Republican Rudy Giuliani was back in his hometown... shaking hands, kissing babies and drumming up support and money at various fund-raisers in the outer boroughs. He attended functions in very Rudy-friendly neighborhoods in The Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island. He mostly got a warm reception, though protesters did make their voices heard, too.
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Apparently one entry in Ronald Reagan's diaries says of Rudy Giuliani "I think he's crazy." (This was with reference to a scheme to indict Ferdinand Marcos, then still ruling the Philippines.)
Well, the Giuliani people needed to respond somehow. And of course they couldn't criticize St. Ronald. So they dug up a letter from Reagan to Giuliani and gave it to Politico.com's Jonathan Martin, who's either astonishingly gullible even by journalistic standards or simply in the tank.
When it comes to fundraising, Rudy Giuliani wants to hit it out of the park.
The former New York mayor's presidential campaign on Thursday named 20 men and women under the age of 45 to be among his lead fundraisers, giving them goals of raising between $25,000 and $1 million.
Pikers who raise the lowest amount will get the title of All-American Pitcher. Those who bundle $50,000 in contributions will be All-American Sluggers; $100,000 will be All-American All Stars; and $200,000 will be All-American MVPs. A fundraiser who amasses $1 million for Giuliani gets to be All-American Team Captain.
Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani aimed to raise $250,000 on Wednesday night at a fundraiser -- but first he took in a Little League game played by 6- to 8-year-olds.
"Number 2! Let's go, Number 2!" the former New York mayor cheered as he watched the Raptors take a 1-0 lead over the Sand Gnats.
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Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani on Wednesday called the immigration bill championed by one of his presidential rivals a hodgepodge that won't accomplish what should be its central goal: tracking everyone who crosses the border.
"We need to know everyone who's in the United States who comes here from a foreign country. That has to be the goal of our immigration law," he said. "If you make that the objective of your law, you will clear up a lot of the confusion that presently exists both in our present immigration law and in what Congress is trying to do right now, which kind of goes in 10 different directions without any central focus."
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Rudy Giuliani campaigned Tuesday for a second straight day across New York with a message aimed obviously at Republicans outside his home state: I can battle them for the blues.
The "them" is, of course, the Democrats who have been making much of picking up a red state or two and winning back the White House, perhaps riding there with Giuliani's home-state rival, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton. Giuliani pledges to take the battle against the Democrats to the blue states.
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Former Mayor Rudy Giuliani is far from universally loved in New York, but since it's his home turf he sure does get a hero's welcome. The Republican candidate for president was mobbed by his fans outside the Ed Sullivan Theater, where he appeared on David Letterman's show. For the entire report, click here.
Republican presidential candidate Rudy Giuliani made his 28th appearance on the "Late Show" with David Letterman on Monday, answering hypotheticals about the Iraq war in a friendly exchange with the puckish comedian.
Letterman asked the former New York mayor about the war and its chaotic aftermath.
"I think there would have been a better strategy," Giuliani said. "We kind of didn't plan for that the way we should have."
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Western New York Republicans are expected to turn out in large numbers for presidential hopeful Rudy Giuliani's major campaign fundraiser in Buffalo tomorrow night.
The event for the former New York City mayor is being held at Kleinhan's Music Hall.
Giuliani is considered a top contender for the GOP nomination next year, while New York Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton is a front-runner for the Democratic Party's nod.
Canisius College Political Science Professor Kevin Hardwick says western
New York is a swing vote area which helps balance the traditional downstate Democratic vote and the upstate Republican vote.
(Copyright 2007 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
The Republican patronage machine was in full motion early in the Ronald Reagan era, filling countless positions with the faithful. From his high perch at the Justice Department, Rudy Giuliani was not always willing to go along.
Senators accustomed to having their way with certain administration appointments when their party took power bristled when Giuliani put candidates for U.S. attorney on ice. Pennsylvania GOP Sen. Arlen Specter complained directly to President Reagan that Giuliani ignored his calls and stopped answering his letters.
South Dakota's Republican senators told Attorney General William French Smith it was unacceptable for Giuliani to resist their choice of a Reagan loyalist who had little experience in federal court.
"We were shocked last week to receive a letter from Associate Attorney General Rudolph W. Giuliani indicating that the Justice Department takes exception," Sens. James Abdnor and Larry Pressler wrote, in papers released by the National Archives. The senators said indignantly that their selection followed "the most democratic and open procedure ever used in filling patronage positions in the state."
In another rebuff, Giuliani objected to a Connecticut senator's pick for U.S. marshal, telling the lawmaker his candidate "appears to have no law enforcement background."
Giuliani papers made public by the archives open a window into the Republican presidential hopeful's work as the No. 3 official in the Reagan Justice Department from May 1981 to June 1983. He was responsible for criminal investigations and supervised the nation's U.S. attorneys offices.
The agency released 56 boxes of correspondence and records from his files in response to requests from researchers, while holding back sensitive documents. The collection is prime study material for his opponents in the 2008 campaign as well as for historians piecing together the inner workings of the Reagan years.
Researchers still poring over the papers have not found a rash of politically tinged firings of the kind that have jeopardized the job of the current attorney general, Alberto Gonzales.
But hiring was often political and Giuliani routinely considered requests to advance the favored candidates of senators, House members and other partisans, in a process used with variations by successive administrations.
The boldly named Federal Patronage Committee for the Republican Party of Louisiana, for example, recommended judges for the state and asked for the existing federal prosecutor to stay in place.
Giuliani met weekly with Paul A. Russo, Reagan's special assistant for political affairs, and when Russo left the job, thanked him "for your very important contribution in the selection of United States Attorneys and Marshals."
The papers suggest Giuliani considered the legal qualifications of the candidates and their FBI background checks, essentially screening some out and passing others on to the White House.
"We will be attempting to select the best qualified person," he told a Maryland attorney. "In addition, as part of this process, we have been seeking individuals who share the Administration's law enforcement concerns and goals."
A spokeswoman for Giuliani's presidential campaign, Maria Comella, said Giuliani, in the Justice Department job, "was committed to following the law and making the best decisions possible based on the merits, without regard for partisan politics, which has no place in the criminal justice system."
Giuliani was given direct authority to remove assistant U.S. attorneys who did not measure up, but said the Justice Department would not replace them as a result of the change in administrations.
"The Department's work is too important and complex to follow a policy that could lead to an abnormal turnover," he wrote.
In the South Dakota case, Giuliani apparently was unmoved by the senators' pitch for Philip K. Hogen, who proclaimed his "devotion to vigorous law enforcement and the principles for which a landslide of American voters supported the Reagan Administration last November."
Hogen eventually got the job and served 10 years.
Giuliani also handled a dicey situation in Illinois, where GOP Sen. Charles H. Percy put forward three prospects for federal prosecutor.
One of them subsequently proposed that violent prisoners be put in comas and awakened decades later when it was time for them to get out. He said nonviolent prisoners should be dressed in Day-Glo orange, have their heads shaved and be forced to do menial jobs such as polishing firefighters' boots.
The senator wrote to Giuliani saying he wanted to rethink his recommendation.
"We agree with you that this is a serious matter," Giuliani said.
Giuliani left as associate attorney general to become U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York. He replaced a Democratic appointee who resigned after complaining bitterly that his Washington bosses wanted to send prosecutors to try some of his cases.
That office is where Giuliani made his name fighting mob and white-collar crime, his launch pad to the mayor's office and now his bid for the GOP presidential nomination.
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Associated Press writer Ann Sanner contributed to this report.
