There's a hint of drizzle in the fall air as about a dozen sign-waving volunteers gather outside the south gate of Husky Stadium before the Arizona game. Most are soaked to the skin from the earlier downpour; the senator looks fresh in turtleneck, Gore-Tex—and, yes, her trademark tennis shoes.
Patrolling the sidewalks outside sports events is among the most thankless of campaign tasks, and few fans acknowledge Murray at first. Maybe they just don't notice her—in person, the senator is double-take small, a slight woman standing just over 5 feet. But after a few greetings, she starts warming to the task. One excited man rushes up and gives her a rib-cracking bear hug. A blond woman hurries over, slightly out of breath, and blurts out the closest thing to a speech at this entire political event: "I'm the biggest Republican. I've voted for so many Republicans, but if you don't beat Linda Smith, I'm just going to die!" Murray's sign wavers crack up.
The latecomers hurrying for their seats seem to be the friendliest group. "Nice tennis shoes," quips one passerby. A thirty-something fellow in rain gear spots the senator and detaches himself from the rush of fans to shake her hand. "Hi, I'm one of yours," he says to a beaming Murray.
So goes Patty Murray's re-election campaign, a low-key effort aimed at reminding her voters that 1992's "Mom in Tennis Shoes" hasn't let the other Washington change her. Her campaign mailer claims that she's "quietly and diligently" going about the business of representing the state. She also is quietly and diligently going about the business of campaigning, keeping a low profile and avoiding direct confrontation with Linda Smith, her notoriously iconoclastic opponent. In the last two weekends' worth of Seattle campaign appearances, Murray has dished up dinner at a Sierra Club fund raiser, spoken to participants at the Northwest AIDS Walk, and greeted Husky fans. Her television commercials are equally soft-sell—she makes cheerfully vague promises about improving education, and reminds voters that she's still in the minority in the Republican-controlled Senate by telling the sad tale of her teacher-hiring bill that fell just one vote short of passage.
It could just be an amusing coincidence, but at the Husky game, just as a rumor circulated that Linda Smith would be appearing with her supporters, the Murray group moved from the traditional campaign soapbox area in front of Hec Edmundson Pavilion to the stadium's side door.
While the mom in tennis shoes shows off her fancy footwork, the fiery Smith is fuming. Her post-primary-election challenge to Murray to schedule eight debates before the November 3 primary will probably result in just one head-to-head appearance, the traditional KING TV/Seattle Post-Intelligencer/Seattle University event (set for October 16). And even that debate had to be rescheduled from its usual Sunday-night slot, because the aggressively Christian Smith won't debate on Sundays. Smith's campaign says the incumbent is ducking its candidate. "They're very concerned, it seems, about [Murray] being opened up to questions about her record," says Jim Troyer, Smith campaign spokesperson. "The only things we see from her are television commercials paid for by special-interest money."
The Murray campaign says Smith is just grandstanding. Campaign spokesperson Rex Carney blasts Smith for her October 2 fax to the media listing the dates and locations of 10 "possible" debates. "It's nonsense," he says. "Their campaign has never contacted us about any of these debates." It should be mentioned that Smith's list of debate "possibilities" included an event set for the following day, three events that Murray had already declined because of scheduling conflicts, and two Sunday debates that Smith wanted rescheduled.
At first glance, Smith's campaign fund raising seems to have survived her bold pledge not to take political-action-committee donations. The most recent Federal Elections Commission numbers show Smith at $2.95 million to Murray's $3.57 million (nearly all of the fund-raising gap between the two is accounted for by Murray's $545,504 in PAC money). But Smith's resources have been drained by a bruising primary campaign against Seattle businessman Chris Bayley and her costly direct-mail fund-raising operation, and now Murray's cash-on-hand advantage is showing in her more plentiful television spots. In addition, the Smith camp is understandably testy about another Murray advantage: a round of Democratic Party ads lampooning Smith's votes on education issues. While a Republican Partyfinanced response technically wouldn't violate Smith's no-PAC-money vow, she can't risk losing the campaign-finance high ground by letting her party pay for a rebuttal this late in the battle. Even if she were to accept the party's help, it's uncertain that state and national Republican leaders—most of whom supported Bayley in the primary—would give Smith anything beyond their warm best wishes.
IF THEY HAVE NOTHING ELSE in common, Smith and Murray definitely share their status of once-unlikely political phenoms. Murray was a capable but little-known state senator from Shoreline when she jumped into the US Senate race in 1992, campaigning on a vow to bring the common sense of a mom, teacher, and former school board member to the cloistered halls of the Capitol. There was already a Democratic incumbent in the race, Sen. Brock Adams, and political pundits were only just floating their theory that 1992 would be the "Year of the Woman" in electoral politics. But even after a scandal over improper behavior toward women drove Adams out of the race, major party players and the media bypassed Murray and switched their allegiance to former US Rep. Don Bonker, a well-spoken moderate who had narrowly lost the Democratic primary for the Senate four years earlier. Warming to Murray's folksy appeal, the voters defied the experts and voted for her in droves. Murray's opponent in the final was US Rep. Rod Chandler, an undistinguished Republican whose major political asset was that he looked good in a suit. The next thing the experts knew, "Patty" was "Sen. Murray."
