Supporters Get Incentive Plans with Bush

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Registered: 08-05-2004
Supporters Get Incentive Plans with Bush
Wed, 09-29-2004 - 1:49pm
Here's the original link: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/09/28/politics/campaign/28crowd.html

Want to see the president when he comes to your town? Get in line - to make phone calls for his campaign.

President Bush's campaign aides say they have hit on a novel way to recruit volunteers for his get-out-the-vote army. Anyone wanting to attend one of Mr. Bush's campaign rallies, anywhere in the country, has to get a ticket first. And anyone wanting a ticket, or a coveted spot up front, can improve his chances by putting in a few hours at a phone bank, canvassing Republican homes or putting up lawn signs.

Campaign rallies may be as old as politics itself, but in this year of earliests, firsts and most-expensive-evers, the Bush campaign has taken this most basic form of communication to a new state of the art, by pressing audiences to work as foot soldiers, before, during and immediately after Bush events.

The tactic points up a stark difference between the presidential campaigns: while Senator John Kerry is using his rallies and forums to try to reach undecided voters and to close the deal with standoffish Democrats, Mr. Bush is packing his audiences with supporters who must identify themselves as such in questionnaires and whipping them into brigades ready to blitz crucial districts to get every last voter to the polls.

Kerry aides scoff at the invitation-only audiences and what they say is the shanghai-ing of volunteers. "We don't require oaths of allegiance, and we don't take people captive," said Tom Shea, director of the Kerry campaign in Florida, after turning out close to 10,000 people for a rally in Orlando last Tuesday where, he said, 700 people signed up to help.

But Donald P. Green, a professor of political science at Yale and the author of "Get Out the Vote! How to Increase Voter Turnout," said Mr. Bush's strategy was inspired. "There's a basic principle in experimental psychology, that the hand teaches the heart," Professor Green said. "You've now made phone calls for George Bush; that helps solidify your commitment to the campaign. If you weren't enthusiastic and committed already, you might be now."

At a rally in Bangor, Me., last Thursday, Katrina Waite had driven nearly two hours and then waited seven more under a sweltering sun to see the president. The reward for her early arrival? A spot way in back, atop a flatbed truck, where she downed cups of water fetched by her two children to stave off the heat.

Ms. Waite said her mother had earned a spot up front. "She did three hours of phone calling to get it," she said, peering to try to pick her mother out in the crowd.

If Mr. Bush likes to call his retail politicking "fertilizing the grass roots," the volunteer recruitment can create a kind of hothouse effect.

When Laura Bush came to Maine a few weeks ago, for example, scores of people were persuaded to stick around and make calls from a phone bank in the basement of the building where she spoke.

And when Mr. Bush concluded an hourlong "Ask President Bush" event in Hudson, Wis., not long ago, the 1,500 people who attended were directed toward a giant tent set up with tables, chairs and telephones, and encouraged to make calls for a few hours.

"In this campaign, we've taken advantage of every opportunity to engage people," said Randy Bumps, the campaign's Maine director.

The campaign began engaging potential recruits as soon as the Bangor rally was scheduled, a week earlier. Those who wanted tickets were required to apply for them, filling out forms stating their home and e-mail addresses, phone numbers, Social Security numbers, willingness to volunteer and whether they supported the president.

And in the days before the rally, supporters were enticed to make calls for the campaign with promises of a spot closer to the president, according to many in the crowd.

Mr. Bumps said the "excitement" generated by the president's visit meant that the campaign for the first time met its weekly goal of 20,000 phone calls to Mainers.

Asked whether opponents of Mr. Bush's were welcome, Reed Dickens, a national campaign spokesman, said the policy was to reward Mr. Bush's most eager supporters first when allocating the "limited number" of tickets.