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By JUANA SUMMERS | 7/15/11 4:34 PM EDT
John Bolton’s hasn’t decided whether he’ll get in to the presidential campaign, but he’s getting into the debate.
The former U.N. ambassador has launched a new group, Decide America, aimed at increasing the level of dialogue about national security, with a special eye on the 2012 elections.
“The genesis was a concern on the ambassador’s part that national security was being ignored in the public discourse,” Decide America executive director Mark Groombridge said. “If you look at it, for example, in the CNN debate, it wasn’t until the last 20 minutes that John King even raised the issue of national security.”
Bolton, who has a long career in government that started at the U.S. Agency for International Development during the Reagan administration, has long talked about an opening for a Republican presidential candidate with foreign policy experience among the current crop of GOP candidates. He’d talked about filling that role himself, but he’s shown few signs of visible political movement in recent month.
Given the tax laws Decide America is subject to as a project of the 501(c)4 organization Citizen Guardian and the potential thorny issues Bolton would face as if he did launch a political campaign while leading the group, its launch might be the clearest sign yet that Bolton won’t be breaking out the bunting.
“Decide America is in no way connected to any type of campaign,” Groombridge, a longtime associate of Bolton’s, said. “Any campaign-related decision is something that John needs to make in close consultation with his family.”
“The only thing I know is what he’s said publicly, which is that he intends to make a decision by Labor Day,” Groombridge added.
But Bolton hasn’t been making any moves that suggest his decision will be yes.
Since January, he’s made just one trip to an early primary state – to Iowa, where he spoke at Rep. Steve King’s Conservative Principles conference — and isn’t scheduled to be in New Hampshire until a speech to the Nashua Republican City Committee set for Sept. 8. Even an Independence Day speech at a tea party rally in Philadelphia was devoid of any mention of a campaign.
Bolton is a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, where he keeps his office, but has not staffed up for a presidential run, though he said he has spoken with fundraisers, pollsters and political consultants in early states.
And Fox News doesn’t seem to think he’s running — though the network dropped Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum from their contracts once their presidential campaigns began to take shape, Bolton, like former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, is still on the payroll as a contributor.
Bolton wasn’t available for an interview — he’s been traveling overseas for more than a week. He’s been traveling often, most recently to Jerusalem with a group of prominent international political figures, led by former Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar as part of the “Friends of Israel Initiative,” an effort to fight the Palestinian bid for UN recognition.
While there, Bolton told the Jerusalem Post that Obama is “the most anti-Israel president in the history of the state.”
Bolton also offered a characteristically hawkish view of the Obama administration’s policies in the Middle East when he testified before the House Foreign Affairs committee on Iran and Syria, saying that the administration views Israel with “disdain.”
“If this is how the United States now treats close friends, how will it treat mere allies of convenience when convenience disappears?” he asked.
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