Terry McAuliffe

Outside, in line, BOILING. 11:22 a.m.

"Lanny, what now?" reporters ask Lanny Davis one by one. "We're going to take the White House" is his talking point today.

And here's a reporter who's been covering Hillary for the whole shebang. What's next for him? "Gonna take a week off."

Inside. There are 10 American flags in the room, six of them on the stage around the podium where she will speak. It's Mark Penn's strategy come at last to full flower, too late.

One-quarter of the floor space is unused, cordoned off.  read more »

So there at the Hillary Clinton event at Baruch College was Lanny Davis, Senator Clinton's old pal from Yale--speaking to reporters, he stressed, as just a private citizen. Barack Obama, he said, "is strong in places where she isn't strong." Also Mr. Davis had called Senator Clinton that morning to tell her he was starting a campaign on a web site, one that would launch at midnight, after the victory speech!

One the web site, womenforfairpolitics.com, women may send a form letter to Barack Obama, asking him to make Hillary Clinton his pick for vice president.  read more »

The official count may not be in, but Terry McAuliffe is ready to call it.

“Let me be crystal clear: Hillary Clinton is not going anywhere,” he told reporters just now at the Clinton watch party here in Columbus. “She’s going to Denver as the nominee.”

“We are going to win three states tonight,” he said.

On a conference call just now, Terry McAuliffe and other Clinton campaign officals announced that they had raised more than $35 million in February and that $30 million of that money came from online grass-roots money.

The campaign attributed some of the huge haul to a groundswell of contributions prompted by Clinton’s lending $5 million to her campaign.

“I wish Hillary had loaned $5 million back in January of '07,” he said.

“Huge night,” said Terry McAuliffe as he walked out of the ballroom, ticking off the states won by Hillary Clinton.

“How about Massachusetts?” he said.

When asked if that win represented a measure of revenge against the Kennedys who had endorsed Obama, McAuliffe said, “We don’t get into revenge. We’re not about that. But let’s put it this way -- it was a fun win.”

Chatter about a possible Clinton-Obama presidential ticket has slowed as attacks between the two campaigns have become more frequent.

But during a taping of NY1’s Inside City Hall, Clinton campaign manager Terry McAuliffe complimented Barack Obama and said, when host Domenic Carter asked if it would be a good idea to put Obama on a Clinton ticket, “Sure it would be, absolutely. How could you deny consideration of someone who has excited so many people?”

Partial transcript from NY1 (the show airs tonight):  read more »

Hillary Clinton’s top strategist Mark Penn said today, “The search for delegates, I think, is going to go straight through to the convention,” a shift from the once-commonly held notion that a nominee would be known after New York, California and 20 other states holding Democratic primaries on February 5.

On a conference call with reporters this afternoon, Penn was asked what benchmarks the campaign hoped to achieve.

“Again, I think it’s a search for delegates. I think the system is set up to be an extremely competitive one.” And, “I’m not going to go through any clear benchmarks other than that the search for delegates I think is going to continue straight through to the convention.”

Which is slightly different than what Terry McAuliffe was saying earlier.

Over the course of a conference call with Howard Wolfson, Terry McAuliffe and a number of high-profile Hillary Clinton supporters, some variation of the phrase "found her voice in New Hampshire" was used at least six times.

New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez said it first, but it was repeated by McAuliffe, Wolfson and Washington State Senator Maria Cantwell. From Chuck Schumer we heard that Hillary is "in touch with what people need and want," from Cantwell that in the last two days before New Hampshire she saw the "passion" in Hillary, and that the candidate is "connecting and connecting with women."

Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee of Texas noted that voters were "passionate, they were connected to the Clintons...they see her as having ideas and as being an inspiration." California Senator Dianne Feinstein added that "there is a great emotional connection between woman and Hillary."  read more »

Terry McAuliffe was talking with reporters when the AP and NBC called the race for Hillary Clinton.
“This is a big, big win for us tonight,” he said, calling the win “another Clinton comeback.”
“I think Hillary really found her voice here and people saw here the real Hillary Clinton,” he said.
When asked if her emotional moment in a Portsmouth coffee shop yesterday had any impact on the result, he said, “Sure it did, you bet,” explaining that “it showed the human side of Hillary Clinton--the passionate side.”  read more »

Terry McAuliffe, one of Hillary Clinton’s biggest fund-raisers and the former chair of the D.N.C., just repeated his belief, and the campaign’s new talking point, that the nominating process will be decided on Feb. 5.

“I think this thing will finally be over on Feb 5,” he said on a conference call, referring to Super Duper Tuesday. “One huge advantage we have at the Clinton campaign is that from day one we were going to run a national campaign.”

Here’s how McAuliffe argued that same point on the Clinton plane last night.  read more »

On a phone call with reporters just now, Hillary Clinton’s campaign chairman Terry McAuliffe said, “We’re excited about where we are.”

He went on to say, “Listen, Hillary is going to be the nominee. There‘s no question. I feel stronger about that today than I have ever before.”

Here's Columbia student Alice Mottola reacting to a speech by Terry McAuliffe to her class last week: "When he came in here, I didn’t really like him, but by the end, I wanted to and had to try not to.”

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Al Sharpton is taking over for Chris Matthews as host of Hardball on MSBC tonight, a spokesman for Sharpton just announced via email. The guests for tonight's show include Hillary Clinton's campaign chairman, Terry McAuliffe, and Democratic National Committee Chairman, Howard Dean. Since Dean's entire tenure at the DNC has been a not-so-subtle of repudiation of McAuliffe's chairmanship, there'll be ample opportunity for some super-insider vituperation. Good thing the Rev. Al's there to exercise his calming influence.

Hillary Clinton had a small fund-raiser at the 57th Street and 8th Avenue home of Mike DelGuidice last night that featured a number of big Democratic names: Bill Clinton, Terry McAulliffe, former New Jersey Governor Jim Florio and Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, among others.

There were also at least two Republicans.

 read more »

Terry McAuliffe explains what 'in it to win it' has meant for fund-raising. There's more campaign cash going around this cycle than previous ones probably because of rising economic inequality, not the Internet, says Ben. Mitt Romney raised more money that Rudy Giuliani Gail Robinson thinks "one clear loser" in the state budget this year was "open government." Joe Bruno is gloating about how he fared. John Catsimatidis is registering as a Republican Howard Weitzman is raising money for something. Andrew Cuomo settled cases against Citibank and school lenders. Plans to build a new United Nations building on a playground has at least one critic. Conspiracy alert: The guy who convinced Rudy Giuliani to dress in drag - and may have introduced the former mayor to his current wife - is now helping John McCain. Giuliani leads 2008 contenders in Florida. And pictured above is a scene from the Assembly chambers shortly after the budget deadline on Saturday night. -- Azi Paybarah  read more »

Republican Senators from Long Island aren't impressed with Eliot Spitzer's budget modifications.

Hillary Clinton set expectations pretty high in Iowa, and Terry McAuliffe explained why she moved up her Presidential announcement.

Here's a campaign video from John McCain's trip to New Hampshire.

Indicted Assemblywoman Diane Gordon is having a fund-raiser on May 3.

Lew Fidler is pushing an anti-congestion pricing resolution, reports Aaron Naparstek.

A new murder mystery video game is set entirely in the Canal Street station.

Say good-bye (again?) to Life magazine.

New Jersey Senate President Dick Codey will face a re-election challenge from the Sausage King.

An embattled GOP boss in Yonkers got some help.

And pictured above is Charles Barron at a Dennis Kucinich press conference earlier today.

-- Azi Paybarah

Hassan Nemazee, the Democratic bundler chairing tonight's Hillary Clinton fund-raiser (featuring Bill) just told me that the event has raised $500,000 for the Senator's presidential campaign.

Nemazee, whose co-chairs tonight include the prominent fund-raisers Robert Zimmerman and Steve Robert, said that former DNC chair Terry McAuliffe called asking him to put the event together only two weeks ago.

About 100 people are expected to show at the event, each maxing out at $4,600. Enough no-shows sent in checks to hit the half million mark, Nemazee said.

Just like that.

--Jason Horowitz

While many Democratic activists and fund-raisers are in an almost celebratory mood at the prospect o  read more »

Want to make your weekend a wonkend? I'll leave you with this Blog Stroll... Over at Power Plays, Tom Robbins notes that a certain new Dem chieftain can't bring himself to say Freddy's name. I'll give you a hint: he's a Brooklyner, and his first name rhymes with "neat-o."

Team Kos takes a look at third-quarter recruitment and fundraising. Casts it as Chuck vs. Libby Dole, cheers wildly.

"Sometimes the gods of Washington gossip-mongering smile, DeLay-like, upon us all," gushes Wonkette, on the announcement of an upcoming tell-all book by former DNC chair Terry McAuliffe. The Politicker - at least partially responsible for a collision involving wine, a busboy, and Mr. McAuliffe, back at a CGI cocktail party - now feels less guilty for not begging to pay Mr. McAuliffe's dry cleaning bill. Apparently, there was a bidding war (for the book, not his suit).

We're getting a Homeland Security representative... now let's send him back home! Gothamist is amused by the Police Commissioner's warm welcome to New York's Newest.

GOP and the City sends up the Daily News' latest take on TerrorEmailgate, proposing a complex network of alliances all the way from U.S. Coast Guard information officer Nathaniel Heiner (an original member of Sha-Na-Na) to the ubiquitous Kevin Bacon. The Daily Gotham runs an article taking Bloomberg's education record to task. And, as one reader notes, the fame of Freddy's botched appearance with Bill Clinton yesterday has spread so far, so wide, that... the Drudge Report has taken notice.  read more »

The Politicker, however, urges fans of Freddy to look on the bright side. It must be noted that, even though the speech he'd planned for this morning was cancelled when no one showed up, the sound guy was there.

'Til Monday.

It's spring, and your diarist finds himself in a mood that is not so much bewitched as bothered, and  read more »

It was March 2-Super Tuesday-and John Kerry was in the process of nailing down the Democratic nomina  read more »

Like horses being led to the post parade at Saratoga, a string of Democratic Presidential hopefuls g  read more »

Don't blame Chelsea-at least not entirely.  read more »