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| BATTLEGROUND PENNSYLVANIA | |
 October 9, 2000  |
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Gwen Ifill reports on George W. Bush and Al Gore's battle to win voters in the key election battleground state of Pennsylvania.
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ANNOUNCER: U.S. Senator Rick Santorum. GWEN IFILL: All competing for the attention of the Pennsylvania voter -- voters who have proved hazardous to Republicans and Democrats for decades, and who, this year, may hold the key to the presidential election -- voters like Vera Fioravanti, a Pittsburgh Democrat. She likes what Al Gore has to say about expanding prescription drug coverage, but prefers George W. Bush's stand against abortion. |
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| Decision-making time | ||||||||||||||||||||
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GWEN IFILL: Across the state, at an orchard in a Philadelphia suburb, Kate Gilhool, a mother of two, can't decide either -- but for a different reason. She favors abortion rights, and leans toward the Democrats. Her husband, Jim, is backing Bush.
GWEN IFILL: These are the voters Al Gore and George W. Bush have to win: Voters divided on abortion and Social Security, and the role of government in their lives. ANNOUNCER: They got to hear in you Philly, Scranton and Allentown and Erie, Pennsylvania. What time is it? CROWD: Gore time! MUSIC PLAYING: Here's to the babies in the brand-new world -- GWEN IFILL: During the final month of an intensely competitive presidential campaign, both men are engaged in a heated, high-energy battle for the hearts and minds of a notoriously fickle state.
SPOKESMAN: The next President and First Lady of the United States, Governor George W. Bush and Laura Bush.
JOSEPH DiSARRO: The candidates haven't really talked about health care with respect to the details. GWEN IFILL: Joseph DiSarro, dean of the political science department at Washington- Jefferson College near Pittsburgh, says it's a tough balancing act -- tougher, he says, for Governor Bush.
GWEN IFILL: To outsiders, Pennsylvania is a political puzzle. Democrats outnumber Republicans, but it has a Republican Governor and two Republican Senators. Yet nothing fits into a comfortable partisan box. Here in western Pennsylvania many Democrats are more conservative than the moderate Republicans in suburban Philadelphia. In order to win this critical state, a candidate has to appeal to both. Democrat Trudy Cruice, a mother of six who attended a Bush rally last week, says she can't decide what to believe.
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| Pittsburgh: Views from the hills | ||||||||||||||||||||
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GWEN IFILL: In western Pennsylvania's Beaver Valley, Friday night football rules. The names in the local hall of fame include Mike Ditka and Joe Namath. The large elderly population also remembers when the steel mills closed two decades ago, and job security vanished. So now they worry about Social Security and Medicare and health coverage. Louis Pupi is a retired pharmacist.
GWEN IFILL: Kristi and Jeff Koenig have listened to the same set of facts from the candidates. She remains undecided.
GWEN IFILL: He is supporting Bush.
GWEN IFILL: As the race has turned into a dead heat, both Bush and Gore have turned to local politicians for advice. GOVERNOR TOM RIDGE: Now who do you think trusts Pennsylvanians to make decisions about their money? Governor George Bush. GWEN IFILL: Bush considered Governor Tom Ridge, a popular Republican who himself was elected by a narrow margin, for his running mate. Now Ridge is more valuable to him than ever.
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| The PA Senate battle | ||||||||||||||||||||
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GWEN IFILL: Republican Rick Santorum is defending his U.S. Senate seat this year. He too faces a vigorous Democratic challenge.
GWEN IFILL: Dan Onorato, a Democrat, is Allegheny Country comptroller. One of the issues that helps Gore, he says, is fiscal responsibility.
GWEN IFILL: Democrat Tom Murphy, the mayor of Pittsburgh, agrees. He says Gore can win votes by emphasizing western Pennsylvania's new prosperity.
GWEN IFILL: Both candidates are flooding the airwaves, the Planned Parenthood Federation supporting Gore with the testimonials of Republican women. WOMAN IN AD: Bush says he wants to take away a woman's right to choose. WOMAN IN AD: And Bush is willing to support Supreme Court Justices who oppose a woman's right to choose. That's a risk I don't want to take. GWEN IFILL: And the Bush campaign driving home a more basic theme: Asking in its ads, who do you trust? GOV. GEORGE W. BUSH: Because when we trust individuals, when we respect local control of schools, when we empower communities, together we can ignite America's spirit and renew our purpose. |
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| Wooing voters | ||||||||||||||||||||
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GOV. GEORGE W. BUSH: I understand this is a county full of loyal Republicans, discerning Democrats, and independents that need to be convinced. And I want to tell you all I'm not afraid to take my message to those discerning Democrats and open-minded independents. VICE PRESIDENT AL GORE: I want to ask you now for something that is difficult for you to give, and something that people hardly ever give anymore. I want to ask you to open your hearts and allow yourselves to genuinely believe, without reservation, that we can do the right thing in this country and be the better for it. I ask you to push past the fear of disillusionment and disappointment. GWEN IFILL: Joseph DiSarro of Washington-Jefferson College says Pennsylvania voters are still watching and waiting.
GWEN IFILL: And whoever ends up on the top of the Pennsylvania seesaw on election day, experts say, could very likely be the nation's next president. |
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GWEN
IFILL: Columbus holiday weekend in Pittsburgh: High school bands parade
through downtown. The Sons of Italy gather for their annual picnic.
And, one month before the November election, the politicians are out
in force. 
VERA
FIORAVANTI: I definitely am pro-life. And I just --I can't see it any
other way. I really can't. So -- I just don't know what to do. I don't
know what I'm going to do at the moment. But I have to make a decision.
KATE
GILHOOL: I don't like what either of them have been saying so far. At
least I haven't found anything that I've been able to latch onto that
I really strongly like or dislike. What I don't like is, and we disagree
on this, is I do think Bush would put somebody on the Supreme Court
Justice that would reverse "Roe v. Wade," so that's my biggest
concern right now.
VICE
PRESIDENT AL GORE: Do you remember how bad it was eight years ago? The
deficits were $300 billion a year; the unemployment rate was high. We
saw jobs being shipped overseas. We had all kinds of social problems
getting worse. And thanks to you, we had a chance to bring some changes.
Instead of the biggest deficits, we now have the biggest surpluses.
GOV.
GEORGE W. BUSH: It's time for somebody who will unite this nation, not
divide it. It's time for somebody to get rid of this class warfare,
of trying to pit rich against poor. Now that's what time it is. It's
time for a change. And when America shows up, and when you vote -- and
by the way -- I'm here in this important state, asking for the vote.
I want you to go the polls and support me. I don't care what your party
is. Get in that booth and vote for George W. Bush. 
JOSEPH
DiSARRO: If a Republican does not carry Pennsylvania, they will not
win the race in my opinion, unless they carry a heck of a lot of other
states. This is the battleground state, and it's clear. Both candidates
have visited this state over 15 times. They will continue to come here.
This is also a battle for the soul of the Democratic Party. 
TRUDY
CRUICE: I'm really confused. I have been watching the debates and reading
as much as I can, but I really want a man with integrity. And at this
point, I think they both are coming across as men with integrity, but
I have some issues with their issues. I'm very pro-life, but in my heart,
I think, I tend to be a more Democratic person. 
LOUIS
PUPI: The pharmaceutical companies, they have no mercy. The cost of
the medication that they put out is extremely expensive. I mean, if
you've seen the price of some of these prescriptions these people have
to take and some of them don't take them -- I've seen some of them walk
out and leave the prescription there because they don't have the money,
or they weren't going to pay the kind of money, so they're taking they're
health into their own hands, even though they may need the medication.
KRISTI
KOENIG: They spin things without talking about the issues. For example,
the prescription drug thing: why are drugs so expensive in this country?
That is the issue - not who has the better plan - because I think their
plans are wrapped up in a lot of this rhetoric and, you know, my way's
better than your way, without really looking at the true issues.
JEFF
KOENIG: I like his view on vouchers specifically. I also like the fact
that I think he would put monies into the schools, and give the schools
a choice of what to do with the money, instead of forcing the schools
to hire new teachers. 
GOVERNOR
TOM RIDGE: We keep telling our friends in the Bush/Cheney campaign,
come back to Pennsylvania, and then personalize that national message.
And they've begun doing that rather successfully, and I think we've
got the trend line moving in the right direction. We know their place
is in Pennsylvania, we have to maneuver to and get them to deliver the
message, but I think we're going to be okay. We never thought we could
win by a large margin, it's impossible to win by a large margin in a
presidential race, but we can still win this and the trend line's moving
in the right direction. We have enough time, I think, to deliver. 
SEN.
RICK SANTORUM: Hand-to-hand politics is very important in this state.
We're very diverse. And you can't go out and give a message to Pennsylvania
and expect to connect because, you know, Harrisburg is not what Philadelphia
is, and Pittsburgh is not anything like Philadelphia, and so if you
were to go out and just sort of run a campaign and just sort of run
a national campaign in Pennsylvania, you're going to lose. You've got
to go out and run a campaign that focuses on issues and concerns because
of the complexity of the state. 
DAN
ONORATO: The big debate right now is what to do with the surplus. You
have two options: One, on the Republican side, is give it all back to
the taxpayers; it's their money. Or, two, take care of the taxpayer's
debt, because the debt is also the taxpayer's debt, and write that down
so we don't have a problem with interest rates in the near future. I
believe that at the end of the day, writing down the debt is what the
taxpayers are going to vote for. 
MAYOR
TOM MURPHY: Clearly, the economy, and what has happened for the last
eight years, continues to be a remarkable selling point. In western
Pennsylvania, that suffered really devastation with the collapse of
the steel industry and had lagged behind significantly the success nationally
with the economy until just a couple years ago. And we are now enjoying
a really exciting, surging economy here. I think that continues to be
Gore's major, major strength here in western Pennsylvania.