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profile in the November 29, 1999, New Republic of Bush communications
director Karen Hughes contains a passage that suggests the Texas governor
said he had not been arrested after 1968. The article, entitled
"The Enforcer," by Michelle Cottle, relates a conversation between Bush
and Wayne Slater regarding the governor's arrest record. Slater, of the
Dallas Morning News, has recalled the conversation for Cottle.
As of today, the Bush camp is disputing the meaning of this conversation.
It's widely recognized that Bush trusts Hughes implicitly and seeks her
advice on anything involving message or political positioning. "My sense
of Karen is that she is one of the few people who is able to interrupt,
contradict, and in other ways speak as an adult and a peer to Bush," says
[Tucker] Carlson. In the message department, Hughes's primacy is absolute.
For instance, although several members of Team Bush — including [Karl]
Rove — felt the governor should come out early with multiple policy
prescriptions, Hughes favored focusing on two or three broad themes. The
governor apparently agreed with her.
Hughes's role, however, goes beyond that of a trusted adviser. "She
can be a bit of a mother hen, and you can tell he wants her to do that.
He kind of relies on her to do that," says David Yepsen, a veteran political
reporter with The Des Moines Register. "I've never seen her argue
with him, but she'll prompt, she'll flesh out — things like that."
(At the risk of waxing Freudian, you can't help but notice the similarities,
in both physique and character, between Hughes and George W.'s mama,
Barbara.) At press conferences, notes Wayne Slater, "when somebody asks
something or says something and Bush isn't responding well enough, she'll
be off to the side; Bush will instinctively stop — this has gone
on for years — and all heads will turn to her as she explains something
real loud. It happens so often that he instinctively falls back and
lets her do it."
Indeed, it's Hughes's message discipline that gives Bush the freedom
to be the friendly good old boy that voters (and the media) embrace.
"Bush is a chatty guy who loves an audience," says Carlson. "He's very
good at bullshitting with the guys. That's very appealing." But it can
also be dangerous, and Bush counts on Hughes to keep him on track. Jay
Root recalls one interview in which Bush was being slightly more talkative
than usual. "He said a couple of things that might have gone farther
than she might have said," says Root. Hughes didn't stop the governor,
but at one point she commented, "My, isn't he being expansive today."
Other times Hughes simply shuts down the conversation. Just after the
governor's reelection in 1998, Slater pressed Bush about whether he
had ever been arrested. "He said, 'After 1968? No.' I said, 'What about
before 1968?' He said, 'Well…' and at that moment Karen stepped
in and said, 'Wait a minute, I've not heard this.' She clearly wasn't
prepared for whatever it was he was about to say, and he shut up." Slater
argued that it was better for the governor to deal with any revelations
sooner rather than later, and Bush agreed to get back to him on the
matter. "To this day I have no idea what he was going to say," says
Slater. "After she got to him, he shut up."
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