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"Slim" chance Tancredo will remain in presidential race

By M.E. Sprengelmeyer, Rocky Mountain News (Contact)

Published December 19, 2007 at 6 p.m.
Updated December 19, 2007 at 9:25 p.m.

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DES MOINES, Iowa – Rep. Tom Tancredo plans to meet with some presidential rivals in Iowa on Thursday, and then there’s only a “slim” chance he’ll remain in the Republican contest, his wife said Wednesday night.

“What he’s trying to do is get a commitment that someone will continue his (illegal immigration) issue and do it in a way (that) he can support them,” Jackie Tancredo said in a telephone interview.

If he’s satisfied, then Tancredo plans to end his long-shot bid for the presidency on Thursday, which is his 62nd birthday.

Getting someone to adopt the issue, “that’s what he wanted. That was his goal,” Tancredo’s wife said. “There was never any illusion he was going to be president.”

She said media outlets “jumped the gun” by reporting Wednesday afternoon that her husband definitely had decided to quit the race.

Earlier in the day, Tancredo told FoxNews, “I will neither confirm nor deny that report.” But he also added, “I wouldn’t have a press conference if I didn’t have anything to say.”

Jackie Tancredo said the situation has “changed hourly,” and on Wednesday night there still was a “slim” chance that her husband would continue his uphill battle, which now finds him near the bottom of the polls in Iowa and nationally.

“I’d be surprised,” she said. “But I’ve been surprised so many times in this.”

The Colorado congressman has been stuck in the bottom tier of the Republican presidential polls, even as rival campaigns have tried to match some of his hard-line rhetoric opposing illegal immigration.

He first began flirting with a White House bid in 2005, saying that, while he did not expect to be elected president, he hoped to force other candidates to adopt his positions. He has pinned his hopes on two early, springboard states: Iowa, where the caucuses will be held on Jan. 3, 2008, and New Hampshire, which holds the first primary five days later.

Still, his poll numbers have been mired in single-digits, and in recent days, two close allies in the immigration reform movement have endorsed other candidates.

First, Jim Gilchrist, founder of The Minuteman Project, announced he was backing former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee. Then Tancredo's friend and close congressional ally, Rep. Steve King of Iowa, endorsed former Sen. Fred Thompson of Tennessee.

Some of Tancredo's more faithful campaign volunteers got calls Wednesday inviting them to have a brief meeting with the congressman shortly before his scheduled news conference.

"They just said he had some things to talk over," said Ron Duncan, a retired truck driver from Missouri Valley, Iowa.

Duncan said he also got a call from former Mass. Gov. Mitt Romney's campaign asking him to help put rumors to rest about Tancredo's pending withdrawal from the contest. Rep. Ron Paul's campaign called another longtime Tancredo supporter, Craig Halverson, director of the Minuteman Civil Defense Corps and the group Citizens for Tom Tancredo, to recruit him into their campaign.

"I'm shocked," Halverson said. "All the work and all the time we put in. We're shocked. We thought he was going to go all the way."

Halverson said he would wait for the official word, "then I'm going to jump on the bandwagon of Ron Paul."

Some media outlets were speculating about which candidate Tancredo might endorse if he dropped out. In the latest Des Moines Register poll, he had support of 6 percent of likely Republican caucus participants, and in theory his block could give someone else a significant boost.

Tancredo has long been a magnet for controversy over his harsh rhetoric on immigration or his statements that the United States should threaten to bomb Muslim holy sites as a way to deter radical Islamic terrorists.

He has pushed the envelope even further with television advertisements during the presidential campaign.

One used gruesome photographs and the sound of an exploding bomb to warn about terrorists sneaking across unguarded borders. Another ad showed bloody bodies lined up after gangland assassinations, blaming illegal immigration for violence by Latin American street gangs.

Critics ripped the ads as desperate fear-mongering, and called Tancredo a xenophobe or racist — charges he has long denied.

Earlier this month, when Tancredo boycotted the Republicans' Spanish-language debate, his campaign released an online video that used numerous Mexican stereotypes to spoof his rivals. Among the scenes, rival candidates were shown wearing sombreros, riding trucks with dark-skinned farm workers or cheering at a "presidential cock fight."

Comments

  • December 19, 2007

    6:41 p.m.

    Suggest removal

    lnardozi writes:

    Expect to see a lot more of this after New Hampshire when Dr. Paul wins the primary.

  • December 19, 2007

    7:19 p.m.

    Suggest removal

    truth_teller writes:

    His two supporters will be very upset.

  • December 19, 2007

    8:29 p.m.

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    jgd writes:

    Tom Tancredo brought to the forefront the problems with illegal immigration, and I thank him for that.

    Good Luck Tom with your future plans