First Lady Raises Funds For Sen. Murray Senator’s ‘Real Life’ Politics Praised; She All But Announces Campaign Bid

First lady Hillary Rodham Clinton gave Sen. Patty Murray’s 1998 re-election campaign an early kickoff Monday, raising funds and rousing the troops for Murray’s reprise of her “mom in tennis shoes” pitch.

Clinton, whose stopover raised nearly $200,000 for Murray and other Democratic Senate hopefuls around the country, made no mention of a mild earthquake that rumbled through the region during her midday appearances. But she made a case for shaking up the nation’s politics with Murray-style “humanization” of issues.

Clinton said Murray - one of nine women senators - is on the Republicans’ “most wanted” list and that her re-election should not be taken for granted.

But Murray’s persona and issues should have strong appeal, the first lady said.

While about 70 of the 100 senators are millionaires, Murray’s roots are modest and she “hasn’t lost touch with what goes on around the kitchen table, and around the water cooler and at the soccer game,” Clinton told a cheering crowd of more than 600 Democratic Party faithful.

Murray specializes in “real-life political issues,” she said.

It was a familiar theme, one that Murray used to capture an open Senate seat in 1992. Murray, who hasn’t formally announced her re-election bid, all but made it official Monday.

“Our work is not done yet,” she told her annual Golden Tennis Shoe Award luncheon to honor citizen activists. “I am not done yet. There is so much left to do.”

Murray, a Seattle-area liberal finishing up her first term, has no declared opposition in the September 1998 primary and leads in the early polls. U.S. Rep. Linda Smith, a conservative Republican who won the nomination for her House seat with a last-minute write-in campaign, already is campaigning for the GOP nomination.

Murray’s luncheon drew a largely female audience Monday, and the main speakers were all women - Clinton, the senator and the state’s first lady, Mona Lee Locke. The one man with a speaking part, King County Executive Ron Sims, blew his lines, introducing Clinton as “Hillary Rodman Clinton,” apparently having watched too much Chicago Bulls basketball lately.

But Clinton said concerns about children, family, health care, medical and family leave - and other issues Murray and other Democrats have been raising - shouldn’t be considered just the province of women.