ehrlich will run a state government that will not pay out taxpayer dollars to settle lawsuits to bail out elected officials from their oversight responsibilities, unlike our
opponents, who already have," Steele said.

In March, the state agreed to $4 million in direct payments, education costs and attorney fees to settle a lawsuit brought by young inmates who said they were beaten while in the state
juvenile justice system. Townsend has been the administration's point person on juvenile justice and has been criticized for her handling of the department.

"Today, I declare a new HotSpot in Maryland," said Steele, a reference to a criminal justice program championed by Townsend. "This HotSpot is the record of our opponents. It is a
record of eight years of silence, eight years of complicity in which legacy-building with bricks and mortar took precedence over the human needs of Marylanders, eight years of being
AWOL - absent without leadership."

Townsend's campaign declined to comment on Steele's appointment.

"Our thoughts are with our selection," said campaign spokesman Michael Morrill. "The lieutenant governor picked somebody with real leadership experience, a real record and a real
vision for where Maryland should go. There is a clear, definite difference between the two campaigns on those issues."

Steele's selection brings the issue of race into sharp relief in the campaign for governor.

Townsend enjoys strong support among African-Americans in Maryland, and without significant primary opposition, she chose a white male running mate who changed his party
registration from Republican to Democrat three weeks ago.

Politicians who had urged Townsend to select a black running mate are still reconciling her choice as they evaluate whether Ehrlich can gain a foothold in the black community.

"Michael [Steele] is a well-respected individual," said Del. Obie Patterson, a Prince George's County Democrat and head of the black legislative caucus. The pick, he said, "raises the
conscience and the awareness of the lack of the Democratic Party to field a diverse ticket."

Sen. Clarence M. Mitchell IV, a Baltimore Democrat who endorsed Ehrlich in May and stood at his side at yesterday's announcement, said, "The selection today does what Kathleen
Kennedy Townsend wouldn't do. Democrats only talk."

Ehrlich said he was fulfilling a pledge to run an expansive campaign. Democrats outnumber Republicans nearly 2-1 in Maryland, so the congressman needs heavy crossover support to
prevail. "I promised you a campaign willing to go places Republicans ... have never gone in the past," he said yesterday.

But some political observers questioned whether the strategy would be successful.

"We are certainly going to be working hard to dispel any myth that because Mr. Steele is an African-American, our community is going to benefit," said Del. Howard P. Rawlings, a
Baltimore Democrat and chairman of the House Appropriations Committee.

"He's a very likable guy," Rawlings said. "But once you peel the skin away, you see that he has no portfolio, his main purpose is to dilute the black voting strength of the lieutenant
governor, and his overall values correspond with that of Bob Ehrlich, which is very right-wing conservative."

Donald F. Norris, a policy sciences professor at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, said Ehrlich's gamble could fall flat. "African-Americans don't vote only for black
candidates," he said. "They vote because of partisan preferences and the issues. Michael Steele doesn't stand for what most African-Americans stand for."

In answering media questions yesterday, Steele also offered opinions different from Ehrlich's on some sensitive issues.

A former seminarian and a product of Catholic schools, Steele said he is staunchly opposed to abortion, as well as to the death penalty. He supports Gov. Parris N. Glendening's
moratorium on executions.

Ehrlich says he supports abortion rights in many cases and favors the death penalty.

Steele balked when asked about gay rights, saying he has trouble with the concept if not precisely defined. "There's a lot of rights that already protect white gay men," he said.

As reporters continued to press him, Steele grew agitated. "He doesn't want someone who's going to be a 'yes' man," he said. "So we differ? So what? I don't get it."

Race aside, GOP leaders said Steele will be an acceptable choice to all wings of the Republican Party.

"Michael has been out there talking to Republicans at dinners and events, building a lot of goodwill," said Ellen R. Sauerbrey, the gubernatorial nominee in 1994 and 1998. "He has very
strong support across the state."

Former U.S. Rep. Helen Delich Bentley, who is running to reclaim the 2nd District congressional seat that Ehrlich is leaving, said she hoped Steele's selection might end a divisive issue in
Maryland politics.

"I think Michael Steele brings a lot of credibility and should also break through this barrier that Republicans are anti-minority, anti-black," Bentley said. "Hopefully, this will go once and
for all."

Ehrlich called his running mate an embodiment of the American dream.

Steele's family roots extend to South Carolina, where his mother was born into a sharecropper's family. She moved to Washington in the early 1940s and took a laundry job that she held
for 45 years.

The laundry also offered Steele his first employment, cleaning toilets when he was 14. The family pooled their savings to pay for Catholic schools, and Steele graduated from the Johns
Hopkins University in 1981 with a degree in international relations.

"When it came to education, they sacrificed," he said of his family.

There is a hint of irony in Steele running to defeat Townsend. "My natural father used to work for Jack Kennedy, he was a gardener," he said. His stepfather, a Department of Defense
truck driver, and stepuncle would drive limousines to make extra money in their spare time; they were often hired by Robert Kennedy.

"I find it to be quite amusing," he said. "It is a small world."

Steele's sister, Monica, is married to the boxer Mike Tyson. The couple is seeking a divorce.

Steele worked as a paralegal while attending Georgetown University Law School at night. After receiving his degree in 1991, he was hired as an associate at Cleary, Gottlieb, Steen &
Hamilton, a Washington law firm.

"We have only good things to say about him," said Donald L. Morgan, a managing partner with the firm. "He's a very well-spoken, attractive man. I would think he would be a good
campaigner."

Steele left the law firm in 1997 and worked briefly as counsel for the Mills Corp., a shopping mall developer, before launching his own consulting business in 1999.

At the same time, his political aspirations were mounting. In 1998, Steele was chairman of the Prince George's County Republican Party when Sauerbrey considered making him her
gubernatorial running mate. She passed him over, and he ran for state comptroller, losing in a primary.

He then made a bid to become state party chairman, and Ehrlich was brought in to moderate a dispute between Steele and then-party head Richard D. Bennett. With an assist from the
congressman, Steele got the position in December 2000.

It was the start, Ehrlich said, of a strong partnership.

Copyright © 2002, The Baltimore Sun