View Video: Former New York governor George Pataki is a contender for the White House in 2016. Here's the Republican's take on tax reform, the Islamic State, student loans and more, in his own words. (Sarah Parnass / The Washington Post)
MAY 28, 2015
Former New York governor George E. Pataki — a moderate Republican who led the state through the aftermath of the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks — launched a long-shot bid for the presidency Thursday and became the eighth declared candidate in the boisterous race for the GOP nomination.
Pataki, who has not held elected office since 2007, hopes to position himself as a relative centrist in a Republican field that is rapidly tacking to the right on issues such as immigration and national security. But his chances are slim at best against more than a dozen other likely candidates, many of whom are better-known and better-funded.
In a speech in a stifling-hot town hall in Exeter, N.H., Pataki emphasized a message of fiscal conservatism and smaller government, steering clear of divisive social issues championed by many of the party’s most conservative voters. He emphasized his parents’ immigrant past and the life they were able to build in the United States.
“Too many Americans feel the path of opportunity is closed to them,” Pataki said, with sweat pouring from his forehead in the hot room. “The problems we face are real. But I’ve never been one to dwell on problems. I’m a solutions guy.”
Pataki, 69, announced his White House run in a campaign video released Thursday morning before the speech.
“America has a big decision to make about who we’re going to be and what we’re going to stand for. The system is broken,” Pataki said in the video, which emphasized his three terms as governor and his leadership following the 9/11 attacks. “The question is no longer about what our government should do but what we should do about our government, about our divided union, about our uncertain future.”
[Flashback: Will he or won’t he? (He will.)]
Pataki had flirted with a presidential candidacy three times before this year, raising money and meeting voters in early-voting states such as New Hampshire. But each time — in 2000, in 2008 and in 2012 — Pataki decided the moment wasn’t right and never launched a campaign.
“I make a joke that every four years, there’s the Olympics, there’s the World Cup, and I come to New Hampshire thinking about running for president,” Pataki told a crowd of 15 people in Laconia, N.H., last month.
Now that he has actually entered the race, Pataki must face the harsh reality that flirting had allowed him to avoid: He has very little chance of winning the GOP nomination.
For one thing, he will enter a crowded GOP field without the benefit of wide name recognition. This January on “Jeopardy!” three contestants were shown a photo of Pataki’s face — but none could remember his name.
And Pataki’s moderate record in New York — strong gun-control laws, an expansion of the state budget — does not seem well suited to today’s GOP primary voters.
In a Quinnipiac University poll of GOP voters released Thursday, five potential candidates were tied for first with 10 percent support each — former Florida governor Jeb Bush, retired surgeon Ben Carson, former Arkansas governor Mike Huckabee, Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker. Pataki’s support was so low among the 16-person potential field that it didn’t register in the poll — putting him in a tie for last place with former Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum.
If Pataki were to win the 2016 Republican nomination, Florida-based GOP strategist Rick Wilson said a few weeks ago, “basically, it would be like a monkey flying out of a unicorn’s [posterior].”
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