THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, September 11, 1995 TAG: 9509110070
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A2 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: THE NEW YORK TIMES
DATELINE: WASHINGTON LENGTH: Medium: 78 lines
Although Pat Robertson and his conservative political organization, the Christian Coalition, have said they will not endorse any of the Republican presidential candidates, Robertson has made it clear that he considers Sen. Bob Dole quite acceptable to religious conservatives.
Without prompting, Robertson defended Dole's conservative bona fides, rejecting what he said was recent criticism that Dole was merely pandering to religious conservatives.
``I don't think Bob Dole is being some kind of a chameleon,'' Robertson said in the interview Friday at the Christian Coalition's annual convention, which ended Saturday. He said that Dole, of Kansas, was ``a lifelong conservative'' and that if he was ``somewhat of a compromiser'' as Senate majority leader, that was the nature of the job.
Robertson also praised Dole's main challenger, Sen. Phil Gramm of Texas, and spoke in friendly or neutral terms about all the Republican presidential contenders.
He added that he did not expect any new Republican candidates to emerge for the nomination.
As president of the 1.7 million-member Christian Coalition and host of the Family Channel's 700 Club daily television program, Robertson's words carry weight among many politically active religious conservatives.
He will not endorse any of the Republican candidates at this point, he said, ``because it would be perceived that I was, in a sense, speaking for the Christian Coalition.''
His evaluation of Dole's ideological position comes at a time when Gramm has mounted a strong challenge to Dole for the allegiance of religious conservatives, some of whom continue to question the sincerity of Dole's commitment to their cause.
Gramm said Friday in a ballroom of cheering delegates at the Washington Hilton and Towers Hotel that he had signed a pledge backing tough anti-abortion language in the Republican Party platform. Dole, he said pointedly, had not done so.
In the interview, Robertson said that he and the Texas senator had exchanged numerous visits and that Gramm was ``a lifetime, hard-core conservative, as are most of the other candidates.''
But Robertson played down the significance of an event that has given Gramm's campaign a significant public relations boost of late: Gramm's first-place tie with Dole in the Iowa Republican Party's straw poll in Ames, Iowa, last month.
Robertson noted that he, too, finished first in the Ames poll in his unsuccessful run for the presidency in 1988. He was ultimately overwhelmed by Vice President George Bush in the Republican primaries. But his victory in the Ames poll was considered a stunning political coup at the time, which briefly gave his campaign a big lift.
``Phil Gramm obviously was given a shot in the arm in Ames,'' Robertson said. ``I won Ames. I beat Bush and Dole in Ames, so it isn't as significant as everyone thinks it is, except in Iowa.''
In talking of the other candidates, Robertson said that he was ``buddies'' with the conservative commentator Patrick Buchanan, that Sen. Richard Lugar of Indiana was ``a good friend'' and that the conservative radio host Alan Keyes had been a supporter of his in the past.
He even gave a neutral nod to Pennsylvania Sen. Arlen Specter, an abortion-rights supporter and a critic of the Christian Coalition. ``Arlen Specter was a year behind me in law school,'' he said.
He also mentioned a cordial relationship with Lamar Alexander, a former governor of Tennessee and education secretary under President Bush.
``There aren't any strangers out there, except for Pete Wilson,'' Robertson said of the California governor. ``I don't know Pete very well.''
Just before the Christian Coalition opened its convention, the organization said a telephone poll of 1,000 of its members showed their support was largely divided among Dole, Gramm and Buchanan, with 25 percent undecided.
Although the coalition's executive director, Ralph Reed, had declined to be specific about the survey's results, Robertson said they showed Dole slightly ahead. by CNB