I was in Greenville, S.C. yesterday for a Daily Beast piece on the state of play of Gov. Nikki Haley’s reelection prospects. The draw, of course, were the three governors with designs on the White House in 2016: Rick Perry, Bobby Jindal and Scott Walker.
Standing on a stage before a giant American flag, each pepped up the crowd assembled outside the Bi-Lo Center for Haley’s 2014 effort. But it was also an opportunity to test their message in front of a swath of early primary state voters.
Here’s Yellowhammer’s takeaways from the ground:
Texas Gov. Rick Perry
- The Theme: Red-state job growth
- The Applause Line: ”It’s about how do you take care of your family . . . and those of us in red states believe the way that you do that is we let you with more of your money.”
- The Compliment: “Football season is kickin’ off here . . . South Carolina’s gonna be in the game, South Carolina’s gonna compete just like your governor Nikki Haley makes South Carolina compete every day.”
- The Takeaway: Perry still has the strut of a candidate — except one with fashionable new rims (!) — and his message was notably less partisan than his usual routine. The emphasis on red state job growth forecasts the type of message he’d resurrect as a candidate: The Texas story. But this was a more positive, less partisan Perry than what we’re used to.
Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal
- The Theme: Combating the excesses of Washington and President Obama
- The Applause Line: “Now they’ve exempted themselves in Congress. Why don’t they exempt the rest of us from Obamacare as well?”
- The Compliment: ”She campaigned as a conservative, she has governed as a conservative.”
- The Takeaway: Jindal craftily managed to weave the ills of Washington into a speech that also lauded Haley’s record. He fulminated about Obamacare and then pointed to Haley’s leadership fighting against its implementation. He then ran down a checklist of what amounted to red-meat dishes for conservatives: The IRS scandal, the debt, the NSA spying scandal, Fast & Furious, Benghazi. For good measure, he went right at Hillary Clinton for “What difference does it make?” Jindal’s goal seemed to be to amp up his dry brainy persona; what resulted was a pointedly partisan speech that made Perry’s remarks look tame.
Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker
- The Theme: Measuring success by a lack of government dependency
- The Applause Line: “The hard-working taxpayers are in charge, not the big government union bosses.”
- The Compliment: “She’s shown that the R next to her name doesn’t just stand for Republican, it stands for reformer.”
- The Takeaway: Walker, who ducked the earlier media availability, also delivered the shortest speech of the three. It was standard fare from the message he’s carried around the country: Pump up his work in Wisconsin, citing how he beat back a recall attempt and profess that the true way to measure success is by the amount of people who don’t need to rely on government. If Jindal’s speech was hot and Perry’s was comparably cool, Walker’s was . . . well, less is more?
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