ST. PAUL, MINN. — A series of disclosures about Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, Sen. John McCain's choice as running mate, called into question on Monday how thoroughly McCain had examined her background before putting her on the Republican presidential ticket.
On Monday morning, Palin and her husband, Todd, said their 17-year-old daughter, Bristol, was five months pregnant and intended to marry the father.
Among other news of the day: It was learned that Palin now has a private lawyer in a legislative ethics investigation in Alaska into whether she abused her power in dismissing the state's public safety commissioner; that she was a member for two years in the 1990s of the Alaska Independence Party, which has at times sought a vote on whether the state should secede; and that Todd Palin was arrested 22 years ago on a drunken-driving charge.
Aides to McCain said they had a team on the ground in Alaska, now, to look more thoroughly into Palin's background. A Republican with ties to the campaign said the team assigned to vet Palin in Alaska had not arrived there until Thursday, a day before McCain stunned the political world with his vice-presidential choice.
Although the McCain campaign said that McCain had known about Bristol Palin's pregnancy before he asked her mother to join him on the ticket and said that he did not consider it disqualifying, top aides were vague on Monday about how and when he had learned of the pregnancy, and from whom.
While there was no sign that her formal nomination this week was in jeopardy, the questions swirling around Palin on the first day of the Republican National Convention, already disrupted by Hurricane Gustav, brought anxiety to Republicans who worried that Democrats would use the selection of Palin to question McCain's judgment and his ability to make crucial decisions.
At the least, Republicans close to the campaign said it was increasingly apparent that Palin had been selected as McCain's running mate with more haste than McCain advisers initially described.
Last-minute decision
Up until midweek last week, 48 hours to 72 hours before McCain introduced Palin at a Friday rally in Dayton, Ohio, McCain was still holding out the hope that he could name as his running mate a good friend, Sen. Joseph Lieberman, I-Conn., a Republican close to the campaign said. McCain had also been interested in another favorite, former Gov. Tom Ridge of Pennsylvania.
But both men favor abortion rights, anathema to the Christian conservatives who make up a crucial base of the Republican Party. As word leaked out that McCain was seriously considering the men, the campaign was bombarded by outrage from influential conservatives who predicted an explosive floor fight at the convention and vowed delegates would reject Ridge or Lieberman.
Perhaps more important, several Republicans said, McCain was getting advice that if he did not do something to shake up the race, his campaign would be stuck on a potentially losing trajectory.
With time running out — and as McCain discarded two safer choices, Gov. Tim Pawlenty of Minnesota and former Gov. Mitt Romney of Massachusetts, as too predictable — he turned to Palin. He had his first face-to-face interview with her on Thursday and offered her the job moments later.
"They didn't seriously consider her until four or five days from the time she was picked, before she was asked, maybe the Thursday or Friday before," said a Republican close to the campaign. "This was really kind of rushed at the end, because John didn't get what he wanted. He wanted to do Joe or Ridge."
McCain's advisers said repeatedly on Monday that Palin was "thoroughly vetted," a process that would have included a review of all financial and legal records as well as a criminal background check. A McCain aide said that the campaign was well-aware of the ethics investigation and had looked into it.
People familiar with the process said Palin had responded to a standard form with more than 70 questions.
"It was obviously something that anybody Googling Sarah Palin knew was in the news, and there was a very thorough vetting done on that and also on the daughter," the aide said.
Mark Salter, McCain's closest adviser, said in an e-mail that Palin had been interviewed by Arthur B. Culvahouse Jr., a veteran Washington lawyer in charge of the vice-presidential vetting process for McCain, as well as by other lawyers who worked for Culvahouse. Salter did not respond to an e-mail message asking if Palin had told Culvahouse and his lawyers that her daughter was pregnant.
Total surprise in Alaska
In Alaska, several state leaders and local officials said they knew of no efforts by the McCain campaign to find out more information about Palin before the announcement of her selection. Although campaigns are typically discreet when they make inquiries into potential running mates, officials in Alaska said Monday they thought it was peculiar that no one in the state had the slightest hint that Palin might be under consideration.
"They didn't speak to anyone in the Legislature, they didn't speak to anyone in the business community," said Lyda Green, the state Senate president, who lives in Wasilla, where Palin served as mayor.
Rep. Gail Phillips, a Republican and former speaker of the state House of Representatives, said the widespread surprise in Alaska when Palin was named to the ticket made her wonder how intensively the McCain campaign had vetted her.
"I started calling around and asking, and I have not been able to find one person that was called," Phillips said.
The current mayor of Wasilla, Dianne M. Keller, said she had not heard of any efforts to look into Palin's background. And Randy Ruedrich, the state Republican Party chairman, said he, too, knew nothing of any vetting that had been conducted.
State Sen. Hollis French, a Democrat who is directing the ethics investigation, said that no one asked him about the allegations. "I heard not a word, not a single contact," he said.
A number of Republicans said the McCain campaign had to some degree tied its hands in its effort to keep the selection process so secret.
"If you really want it to be a surprise, the circle of people that you're going to allow to know about it is going to be small, and that's just the nature of it," said Dan Bartlett, a former counselor to President Bush and an adviser in both of his presidential campaigns.
The risk of leaks
Former McCain strategists disagreed on whether it would have been useful for Palin's name to have been more publicly floated before her selection so that issues like the ethics investigation and her daughter's pregnancy might have already been aired and not seemed so new at the time of her announcement.
"Had the story been written about the state trooper three months ago, nobody would care about it anymore," said Dan Schnur, a former McCain aide who now directs the Jesse M. Unruh Institute of Politics at the University of Southern California.
"They obviously felt it was worth the risk to rev up the base and potentially reach out to Clinton supporters," Schnur said.
But Howard Opinsky, another McCain veteran, said calling attention to Palin's possible candidacy during the search process would have undermined the impact of her eventual selection.
"Had her name been played out in the press for months and months, she wouldn't have been seen as so bold," Opinsky said. "You either get freshness and you have to live with what you get in your vetting, or you lose the freshness."
Vetting of Palin gets own scrutiny | Politics | Chron.com - Houston Chronicle
Vetting of Sarah Palin gets own scrutiny
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The Palin family
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