USDA appointees say they'll keep campaigning for Democrats

Clinton administration Agriculture Department appointees who campaigned for Democratic presidential nominee Al Gore under the banner "Harvest 2000" celebrated victories Wednesday and agreed to work for rural Senate and House candidates in 2002--no matter who becomes President.

More than 100 members of the group met for lunch Wednesday to evaluate the election. Agriculture Secretary Dan Glickman told the group he still has faith that Gore will become president, but most of the group's attention was focused on assessing strategic victories and planning for the future.

Harvest 2000 sent teams of USDA political employees, congressional staffers and college students to campaign in Pennsylvania, Wisconsin, Michigan, Florida, Iowa, Ohio, and Missouri. Gore won all the targeted states except Missouri and Ohio and the disputed Florida.

Steve Crawford, a Democratic aide in the Pennsylvania state legislature, claimed the Harvest 2000 effort had delivered Pennsylvania for Gore by targeting the state's "T"--the northern, rural part of the state that usually votes Republican.

Crawford later told CongressDaily that Republicans needed a 70 percent vote in Lancaster County, Pa., but garnered only 61 percent.

Crawford said the essence of his message to rural voters concerned economic prosperity under the Clinton-Gore administration, senior citizen issues, USDA aid for rural Pennsylvania and "allaying fears laid out by [National Rifle Association President] Charlton Heston that Al Gore was going to take their guns."

Several other appointees said the gun issue had hurt Gore with rural hunters, especially in areas where the campaign did not address it.

Crawford said Democratic operatives did not hope to win many rural areas, only to reduce the GOP's share of the vote. The key to Democratic activities in rural areas in the future, Crawford said, is to examine "where we were we did better."

Joel Berg, a USDA appointee who made statistical calculations about where to campaign, said he regretted that the group did not send teams to Arkansas and Tennessee--two states Gore lost.