Austin American Statesman, TX
11-08-07
Pat Robertson backs Giuliani
Christian conservatives struggling to find a candidate they can all agree on.
By Scott Shepard
WASHINGTON BUREAU
WASHINGTON — Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani's bid to solidify his
conservative credentials in the Republican presidential contest got a boost
Wednesday when he picked up the endorsement of televangelist Pat Robertson,
one of the nation's most influential Christian leaders.
Also on Wednesday, Arizona Sen. John McCain, the onetime GOP presidential
front-runner, got the backing of Kansas Sen. Sam Brownback, a longtime ally of
religious conservatives who, until last month, was himself a candidate for the
Republican nomination.
Those and other recent endorsements — most notably, Moral Majority cofounder Paul Weyrich's backing of former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney on
Tuesday — reflect the difficulty religious conservatives are having this year
coalescing behind one Republican presidential candidate in the primaries, the
way they have done in every GOP campaign since 1980.
But Steffen Schmidt, a political science professor at Iowa State University,
said Robertson's endorsement of Giuliani could be an important boost for the
former New York mayor by making it "socially acceptable" for conservative
Christians to consider voting for him in spite of his liberal positions on abortion,
gay rights and gun control.
"Now, the Christian conservative voters are going to have a legitimate cover, or
protection, to say to their friends, 'Well, if Pat Robertson is endorsing him, there
must be something there that is really good,' " Schmidt said.
At a news conference in Washington, Robertson, the founder of the Christian
Coalition and himself a candidate for the GOP nomination in 1988, barely
mentioned his differences with Giuliani over social issues, which have been at
the heart of evangelicals becoming the most influential bloc within the Republican
Party since Ronald Reagan's campaign for president in 1980.
Robertson, host of the "700 Club," said he is backing Giuliani because "to me,
the overriding issue before the American people is the defense of our population
from the blood lust of Islamic terrorists," and Giuliani had proved himself "a
leader with a bold vision" even before the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Robertson said he is willing to overlook Giuliani's abortion rights stance because
he takes him at his word to appoint "strict constructionist" judges to the Supreme
Court and federal bench — a term used to describe judges who may be likely to
overturn the Roe vs. Wade ruling that established the right to an abortion.
McCain, appearing with Brownback in Dubuque, Iowa, expressed shock in
response to Robertson's endorsement.
"Every once in a while, I'm left speechless. This is one of those times," he said.