February 2001 Regional Reporter

In some ways it seems a natural fit for a Washington-based reporter to accompany the president back to your home state: you cover the news the president generates directly at the White House or indirectly on Capitol Hill.

And a presidential visit is a big deal, even for states presidents often tour because they hold a bevy of electoral votes or bevy of people with eye-popping bank accounts.

But it's not often a slam dunk for editors, who see the $1,000 to $2,000 or more cost per trip as exorbitant and better spent on sending an enterprising reporter to a foreign country or several of them after hot regional or national stories.

Regional papers have taken different approaches in recent years, some not sending a Washington reporter along, some choosing to do so. Mine, the Omaha World-Herald, sent me in December with President Clinton as he visited Nebraska-the last state in the nation he touched down. The trip came not long before Clinton would leave office, but after the November elections when he might have had a downbeat impact on Democratic former Gov. Ben Nelson's Senate bid.

It was almost worth it on its face for the novelty factor: Democratic president finally takes trip to heavily Republican state he was overwhelmingly defeated in 1992 and 1996, stopping first in Buffalo County, where he came in third behind Ross Perot in 1992.

The trip was a worthwhile expense, I think, and I'll share what our paper did as a whole, how I fit in and some ideas on what Washington reporters can contribute to future presidential trips for their organizations.

Larry Lipman of the Palm Beach Post noted that Clinton often visited Palm Beach County in Florida. Lipman didn't go along because he ran into a common problem. The White House wouldn't set up a one-on-one interview en route.

The paper relied instead on its local political reporter and others writing color or related stories about local preparations.

James R. Carroll of the Louisville Courier-Journal Washington bureau also saw Clinton make a number of trips to Kentucky. While the paper has given presidential visits front-and-center play, Carroll didn't accompany Clinton. "Not that I wouldn't like to, but the cost is difficult to justify without an exclusive interview != fat chance != thrown in," Carroll says.

The estimated cost for him on a trip shortly before Election Day was $1,700, which the White House press office said could be lower if enough journalists signed up. It still never approached what Carroll thought was reasonable.

Christine Dorsey of Donrey Media Group tried to get her papers to send her along with Clinton last fall when he planned a stopover in Hawaii -- who wouldn't ask? --But no dice. She wrote a story tying the announcement to another ongoing story and coordinated with the White House press office to make sure a local reporter and photographer were included in the press pool.

On the other hand, Lolita C. Baldor, of the New Haven Register's Washington bureau, had more success with Clinton's frequent trips to Connecticut. Presidents Clinton and Bush, the elder, often made the quick trip there for two reasons: They went to Yale University and they liked to raise money in Fairfield County.

Baldor didn't travel with the White House, but flew up on her own. The paper has had two types of approaches, a full-blown team effort with reporters and photographers or a smaller effort covering the president just dropping in for a fundraiser.

Stories the paper has done for the larger effort include: color on local preparations, including items in the holding room (jelly beans, cookies, smart-looking blue drapes for photos); food served; local bands playing; crowd reactions from those who shook the president's hand or gave him gifts; protests; security and police preparations, their cost and who pays; private receptions; and reunions with friends and classmates (George W. is a Yalie).

Baldor once got an emtional story by slipping into a private reception and interviewing the kitchen help after Clinton passed through. One woman gave him a cross because his mother had recently died.

For the fundraisers, the paper focused on who's throwing them, the cost, lobbying issues the organizers represented, legislation they may have sought from the administration, and the food, especially when Martha Stewart entered the picture.

Marc Heller of the Watertown Daily Times traveled to a Clinton fundraiser in northern New York. He says presidential visits there almost never happen, so the paper assigned him and two local reporters cover events.

The day of the visit, Heller wrote the main political story on Clinton's speech, mixing in details of the airport landing and the motorcade, while the local reporters gathered crowd reactions.

One note for regional reporters, it took Heller many emails to the White House press office to get into the traveling press. "I'm always afraid the regional press folks are low on the totem pole over there, and that only fed my anxiety about being forgotten," Heller said afterwards.

Indeed, the day before he discovered he apparently wasn't signed up, but managed to get on board. He pleaded to get off the press plane and onto Air Force One, and later realized the several thousand dollars that cost may have eaten up more money than the national political conventions.

"When you're a small paper, all you can do is argue that it's a once-in-a-generation expense and hope your editors go along with it," Heller said.

Editors of course go along with their own ideas over the visit of a president, which can highlight their unusual skills.

Consider this headline the Wichita Eagle reserved for a president from foreign soil when it welcomed in six columns across the top of Page 1 Mr. Yeltsin of Russia: "YO, BORIS!"

In my case, I showed up at Andrews Air Force Base at 3:15 a.m. one December day after numerous emails to the White House press and travel office.

The waiting area looked like it had suffered a terrorist gas attack: two dozen reporters and TV photographers were laying on the baggage claim turnstile, slumped into chairs or sitting on the floor, backs against the wall, all with eyes closed.

Life stirred some as more people arrived. Still in darkness we were bused out to the press charter, a small jet everyone complained about as too cramped, and it was. We drove by Air Force One and I saw it several times more through the day, from afar. Like others, my request for a one-on-one interview was rejected.

When it was initially announced, Clinton's trip was supposed to be one stop mid-state to speak to students at the University of Nebraska at Kearney. But over the course of a few days Clinton added a speech at Offutt Air Force Base in Omaha and a fundraiser at the Omaha home of Vinod Gupta. He'd given more than $1 million to the Democratic Party and to the 2000 millennium celebration on the Mall.

Our newspaper has an afternoon edition, as well as several morning editions, so we dispatched reporters everywhere and ended up with at least six writers and four photographers covering the day's events. We also did several lead-up stories about Clinton's popularity in Nebraska and the preparations. I wrote an advance on what he'd address in his foreign policy speech in Kearney.

I wrote a lead for the afternoon edition off of the speech. Others added color from along the motorcade route, from students and from a side trip Clinton took to a new attraction in Nebraska, a big arch over Interstate 80. One writer in Omaha pulled it all together.

I wrote a morning story on the Kearney speech and a Sunday story on whether Clinton had been able to change the minds of people who disliked him before he came to the state. Our poll showed early in the year his personal popularity rating was in the low 30s.

But the story that I got calls and several emails on was short piece I wrote after eavesdropping on conversations I heard during the day between colleagues who work for national news organizations.

Contemplating the flat, cold, snow-covered prairie, one of them said, "This is what I imagine Siberia to be like." Hefty sheriff's deputies blocking traffic were dubbed "Hoss" and "Big-un." When the press bus driver asked if the assembled journalistic crew ever got to do anything exciting like cover a Super Bowl, the answer back was a deadpan, "This is as good as it gets."

Several angered Nebraskans called wanting to know the journalists' organizations and names. I politely declined.

Press Club, RRA join forces

By Jerry Zremski
Buffalo News