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May 1, 1999

SECTION: POLITICS; Pg. 1164; Vol. 31, No. 18

LENGTH: 3069 words

HEADLINE: Born Yet Again

BYLINE: Mark Francis Cohen

HIGHLIGHT:

Even though many of his candidates lost last year, Ralph Reed, a
master of his own image, emerged a winner. Now the ex-shepherd-
in-chief of the Christian Coalition is the GOP's hottest campaign
adviser.

BODY:

ATLANTA--One pleasant afternoon last August, a few weeks
after surviving a bruising primary and a brutal runoff,
Republican Fob James Jr., Alabama's quixotic chief executive, sat
at a lace-covered table in the Governor's Mansion in Montgomery.
Seated with him were Fred Davis, his Hollywood-based media
adviser, and--under an oil painting of ''Miss Bobbie,'' the
Governor's wife--his political consultant, Ralph Reed.

Reed, who choreographed the rise of the Christian
Coalition and who left the organization-cum-movement in 1997
hoping to become the Republicans' next Lee Atwater, sat facing a
stained-glass window, through which he could see a sparkling
swimming pool shaped like the state of Alabama. Soon enough,
Glen, the mansion's majordomo, served the trio a lunch of
sweetened iced tea and small tuna sandwiches.

Of the more than 20 campaigns Reed was now orchestrating,
this undertaking was the most prominent. But the effort to re-
elect James--a high-profile, anti-lottery, pro-Ten Commandments
Governor--was adrift. Since the run-off, James had adopted a
remarkably laid-back approach to the business of keeping his job.
Most important, he had declined to involve himself with the
business of raising money, and his campaign was consequently
close to penniless. Meanwhile, the Democratic opponent, Lt. Gov.
Don Siegelman, had been savaging James on the streets and airways
for weeks.

Reed had driven from his new headquarters here to
Montgomery several times to implore the Governor to start raising
money. James' reply was always the same: I'll start tomorrow. On
this day in the breakfast room, Reed again begged. ''Governor,
you must make those fund-raising calls.''

''Reverend''--the Governor drawled, calling Reed by one
of his nicknames--''I'll start tomorrow.'' Suddenly, Reed, who is
known as much for his eternal there's-a-silver-lining optimism as
he is for his ever-cool demeanor, blurted: ''Governor, if you
don't make those calls today, you're going to be serving yourself
those tuna fish sandwiches!'' There was a shocked silence, and
then James, and everyone else, chuckled. Two and a half months
later, James was defeated.

The Governor was one of many Reed clients who lost in
1998. But Reed himself did not have a bad year. He walked away
from his string of defeats--in Georgia, Indiana, and Kentucky,
among other places--with his reputation for political acumen
largely intact. The reason he was able to do this tells you
something about the skills of Ralph Reed. He is an expert at
managing image, and he doesn't neglect to manage his own image.
In the months before Election Day, Reed was careful to utter
frequent--and public--warnings that GOP candidates would fare
poorly if his party continued its fixation with President
Clinton's indiscretions. When GOP candidates, including Reed's,
did indeed fare poorly, Reed didn't look like a losing
consultant, but a prescient one.

These days, Ralph E. Reed Jr., 37, is the Republicans'
hottest political consultant. He is advising, in one way or
another, almost all of his party's likely presidential
candidates. In addition, his company, Century Strategies, has
several corporate big fish as clients, among them Microsoft Corp.
This is no function of happenstance; Reed has many talents. He
understands the GOP primary voter better than most. He is
wonderfully telegenic (CNN's Crossfire, where, of late, he's been
filling in as a guest co-host, is trying to entice him to occupy
Pat Buchanan's seat permanently). He has a handsome, unlined face
that conveys confidence and a sharp-eyed realism, yet is somehow
slightly beatific. He can mount a compelling argument laden with
historical and cultural references (as perhaps befits a fellow
who has a doctorate in American history) as easily as he can get
off a snappy soundbite.

''I think he's one of the best in the business,'' gushes
Frank Luntz, the Republican pollster who has worked with Reed and
advises several members of Congress. ''There's no one in the
party that understands grass-roots organizing like Ralph Reed. No
one.'' In fact, Luntz admits, ''I've stayed up late and gotten up
early to watch him on television--just to see the language he
would use. I'd pick up phrases from his language to use later.
His language does resonate.''
But What About Resolve?

Nevertheless, a lot of people watching Reed wonder if he
has the resolve and ruthlessness to succeed in the sometimes-
nasty business of kingmaking. Much of this speculation stems from
the fact that life as a behind-the-scenes operator seems a
peculiar choice for a man who has achieved national celebrity
status among Christian conservatives. (''You can't go with him to
a Dairy Queen without people recognizing him,'' an associate
marvels.) Reed, who taught conservatives to package Christian
values as ''pro-family'' would seem hopelessly out of place in,
as Ross Perot famously put it, the ''dirty tricks'' set.

In a mid-April interview, Reed said, essentially, that he
is in the game to gain clout for the Christian Right in the
backroom realm where the real decisions are made. ''I'm not
trying to impose some exacting standards--that's not why I set
this company up,'' he says. ''I found that grass-roots
organizations were (sought out) for their votes, but once the
door was closed on the smoke-filled room to work out strategy,
they weren't let in. I didn't understand why someone from the
pro-family movement couldn't advise a Senator. It would be a sign
of our maturation, a sign of our arrival.''

Yet, there is something more subtle and more earnest
about Reed's career move. During his tenure at the Christian
Coalition, Reed was vexed by the public's mixed reactions to
evangelicals. He has said that because of unfounded fears and
misinformation (fueled, he believes, mainly by a mass media that
is Christianity-phobic), evangelicals are discouraged from
getting involved in politics. To Reed, faith-loving people are
shamelessly ridiculed, marginalized, stigmatized, and directed--
as a chapter title in one of his books says--''To the Back of the
Bus.'' Christians in politics, Reed argues, are the victims of
anti-religious bias and an ''element of McCarthyism.'' Reed says
he wants to get ''100 pro-life, pro-family candidates elected to
Congress in the next decade.'' But he is not only itching to see
Christian conservatives active in the process, he wants them
accepted by the culture.

No wonder Reed bristled on a recent edition of Crossfire
when Lanny J. Davis, one of many former Clinton lawyers, pegged
Reed somewhere ''on the far right.'' Interrupting Davis, Reed
snapped: ''I am a mainstream conservative.''

Reed has critics within his own party, many of whom
clearly covet the name (and face) recognition he enjoys. In
recent interviews with some of them, I was treated to a list of
aspersions directed at Reed, their one-time ally. Reed's critics
call him ''Ralph Greed.'' They say he takes credit for things he
didn't do.

A recurrent criticism is that Reed's consulting business
sells what amounts to political protection. By hiring Reed and
his firm, Republican candidates can, in effect, buy off the
Christian Right at a bargain price. A tactician associated with
Sen. Paul Coverdell of Georgia, who was re-elected in November,
says Reed was put on the payroll to keep the pro-lifers at bay.
The campaign, he says, was worried that Coverdell might run into
trouble with conservatives if the Senator was closely questioned
about his views on abortion. (Despite what some might assume,
Coverdell does not favor a constitutional ban on the procedure.)
''The only reason Ralph was hired by the Coverdell campaign was
because we thought there could be a backlash,'' says the insider.
''We paid Ralph $ 1,500 a month as an insurance policy, in case we
had a problem with the Christian Coalition. He wasn't involved in
strategy meetings, because he was never supposed to be.''

Reed, for his part, recognizes that he has been used (and
misused) by candidates and their cronies in various ways. He has
made mistakes, he says, that he won't repeat. ''That's something
I learned: I needed to have had pretty serious conversations with
candidates that they were not going to just use my name and my
contacts,'' Reed says. ''I had a naive view of this.''

Conversely, Democrats in some places attacked their
opponents by attacking Reed, portraying him as a religious
bogeyman. In Kentucky, Reed's campaign for former state Sen. Gex
''Jay'' Williams was ridiculed as profoundly deficient,
especially after Williams' campaign ads painted Ken Lucas, a
conservative Democrat, as a liberal. On election night, Democrats
cheered that Reed had lost a House seat controlled by the GOP for
the past 32 years. John Lapp, Lucas' campaign manager, exulted:
''We took on Ralph Reed, and we won.''

In most races, though, Reed is extolled for having
delivered the goods that can win primaries. Reed had several
conservative headliners--such as Jerry Falwell, Pat Robertson,
and Steve Forbes--beat the drum for his clients. Plus, his
counsel on campaign themes, debate preparation, television
scripts, and speechifying was very often deemed valuable in the
primaries--when Republican candidates typically have to tack
right to appeal to the party's conservative base. Mitch
Skandalakis, a former county commissioner who ran for lieutenant
governor of Georgia last year and attended the University of
Georgia with Reed, praises the consultant for his attention to
detail. ''One debate, I wore a dark pin-striped suit,'' recalls
Skandalakis. ''He said, 'You looked like someone from the Mafia.
Don't wear that suit again!' ''

Still, Skandalakis and other clients regret that Reed
wasn't always available because he was managing so many other
campaigns. Some say that his advice in the general election was
off-note because he didn't understand how to appeal to moderate
voters. Many share the view, however, that last year's election
was a true education for Reed. Watch him grow, they say.

Creator of the Christian Coalition
It would be wrong to suggest Reed isn't a formidable strategist.
It is doubtful that the Christian Coalition would have achieved
as much success as it has if Robertson had asked someone else to
captain the organization 10 years ago. The TV evangelist met Reed
in 1989, when the two men were seated next to each other at an
inaugural party for George Bush. Robertson, who ran for President
and lost to Bush, had established campaign offices throughout the
country. Reed, a 28-year-old born-again Christian, was finishing
work on his doctorate at Emory University. Impressed, Robertson
eventually hired Reed to direct the potentially powerful, but
unfocused, campaign apparatus he had founded. Reed made the most
of the assignment.

Reed eventually would be credited by his enemies and
allies alike with creating one of the most powerful political
organizations in the country. By the time of his departure, the
coalition had 1.9 million members, 1,500 chapters, and a $ 20
million budget. More important, though, Reed brought organization
to the movement, and in organization was immense strength: the
ability to swamp the Capitol's switchboard or dominate a caucus
gathering. Reed began by hiring regional field organizers to
create state and local chapters. His first attention-getting
victory came in 1990, when the coalition stopped the city council
of Tustin, Calif., from banning prayer at its meetings.

Then, the coalition turned its sights on the National
Endowment for the Arts. Creating a nationwide campaign against
the agency for allegedly purveying ''taxpayer-funded
pornography'' brought Reed and the organization plenty of
publicity and contributions, enough to continue its expansion. In
large measure because of the coalition's effort, the agency's
budget was slashed, and it has never fully recovered. Next came
Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas' confirmation hearings in
1991. Reed, who had friends close to Thomas, produced radio ads
and directed a battery of phone calls to help get the embattled
judge confirmed. From that point on, the Christian Coalition had
the nation's attention.

By 1994, the organization was humming. That year, it
produced 50 million voter guides and it churned out the vote in
record numbers. When the Republicans took Capitol Hill, Reed was
firmly established as a power broker. What became known as the
Contract With America was, by and large, a compact with Reed's
constituency.

At the same time, Reed focused on energizing his local
affiliates. He targeted barely noticed school board elections--
putting up slates of candidates and efficiently getting out
voters. In New York City, the work of Reed's troops in electing
candidates to school boards generated widespread concern. Many of
the fretting stemmed from earlier election shockers: Religious
activists had recently helped oust the city's chancellor of the
public schools, Joseph Fernandez, because he advocated the
Rainbow Curriculum, which included sex education and tolerance of
gay and lesbian parenting. As a result, a headline in the New
York Daily News called the school board campaigns the ''Christian
Right's Battle Plan to Seize Control of the City.'' Nevertheless,
many of Reed's school board candidates won.

Reed also took unconventional steps to broaden the
movement's base. For one thing, he hired Marshall Wittman, a Jew,
as the Christian Coalition's first lobbying director. (When the
Anti-Defamation League published a book condemning the coalition,
Wittman advised Reed to address the organization; today, the head
of the ADL considers Reed a friend and calls him ''brilliant.'')
Moreover, Reed forged relationships with Catholics and joined
forces with them whenever possible. In October 1995, Reed
launched the Catholic Alliance, initially (but no longer) an arm
of the Christian Coalition that would appeal to Catholics. Of
course, it was no coincidence that the new division was
established during the same month that Pope John Paul II made his
highly publicized tour of the United States.

In 1996, every Republican presidential aspirant cozied up
to Reed, and with good reason. In the South Carolina primary, the
evangelical turnout for Bob Dole, who by that time was widely
believed to have Reed's support, was significant enough to
eliminate Pat Buchanan. Similarly, Steve Forbes' effort was
trampled by Reed's flock--which could explain, in part, Forbes'
subsequent religious epiphany. In preparation for his run in
2000, Forbes launched an issues-advocacy group with heady
evangelical ambitions and provided Reed with the group's
consulting contract.

During all this, Reed had become a regular on television.
His face graced many a national magazine cover. He was even
profiled in People magazine. Reed's 1992 appearance on NBC's Meet
the Press, following Clinton's election, was considered so
virtuoso that sympathizers acquired the transcript, passed it
around to friends, and made a study of it. ''It became a special
moment for the Christian Coalition,'' says Wittman. ''He went
into the lion's den and performed masterfully.'' Reed's
performances were focused but never didactic or mean-spirited.
Rather than sermonize, he blended moral messages with economic
ones. He played against stereotype, pledging support to black
congregations when their churches were burning and preaching
tolerance of homosexuals.

When Reed stepped down from the Christian Coalition in
1997, candidates from all over tried to snag him. At his goodbye
gala, he was saluted by most of the leaders of the Republican
Party in a manner that resembled a fete for an outgoing head of
state. Donald P. Hodel, a former Reagan Interior Secretary and
then the coalition's new president, declared: ''The first battle
for 2000 will be (over which) candidate gets Ralph Reed's
services.''

It is clear to anyone studying Reed these days that he's
something of a free agent now that he's no longer tethered to the
nonprofit Christian Coalition. Certainly he enjoys running his
own company. Still, some find this independence nettlesome.
Recently, Phyllis Schlafly of the Eagle Forum and other
conservative activists were dismayed to find Reed had been put on
the payroll of Channel One, a company that has long been a target
of the Religious Right. Channel One installs television sets in
school classrooms and broadcasts, every morning, a short news
program padded with commercials. When asked why he is working for
Channel One, Reed would not comment directly, saying he doesn't
discuss who his clients are, not even if a client, as in Channel
One's case, confirms he's been hired. He did say that, generally,
he doesn't view ''television as only bad'' and that it's
important for children to have ''access to news from an unbiased
source'' that reinforces ''values taught by parents, pastors, and
rabbis.''

''I'm really surprised that he's taking them on as
clients,'' grouses Schlafly. ''I thought we were trying to wean
kids away from television.''

No matter. Reed is in one of the most enviable positions
imaginable for a political consultant going into next year's
presidential campaign. He's a celebrity, he's quick on his feet,
and most pols recognize that his word still counts with the
Religious Right. It's a certainty that when the GOP National
Convention is assembled in Philadelphia in 2000, Reed will be--as
he so wants to be--deep inside that smoke-filled room, advising
the Republicans' next presidential nominee.

Mark Francis Cohen, a New York City-based writer, is a
frequent contributor to National Journal.