Nader consideration splits Maine Greens at caucuses

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AUGUSTA – With their presidential election year caucuses concluded, Maine Democrats are now moving into the next phase of this politically supercharged year as they prepare for this spring’s state party convention.

But Republicans and Greens, operating with far less public attention trained on them, are still busy caucusing, with weeks left on their schedules of local party gatherings.

On the Republican side, where President Bush’s nomination for a second term is unquestioned, there’s no presidential voting at this year’s caucuses.

Limited to party organization business, GOP caucuses have been held in about half the state’s counties. The schedule is to conclude March 7 with Androscoggin County’s caucuses.

It’s a much different story in the Green Independent Party, which is actively involved in the process of choosing its 2004 presidential nominee in caucuses that began in late January and may run through March 19.

Some Maine Greens are courting the party’s 2000 presidential nominee, Ralph Nader, while others oppose a draft-Nader movement and say Greens should choose from among a half-dozen other presidential candidates.

The Nader issue not only has split the Green party in Maine, it also could set Maine apart as the first state where Greens rally behind the consumer activist, said party co-chairman Ben Meiklejohn.

Maine Greens have a prominent role within their own national party establishment, with a larger share of delegates than other states are allotted, but they play a relatively minor role in Maine politics. In the 2000 presidential tally in Maine, Democrat Al Gore beat Bush 49 percent to 44 percent, while Nader took 5.7 percent of the vote.

With so much interest in this year’s Democratic race, “a lot of Greens left [the party] to vote in the Democratic caucuses,” said Meiklejohn, who believes that most of the disaffected Greens supported U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich of Ohio.

“We probably contributed to his high showing in Maine,” added Meiklejohn.

In one of his strongest showings in the country, Kucinich finished third with 16 percent of the votes in Maine’s Democratic caucuses, according to counts from 98 percent of the towns participating.

Sen. John Kerry won with 44 percent, while former Vermont Gov. Howard Dean, who is no longer actively campaigning, finished second with 28 percent.

Sen. John Edwards of North Carolina was fourth with 7 percent and Wesley Clark, who dropped out and has since thrown his support to Kerry, won 3 percent, according to Democratic Party counts.

The Democrats still have some counting ahead of them.

The 3,330-plus delegates to the state convention in May are apportioned according to the percentage of votes won by each candidate. The state delegates, in turn, will elect 24 of Maine’s delegates to this summer’s national convention.

However, the percentages allotted to each candidate can be skewed by how many delegates actually turn out for the state convention, said party spokesman Christopher Harris.

“What really matters,” said Harris, “is who turns up at the state convention.”

As it now stands, Kerry has 47 percent of the delegates, Dean 27 percent, Kucinich 14 percent, Edwards 7 percent and Clark 4 percent.

Party rules also come into play. National rules say a candidate must have a minimum of 15 percent of total delegates in order to be represented by delegates at the national convention, which will rub Kucinich out of the picture.

State party rules say that delegates are obligated to the candidates for whom they sought votes at their local caucuses. But that changes when, as in the case of Clark, a candidate drops out, said Harris.

Those delegates go to the state convention uncommitted, meaning they’re in a position to be wooed by other candidates looking for representation at the national convention.

That’s exactly what Kerry supporters will be doing, said his Maine spokesman, Jesse Connolly, who counts at least 20 national delegates for the Massachusetts senator. The total includes 15 from caucus allocations plus five as of Thursday from the party’s “superdelegates.”

Maine’s “superdelegates” – national delegates who are preselected on the basis of public or party office – represent a potential wild card. Maine sends 11 superdelegates to the national convention, and they are free to support whom they please.

While five of those delegates had lined up in Kerry’s camp, at least two Dean supporters left open the possibility of switching to Kerry, and others were uncommitted or their leanings unknown.

Convention dates for state, nation

DEMOCRATS

State convention: May 21-22 in Portland.

National convention: July 26-30 in Boston.

GREENS

State convention: April 17-18 in Lewiston.

National convention: June 23-28 in Milwaukee.

REPUBLICANS

State convention: May 14-15 in Augusta.

National convention: Aug. 30-Sept. 2 in New York.