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By Michael Gormley
Associated Press Writer
November 17, 2005

Republican Daniels to run Conservative campaign for governor

ALBANY, N.Y. -- In a move that could hurt Republican chances to hold onto the governor's office, GOP candidate Randy Daniels has promised to run as the Conservative Party's nominee if he loses the Republican nomination.

State GOP Chairman Stephen Minarik, who is backing the rival GOP gubernatorial candidacy of former Massachusetts Gov. Bill Weld, immediately denounced the move as "just wrong" and told The Associated Press on Thursday that it raises serious questions about Daniels' commitment to the GOP.

Daniels has emphasized his conservative credentials in his Republican campaign for governor in 2006. And while Weld, a native New Yorker, and potential candidate billionaire B. Thomas Golisano have gained some support from Republican leaders, their positions on social issues, such as support for abortion rights, has made Conservative Party leaders leery.

No Republican running for statewide office in New York has won without Conservative Party support since 1974.

"If I were the nominee of the Conservative Party, and after losing a Republican primary were on the Conservative line alone, I would run a vigorous, hard fought campaign and use every avenue open to me to promote my candidacy to the voters of New York," Daniels said in a letter to Conservative Party leaders dated Tuesday.

"I will not shy away from this battle because, quite frankly, this not about you or me, it's not about Bill Weld or Eliot Spitzer," Daniels wrote. "It's about the future of our children, the future of our parties and the future of our state! It is about whether we become that `shining city on a hill' that Ronald Reagan spoke about or whether we continue on a path of decline that will erase the term `Empire State' from the history books."

Minarik was blunt in his assessment of Daniels' move.

"To say, `To hell with the Republican Party, I'm just going to run on the Conservative line,' doesn't make a lot of sense," the state GOP chairman said.

"You have to question the motivation and how deeply committed you are to the party," Minarik added.

Later, in an interview with Albany's WROW-AM radio, Daniels called New York's GOP "a party in decline."

"Help us, don't continually criticize," Minarik fired back in his interview with the AP.

Daniels wasn't the only GOP gubernatorial contender criticizing fellow Republicans and courting the Conservative Party. State Assemblyman Patrick Manning, citing GOP setbacks in last week's local elections, said "voters are tired of Republicans who act and govern like liberal Democrats."

Daniels met last week with state Conservative Party Chairman Michael Long. In his letter, Daniels said that without a committed Conservative candidate, the party could end up on the "ash heap of New York state politics" like the Liberal and Right-to-Life parties.

"He was clearly very serious about the direction that the state was going in and he felt very strongly that the Republican Party is not going in the right direction and he was in the battle to the end," Long said.

"We ultimately have to have a candidate who is committed ... we want a candidate who feels passionately about what we believe in, and he does," Long said.

Conservative Party leaders are expected to endorse a nominee in the spring.

Republican leaders are scheduled to meet Monday in Albany to discuss winnowing its field of a half-dozen candidates for governor. The party leaders have said they expect to endorse a candidate by the end of December, although the candidates not receiving the nod could still seek a spot on the ballot by petition. That would lead to a primary in September.

Manning said he was displeased with the process and was concerned Minarik was stacking the deck in favor of Weld. The Dutchess County Republican said "any attempt to dictate the nominee 10 months before the primary is tantamount to denying rank-and-file Republicans a voice in the process."

Like Manning, former state Assembly Minority Leader John Faso has also stressed his conservative credentials. They have both said the GOP nominee should be endorsed by the Conservative Party to have the best chance against the only announced Democratic candidate, Eliot Spitzer, the state attorney general.

Daniels is the former state secretary of state appointed by Republican Gov. George Pataki, who has declined to run for a fourth term.

The Conservative Party routinely seeks pledges, such as Daniels made, from its prospective candidates for governor because any party whose gubernatorial candidate does not receive at least 50,000 votes loses its automatic spot on the New York ballot. That ballot status is considered the lifeblood of the state's minor parties.

AP political Writer Marc Humbert in Albany contributed to this report.