Presidents and Populism: Pat Buchanan
Patrick Joseph Buchanan is a conservative media personality who was once a speechwriter for Richard Nixon and White House Director of Communications for Ronald Reagan. He sought the Republican presidential nomination in 1992 and 1996 and ran on the Reform Party ticket in the 2000 presidential election. He is a co-founder of The American Conservative magazine and founded an organization named The American Cause.
Buchanan was born in Washington, D.C. on November 2, 1938. His great-grandfather fought in the Civil War for the Confederate army, and Buchanan is a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans. He was born into a Catholic family and attended the Jesuit-run Gonzaga College High School. He received a master's degree in journalism from Columbia University in 1962. Buchanan joined the St. Louis Globe-Democrat newspaper when he was 23. He was promoted to assistant editorial page editor in 1964 and supported Barry Goldwater's presidential campaign. He served as an executive assistant in the Nixon, Mudge, Rose, Guthrie, Alexander, and Mitchell law offices in New York City in 1965.
In 1966 he was the first adviser hired by Richard Nixon's presidential campaign and he worked primarily doing opposition research. He traveled with Nixon throughout the campaigns of 1966 and 1968. When Nixon became President in 1969, Buchanan worked as a White House adviser and speechwriter for Nixon and Vice President Spiro Agnew. He was the one who coined the phrase "Silent Majority". From those early days he saw the value of populism and in a 1972 memo, he suggested that the White House "should move to re-capture the anti-Establishment tradition or theme in American politics." Buchanan accompanied Nixon on his trip to China in 1972 and the summit in Moscow, Yalta and Minsk in 1974. He suggested that Nixon label Democratic opponent George McGovern an extremist and also recommended that Nixon burn the White House tapes.
Buchanan remained as a special assistant to Nixon through the final days of the Watergate scandal. He was not accused of wrongdoing, but he was mistakenly suspected of being Bob Woodward's famous source "Deep Throat". When Nixon resigned in 1974, Buchanan briefly stayed on as special assistant under incoming President Gerald Ford. Chief of Staff Alexander Haig had approved Buchanan's appointment as ambassador to South Africa, but Ford refused it.
After his resignation, Richard Nixon maintained contact with Buchanan as a confidant. Nixon called Buchanan a "decent, patriotic American", though he disagreed with Buchanan's isolationist view of foreign policy
Buchanan returned to his old work as a newspaper columnist and branched out into radio and television. He delivered daily commentaries on NBC radio from 1978 to 1984 and became a regular panelist on PBS shows The McLaughlin Group and The Capital Gang, and also on CNN's Crossfire. His columns were syndicated nationally by Creators Syndicate. Buchanan served as White House Communications Director from February 1985 to March 1987. While he was working for Reagan, his sister, Bay Buchanan, started a "Pat Buchanan for President" movement in June 1986. Her brother was lukewarm to the idea at first. He decided to sit out the 1988 race.
Buchanan was the subject of controversy in 1990 for alleged anti-Semitism for a column he wrote for the New York Post. In the column, he wrote that it was impossible for 850,000 Jews to be killed by diesel exhaust fed into the gas chamber at Treblinka, stating that "Treblinka was not a death camp but a transit camp used as a pass-through point for prisoners". In fact, some 900,000 Jews had died at Treblinka. Buchanan was challenged by other conservatives such as George Will and William F. Buckley, Jr. The Anti-Defamation League has called Buchanan an "unrepentant bigot", a charge Buchanan denied. Buchanan supported President Reagan's plan to visit a German military cemetery at Bitburg in 1985.
In 1990, Buchanan published a newsletter called "Patrick J. Buchanan: From the Right". The newsletter sent subscribers a bumper sticker reading: "Read Our Lips! No new taxes", the opening salvo for Buchanan's 1992 challenge of President George H.W. Bush. He ran on a platform that called for immigration reduction, and opposition to multiculturalism, abortion, and gay rights. Buchanan challenged Bush and hurt the incumbent president's political prospects when Buchanan won 38 percent of the vote in the New Hampshire primary. In the primary elections, Buchanan garnered three million total votes or 23% of the vote, though Bush won every primary. Buchanan later threw his support behind Bush and delivered an address at the 1992 Republican National Convention, dubbed the culture war speech, in which he told his audience that there was "a religious war going on in our country for the soul of America." He attacked Bill and Hillary Clinton, stating:
"The agenda Clinton & Clinton would impose on America—abortion on demand, a litmus test for the Supreme Court, homosexual rights, discrimination against religious schools, women in combat units—that's change, all right. But it is not the kind of change America needs. It is not the kind of change America wants. And it is not the kind of change we can abide in a nation we still call God's country."
Buchanan received enthusiastic applause, but there was concern that the speech alienated moderates from the Bush-Quayle ticket.
After the election, Buchanan returned to his column and to Crossfire. He founded The American Cause, a conservative educational foundation, in 1993. He also returned to radio as host of Buchanan and Company, a three-hour talk show for Mutual Broadcasting System on July 5, 1993, in a time slot opposite Rush Limbaugh's show.
Buchanan left the program on March 20, 1995 to launch his campaign for President in 1996. With Democratic President Bill Clinton seeking re-election, there was no incumbent Republican with a lock on the ticket and former President George H. W. Bush announced that he would not seek the nomination. The front-runner was Senate Majority leader Bob Dole of Kansas. Buchanan sought the nomination, campaigning on a platform of opposition to the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). In February, the Center for Public Integrity, a liberal think tank, issued a report claiming Buchanan's presidential campaign co-chairman, Larry Pratt, appeared at two meetings organized by a white supremacist group. Pratt denied any ties to racist groups and said that the report was an orchestrated smear before the New Hampshire primary. Buchanan told the Manchester Union Leader he believed Pratt, though Pratt took a leave of absence from Buchanan's team "so as not to have distraction in the campaign."
Buchanan defeated Dole by about 3,000 votes to win the February New Hampshire primary, giving his campaign an energetic start. He was endorsed by conservatives such as Phyllis Schlafly. He won three other states (Alaska, Missouri, and Louisiana), and finished slightly behind Dole in the Iowa caucus. He used inflammatory rhetoric to mobilize grass-roots right wing supporters against what he called the bland Washington establishment that controlled the GOP. At one rally, he said:
"We shocked them in Alaska. Stunned them in Louisiana. Stunned them in Iowa. They are in a terminal panic. They hear the shouts of the peasants from over the hill. All the knights and barons will be riding into the castle pulling up the drawbridge in a minute. All the peasants are coming with pitchforks. We're going to take this over the top."
In the Super Tuesday primaries, Dole defeated Buchanan by large margins. Having collected only 21 percent of the total votes or 3.1 million in Republican primaries, Buchanan suspended his campaign in March. He announced that if Dole chose a pro-choice running mate, he would run as the US Taxpayers Party candidate. Dole chose Jack Kemp and he received Buchanan's endorsement. After the 1996 campaign, Buchanan once again returned to his column and Crossfire. He also authored a series of books.
Buchanan announced that he was leaving the Republican Party in October 1999. He sought the nomination of the Reform Party. Party founder Ross Perot did not endorse Buchanan for the nomination. (In late October, 2000, Perot publicly endorsed George W. Bush). A split in the Reform Party led to dual conventions being held simultaneously in separate areas of the Long Beach Convention Center complex. One convention nominated Buchanan while the other backed Iowa physicist John Hagelin, with each claiming to be the legitimate Reform Party. The Federal Elections Commission ruled Buchanan was to receive ballot status as the Reform candidate, as well as about $12.6 million in federal campaign funds secured by Perot's showing in the 1996 election. In his acceptance speech, Buchanan called for US withdrawal from the United Nations and expelling the UN from New York, abolishing the Internal Revenue Service, Department of Education, Department of Energy, Department of Housing and Urban Development, taxes on inheritance and capital gains, and affirmative action programs.
In the election Buchanan had support from a variety of groups. Socialist Party politician Brian Moore said that he supported Buchanan because "he was for fair trade over free trade. The New York Right to Life Party chose Buchanan as their nominee for president. He courted support from southern right wingers, telling an audience at Bob Jones University:
"God and the Ten Commandments have all been expelled from the public schools. Christmas carols are out. Christmas holidays are out. The latest decision of the United States Supreme Court said that children in stadiums or young people in high school games are not to speak an inspirational moment for fear they may mention God's name, and offend an atheist in the grandstand.
We may not succeed, but I believe we need a new fighting conservative traditionalist party in America. I believe, and I hope that one day we can take America back. That is why we are building this Gideon's army and heading for Armageddon, to do battle for the Lord."
In the 2000 presidential election, Buchanan finished fourth with 449,895 votes, 0.4% of the popular vote. In Palm Beach County, Florida, Buchanan received 3,407 votes. During the battle over Florida's electoral votes, those who alleged voter irregularity saw Buchanan's total as being inconsistent with Palm Beach County's liberal leanings due to its large Jewish population and his showing in the rest of the state. The county used the "butterfly ballot", and it was suspected that Buchanan gained thousands of votes from those misled into thinking they were voting for Al Gore. But in an interview on The Today Show, Buchanan said "When I took one look at that ballot on Election Night, it's very easy for me to see how someone could have voted for me in the belief they voted for Al Gore." In another interview with the Daily Caller, he said "What cost Al Gore Florida in 2000, and the presidency, was the 'butterfly ballot'".
Following the 2000 election, Reform Party members urged Buchanan to take an active role within the party, but Buchanan declined. He attended their 2001 convention, but in subsequent years, he identified himself as an independent. As the 2004 election approached, Buchanan identified himself as a Republican. He said that he had no interest in ever running for president again, and endorsed George W. Bush in his 2004 re-election bid. He said in a back-handed complement, "Bush is right on taxes, judges, sovereignty, and values. Kerry is right on nothing." Buchanan also endorsed Republican Mitt Romney in 2012. He said "Obama offers more of the stalemate America has gone through for the past two years; Romney alone offers a possibility of hope and change." He supported Donald Trump's nomination during the Republican primaries and in the 2016 presidential election.
In September 2009, Buchanan was involved in controversy once again when MSNBC removed a Buchanan column from its website in which Buchanan used the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the German invasion of Poland to make the case that Britain should not have declared war on Germany. This was met with charges of antisemitism from a number of groups including the National Jewish Democratic Council. In January 2012, Buchanan was indefinitely suspended from MSNBC over alleged racist slurs. MSNBC ended its relationship with Buchanan on February 16, 2012.
Buchanan was born in Washington, D.C. on November 2, 1938. His great-grandfather fought in the Civil War for the Confederate army, and Buchanan is a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans. He was born into a Catholic family and attended the Jesuit-run Gonzaga College High School. He received a master's degree in journalism from Columbia University in 1962. Buchanan joined the St. Louis Globe-Democrat newspaper when he was 23. He was promoted to assistant editorial page editor in 1964 and supported Barry Goldwater's presidential campaign. He served as an executive assistant in the Nixon, Mudge, Rose, Guthrie, Alexander, and Mitchell law offices in New York City in 1965.
In 1966 he was the first adviser hired by Richard Nixon's presidential campaign and he worked primarily doing opposition research. He traveled with Nixon throughout the campaigns of 1966 and 1968. When Nixon became President in 1969, Buchanan worked as a White House adviser and speechwriter for Nixon and Vice President Spiro Agnew. He was the one who coined the phrase "Silent Majority". From those early days he saw the value of populism and in a 1972 memo, he suggested that the White House "should move to re-capture the anti-Establishment tradition or theme in American politics." Buchanan accompanied Nixon on his trip to China in 1972 and the summit in Moscow, Yalta and Minsk in 1974. He suggested that Nixon label Democratic opponent George McGovern an extremist and also recommended that Nixon burn the White House tapes.
Buchanan remained as a special assistant to Nixon through the final days of the Watergate scandal. He was not accused of wrongdoing, but he was mistakenly suspected of being Bob Woodward's famous source "Deep Throat". When Nixon resigned in 1974, Buchanan briefly stayed on as special assistant under incoming President Gerald Ford. Chief of Staff Alexander Haig had approved Buchanan's appointment as ambassador to South Africa, but Ford refused it.
After his resignation, Richard Nixon maintained contact with Buchanan as a confidant. Nixon called Buchanan a "decent, patriotic American", though he disagreed with Buchanan's isolationist view of foreign policy
Buchanan returned to his old work as a newspaper columnist and branched out into radio and television. He delivered daily commentaries on NBC radio from 1978 to 1984 and became a regular panelist on PBS shows The McLaughlin Group and The Capital Gang, and also on CNN's Crossfire. His columns were syndicated nationally by Creators Syndicate. Buchanan served as White House Communications Director from February 1985 to March 1987. While he was working for Reagan, his sister, Bay Buchanan, started a "Pat Buchanan for President" movement in June 1986. Her brother was lukewarm to the idea at first. He decided to sit out the 1988 race.
Buchanan was the subject of controversy in 1990 for alleged anti-Semitism for a column he wrote for the New York Post. In the column, he wrote that it was impossible for 850,000 Jews to be killed by diesel exhaust fed into the gas chamber at Treblinka, stating that "Treblinka was not a death camp but a transit camp used as a pass-through point for prisoners". In fact, some 900,000 Jews had died at Treblinka. Buchanan was challenged by other conservatives such as George Will and William F. Buckley, Jr. The Anti-Defamation League has called Buchanan an "unrepentant bigot", a charge Buchanan denied. Buchanan supported President Reagan's plan to visit a German military cemetery at Bitburg in 1985.
In 1990, Buchanan published a newsletter called "Patrick J. Buchanan: From the Right". The newsletter sent subscribers a bumper sticker reading: "Read Our Lips! No new taxes", the opening salvo for Buchanan's 1992 challenge of President George H.W. Bush. He ran on a platform that called for immigration reduction, and opposition to multiculturalism, abortion, and gay rights. Buchanan challenged Bush and hurt the incumbent president's political prospects when Buchanan won 38 percent of the vote in the New Hampshire primary. In the primary elections, Buchanan garnered three million total votes or 23% of the vote, though Bush won every primary. Buchanan later threw his support behind Bush and delivered an address at the 1992 Republican National Convention, dubbed the culture war speech, in which he told his audience that there was "a religious war going on in our country for the soul of America." He attacked Bill and Hillary Clinton, stating:
"The agenda Clinton & Clinton would impose on America—abortion on demand, a litmus test for the Supreme Court, homosexual rights, discrimination against religious schools, women in combat units—that's change, all right. But it is not the kind of change America needs. It is not the kind of change America wants. And it is not the kind of change we can abide in a nation we still call God's country."
Buchanan received enthusiastic applause, but there was concern that the speech alienated moderates from the Bush-Quayle ticket.
After the election, Buchanan returned to his column and to Crossfire. He founded The American Cause, a conservative educational foundation, in 1993. He also returned to radio as host of Buchanan and Company, a three-hour talk show for Mutual Broadcasting System on July 5, 1993, in a time slot opposite Rush Limbaugh's show.
Buchanan left the program on March 20, 1995 to launch his campaign for President in 1996. With Democratic President Bill Clinton seeking re-election, there was no incumbent Republican with a lock on the ticket and former President George H. W. Bush announced that he would not seek the nomination. The front-runner was Senate Majority leader Bob Dole of Kansas. Buchanan sought the nomination, campaigning on a platform of opposition to the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). In February, the Center for Public Integrity, a liberal think tank, issued a report claiming Buchanan's presidential campaign co-chairman, Larry Pratt, appeared at two meetings organized by a white supremacist group. Pratt denied any ties to racist groups and said that the report was an orchestrated smear before the New Hampshire primary. Buchanan told the Manchester Union Leader he believed Pratt, though Pratt took a leave of absence from Buchanan's team "so as not to have distraction in the campaign."
Buchanan defeated Dole by about 3,000 votes to win the February New Hampshire primary, giving his campaign an energetic start. He was endorsed by conservatives such as Phyllis Schlafly. He won three other states (Alaska, Missouri, and Louisiana), and finished slightly behind Dole in the Iowa caucus. He used inflammatory rhetoric to mobilize grass-roots right wing supporters against what he called the bland Washington establishment that controlled the GOP. At one rally, he said:
"We shocked them in Alaska. Stunned them in Louisiana. Stunned them in Iowa. They are in a terminal panic. They hear the shouts of the peasants from over the hill. All the knights and barons will be riding into the castle pulling up the drawbridge in a minute. All the peasants are coming with pitchforks. We're going to take this over the top."
In the Super Tuesday primaries, Dole defeated Buchanan by large margins. Having collected only 21 percent of the total votes or 3.1 million in Republican primaries, Buchanan suspended his campaign in March. He announced that if Dole chose a pro-choice running mate, he would run as the US Taxpayers Party candidate. Dole chose Jack Kemp and he received Buchanan's endorsement. After the 1996 campaign, Buchanan once again returned to his column and Crossfire. He also authored a series of books.
Buchanan announced that he was leaving the Republican Party in October 1999. He sought the nomination of the Reform Party. Party founder Ross Perot did not endorse Buchanan for the nomination. (In late October, 2000, Perot publicly endorsed George W. Bush). A split in the Reform Party led to dual conventions being held simultaneously in separate areas of the Long Beach Convention Center complex. One convention nominated Buchanan while the other backed Iowa physicist John Hagelin, with each claiming to be the legitimate Reform Party. The Federal Elections Commission ruled Buchanan was to receive ballot status as the Reform candidate, as well as about $12.6 million in federal campaign funds secured by Perot's showing in the 1996 election. In his acceptance speech, Buchanan called for US withdrawal from the United Nations and expelling the UN from New York, abolishing the Internal Revenue Service, Department of Education, Department of Energy, Department of Housing and Urban Development, taxes on inheritance and capital gains, and affirmative action programs.
In the election Buchanan had support from a variety of groups. Socialist Party politician Brian Moore said that he supported Buchanan because "he was for fair trade over free trade. The New York Right to Life Party chose Buchanan as their nominee for president. He courted support from southern right wingers, telling an audience at Bob Jones University:
"God and the Ten Commandments have all been expelled from the public schools. Christmas carols are out. Christmas holidays are out. The latest decision of the United States Supreme Court said that children in stadiums or young people in high school games are not to speak an inspirational moment for fear they may mention God's name, and offend an atheist in the grandstand.
We may not succeed, but I believe we need a new fighting conservative traditionalist party in America. I believe, and I hope that one day we can take America back. That is why we are building this Gideon's army and heading for Armageddon, to do battle for the Lord."
In the 2000 presidential election, Buchanan finished fourth with 449,895 votes, 0.4% of the popular vote. In Palm Beach County, Florida, Buchanan received 3,407 votes. During the battle over Florida's electoral votes, those who alleged voter irregularity saw Buchanan's total as being inconsistent with Palm Beach County's liberal leanings due to its large Jewish population and his showing in the rest of the state. The county used the "butterfly ballot", and it was suspected that Buchanan gained thousands of votes from those misled into thinking they were voting for Al Gore. But in an interview on The Today Show, Buchanan said "When I took one look at that ballot on Election Night, it's very easy for me to see how someone could have voted for me in the belief they voted for Al Gore." In another interview with the Daily Caller, he said "What cost Al Gore Florida in 2000, and the presidency, was the 'butterfly ballot'".
Following the 2000 election, Reform Party members urged Buchanan to take an active role within the party, but Buchanan declined. He attended their 2001 convention, but in subsequent years, he identified himself as an independent. As the 2004 election approached, Buchanan identified himself as a Republican. He said that he had no interest in ever running for president again, and endorsed George W. Bush in his 2004 re-election bid. He said in a back-handed complement, "Bush is right on taxes, judges, sovereignty, and values. Kerry is right on nothing." Buchanan also endorsed Republican Mitt Romney in 2012. He said "Obama offers more of the stalemate America has gone through for the past two years; Romney alone offers a possibility of hope and change." He supported Donald Trump's nomination during the Republican primaries and in the 2016 presidential election.
In September 2009, Buchanan was involved in controversy once again when MSNBC removed a Buchanan column from its website in which Buchanan used the occasion of the 70th anniversary of the German invasion of Poland to make the case that Britain should not have declared war on Germany. This was met with charges of antisemitism from a number of groups including the National Jewish Democratic Council. In January 2012, Buchanan was indefinitely suspended from MSNBC over alleged racist slurs. MSNBC ended its relationship with Buchanan on February 16, 2012.