GOP’s next hope to unseat Barbara Boxer: Carly Fiorina
The former CEO of Hewlett Packard, who hasn't formally announced her candidacy for the US Senate seat from California, would be one of the few women fielded for high office by the state GOP.
By Daniel B. Wood | Staff writer/ September 28, 2009 edition
Brendan Smialowski / Meet The Press / Reuters / File
Carly Fiorina, former CEO of Hewlett Packard and former economic adviser for Sen. John McCain’s presidential campaign, speaks during a live taping of "Meet the Press" in Washington on July 13, 2008.
Los Angeles
Carly Fiorina is emerging as a potential GOP challenger for the US Senate seat of Bay Area liberal Barbara Boxer next year, and the prospect has energized the California Republican Party.
Not yet an official candidate, Ms. Fiorina is the former CEO of Hewlett Packard (HP) and was an economic adviser to Sen. John McCain’s presidential bid last year. Like Meg Whitman, who just announced her campaign for governor, Fiorina is a newcomer to politics with very deep pockets. She has registered a campaign committee that reportedly had a strong presence at the state GOP convention this past weekend in Indian Wells, Calif.
Her candidacy to unseat Ms. Boxer, now in her third term in the Senate and who has never faced a female opponent in the general election, would turn the election into one of the most-closely watched Senate races for 2010.
“Fiorina would certainly skyrocket the attention paid to the 2010 Senate race,” says Jessica Levinson, political analyst for the Center for Governmental Studies (CGS). “Her candidacy is symbolically important for the GOP. It puts a new, younger female face on the party.”
Strong women candidates
Fiorina is the only woman to lead a Fortune 20 company. She led HP through the dot-com bust, a recession, and a controversial merger with Compaq Computer Corporation.
Along with Ms. Whitman, the idea of two strong women with business backgrounds is unifying state Republicans who have been fractured in recent years with changing demographics and dwindling voter support.
“For the first time since (former GOP Gov.) Pete Wilson’s 1994 campaign, I feel a sense of ‘we’ in the Republican Party,” said Rep. Darrell Issa to the San Francisco Chronicle after the three-day convention.
Fifty-three percent of California voters are women and the state GOP here has rarely fielded female candidates for high office.
“Fiorina could give Boxer her toughest campaign so far. Along with Meg Whitman, this could return some women to the Republican fold,” says Robert Stern, president of CGS.
New to politics
However, she has several liabilities. She does not have a long track record, her views are relatively unknown to most Californians, and she left Hewlett Packard under less than ideal conditions.
In the GOP primary, Fiorina will be up against state Assemblyman Chuck DeVore, a veteran and businessman who has been doing a little better than her in recent polls. Her unofficial campaign website was launched last week and criticized for being amateurish.
Fiorina was not present at the GOP state convention and has kept a very low profile for several months battling breast cancer.
“People are concerned about her health, she was active in the McCain campaign and the high-tech community is ambivalent about her,” says Barbara O’Connor, director of the Institute for Study of Politics and Media at California State University, Sacramento. Ms. O’Connor notes that Boxer and the Democrats will also be energized by a strong GOP candidate.
“Everyone underestimates Boxer and her ability to campaign,” she says. “She is wickedly good at raising money and motivating people and if the race gets close, deep pockets from the national Democratic party could start pouring in.”
What will be key, say O’Connor and others, will be the state of the California economy next spring. If it’s doing well, the claim of an outsider with business sense won’t be as attractive to voters as if the economy is still in the doldrums.
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Comments
2. Jack | 09.28.09
Please, NOT another wealthy former CEO who is out of touch with most ordinary Americans running for public office. How can a person who has no worries about financial security know about what the average working and unemployed American face each day?
3. Dennis | 09.29.09
Ms Fiorina owes me alot for the trouble that HP gave me under her watch.
The buffer under-run cd writer may have been started before she got there, but she released it anyway. Then I had a laptop that booted win 98 and it took 10 minutes to boot up. Then I had an HP 5 printer that grabbed more than one paper at a time. Then I waited a few years to have anything to do with HP. That is when she sent the HP trailer to our town. They took a picture of our family with an HP camera and printed it right there on an HP printer. I thought it was so nice to have a picture of our family with the American Flag in the background. After 2 months it faded to white. Then the company I worked for purchased some HP workstations. I warned them not to but they did anyway and the workstations froze up and they had to return them too.
Because my experience with HP is so awful, my comments are not objective but rather subjective. But that doesn’t reduce how she is also the poster child for exporting jobs as she sits on the board of Taiwan Semi-Conductor.
Gee wiz, if you are going to export jobs, at the very least make something worth buying. And if the GOP wants to associate with her, that is their business, not mine.
4. Katie | 09.29.09
I would vote for a monkey before I vote for Boxer. She is a horrible senator, and a joke to the state. Now with her wanting to push on parent’s rights…she can’t get out of office fast enough.
5. Bill | 09.29.09
Ms Fiorina’s track record as CEO of HP/Compaq - near failure. Luckily the BoD of HP could fire her before she did more damage. California voters would be stuck with her for 6 years, and imagine what it would be like if she did to the U.S. what she did to HP?
I understand that republicans like to chose “CEO” types as politicians - nothing wrong with that if it demonstrates that they can successfully lead. But why do they have such an affinity for CEO’s who have been such utter failures….W? Fiorina?…..
6. Timmy | 09.29.09
Boxer and Fiorina would give us no choice in California. Boxer is horrible, but Fiorina ran a company where all she wanted was power and to be the celebrity. She exacted vengeance on any manager who ever opposed her, refused to share her power with someone who might know how to do operations… and ultimately got fired for it leaving the company to be cannibalized by her successor. Her track record shows her as being power hungry, but not a true leader. Her moral compass is powered by personal gain, not the good of others. As for Boxer…. she speaks for herself. Can we please get someone else for California?
7. Mike in San Diego | 09.29.09
Boxer - Fienstein and Pelosi MUST GO
ANYONE else is better than these three. VOTE THEM OUT OVER THE NEXT 3 YEARS
California and the Country needs to get RIGHT and sooner the better. Trust no Politician - Make them accountable. One term of keeping promises or you’re voted out.
8. TC | 09.29.09
Like Meg, another unqualified rich beyond belief egomaniac running for office. Again, this time she happens to be female. Both proof that females can run large companies into the ground just as well as men can. Like I said about Meg last week, buy a sports team like other narcissistic egomaniacs who raided the corporate coffers and laid off thousands and bailed out with golden parachutes the last decade when things got tough and they screwed up. If this doesn’t prove that the US needs public campaign finance I don’t know what does.
The good ol’ USA, the best government money can buy!
9. Jack | 09.29.09
No, not another former CEO trying to run government! How does Carly, a multi-millionaire with financial security, know about the lives and insecurity faced by the average worker or the unemployed. Afterall, she has her millions, pension, and health insurance. How can she know the daily worries and insecurities faced by the average guy who has to support a family and kids on a shrinking wage and who worries everyday whether he will be the one getting the pink slip tomorrow.
10. Edward | 09.29.09
A perfect choice for the current crop who run the Republic Party. She drove a company into the ground. They tried to drive a country into the ground. A great match. We’ll be trying to recover from the “CEO presidency” of George Bush and company for decades. We might as well try a CEO senator.
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1. California GOP | 09.28.09
Under “less than ideal conditions” - she was FIRED for nearly destroying the company. And don’t believe the Carly talk about “setting up HP for future success”. That’s like saying Hitler was responsible for the future rise of the European Union.
Carly - totally incompetent at everything except selling herself to stupid old white men.