By Gregory Korte and Spencer Hunt
The Cincinnati Enquirer

COLUMBUS - During his six-month flirtation with a return to politics, Jerry Springer spent almost $1 million of his own money to find out what he had suspected all along: that it would be impossible for voters to separate Springer the politician from Springer the talk show host.

Wednesday, he announced that he would not seek the Democratic nomination for the U.S. Senate seat now held by Republican George Voinovich, leaving little-known Cleveland state Sen. Eric Fingerhut the only Democrat in the race.

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"For me to be heard, I can no longer be doing the show," he said to a room packed with state, national and international news media. "There has to be separation between my show and my entering the public arena."

He said a race for the U.S. Senate in 2004 should be about substantive issues "and not a race about the three transvestites and a midget on yesterday's show - which, by the way, was a great show."

A photographer peers from behind a potted plant as Springer makes his announcement. (Michael E. Keating photo) | ZOOM |

Springer made no apologies for his talk show, which in 13 years has transformed itself from a Cincinnati-based, Phil Donahue-style public affairs program to its current incarnation, a circus-like display of strippers, fistfights and jilted lovers.

To run a campaign of national importance against an entrenched incumbent - and then fly to Chicago a few times a week to tape the show - would have been difficult under the best of circumstances, he said.

His decision to exit the Senate race, which Springer characterized as "the hardest decision I ever remember having to make," came the day before - and five days after his self-imposed end-of-July deadline. He said the choice was so agonizing that "I went to sleep last night not knowing for sure."

To answer that question, Springer's exploratory campaign used two statewide polls, several focus groups in four different cities, and a tour of Democratic events in more than half of Ohio's 88 counties.

The result, Springer and his aides said, was that people were receptive to the message - but not always the messenger.

They declined to give specific poll numbers, but said the support in Cincinnati - where Springer was elected to City Council five times and selected mayor once before losing a Democratic primary for governor and entering a 10-year career as a news anchor - were always higher.

GERALD N. SPRINGER

Born: Feb. 13, 1944, in London, England; emigrated to Queens, N.Y., in 1949. Education: Bachelor's in political science, Tulane University, 1965; law degree, Northwestern University, 1968. Political career: Aide to Robert F. Kennedy's presidential campaign, 1968; led campaign to lower Ohio's voting age to 19, 1969; ran unsuccessfully for Congress, 1970; Cincinnati City Council, 1971-74, 1975-1981; mayor, 1977-78; sought nomination for Ohio governor, 1982. Broadcast career: News anchor, WLWT (Channel 5), 1982-1993; host, Jerry Springer Show, 1991-present. Residence: Chicago and Sarasota, Fla. Family: Wife, Micki, and one adult daughter.

National Democrats were another matter.

While Springer went out of his way to thank Ohio Democratic Party Chairman Dennis White and other local Democratic leaders, Springer's advisers were fuming Wednesday over the lack of support from Washington.

Jon Corzine, the New Jersey senator charged with helping other Democrats get elected to the Senate, said publicly that Springer was not his "first choice."

But even as he said that, he sent an emissary from the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee to Cincinnati Tuesday.

"He didn't come to say, 'Don't run,' " said Springer's chief strategist, Mike Ford. "He could have done that with a phone call."

Ford declined to give specifics of the conversation, saying he didn't want to "put a senator in a bad spot."

A spokesman for the national committee confirmed that executive director Andrew Grossman met with Springer, but said Springer may have misinterpreted the overture.

"The purpose of the meeting was simply to ascertain what Springer's intent was going to be, to try to get a sense of what he was going to do," said Mike Siegel. "Some people characterized it as urging him to run. That's inaccurate."

Regardless, the conflicting accounts of the hours leading up to the announcement underscores what an embarrassment Springer had become for the national party. Springer said he underestimated how much the campaign would become a national story.

"Jon Corzine, God bless him, can say what he wants. He can go buy the next election," Ford said of the New Jersey senator, who used $60 million of his own money to help win his seat. "If we had made this race, we would have run against Corzine and against (Tom) Daschle, because they're the ones who left us with a message-free Democratic Party."

"Let's face it, the Democratic Party has turned into an incredibly boring institution," Ford said.

Tom Daschle, the Senate minority leader, has also been hostile to a Springer candidacy, saying, "I think we can do a lot better than that."

Springer was more diplomatic.

"Say what you want about Republicans. They're wrong, but at least they have a message. We're all over the place - whining, complaining, but not giving people a better way."

So what's next for Springer?

A run against Sen. Mike DeWine in 2006 ... a liberal talk radio show to rival Rush Limbaugh ... a return to the Cincinnati mayor's office, assuming Democrat Charlie Luken doesn't run in 2005? All possible, Springer says.

For now, he has at least another season of the Jerry Springer Show left on his contract, with the production company's option to pick up another season after that.

"I'm going to take a couple of weeks to not think about this," Springer said. "All options are open. I just want to be helpful. There's no other agenda."

The only thing Springer promised is that he wouldn't make public his intentions until he was absolutely sure. Wednesday marked the second time he flirted with a U.S. Senate run - the first being a three-week dalliance in 1999.

"If I ever decide to be a candidate again, you'll know. And it won't be, 'I'm thinking about it.' "

Everyone who contributed to his exploratory campaign will get their money back, he said.

Most of the contributions came via solicitations from a Web site, Runjerryrun.com (about $50,000) and a 30-minute infomercial that ran coast-to-coast for three weeks - but only in a few eastern Ohio markets ($25,000).

In a news conference later on the Statehouse steps, Fingerhut spoke for a quarter as long and to about half as many television cameras.

Every question reporters asked was about Springer. Every answer Fingerhut gave was about Voinovich.

"I've never thought Jerry's candidacy was good for Ohio, and if it's not good for Ohio, it's not good for a campaign to change the face of Ohio," he said.

White, the state Democratic Party chairman, said Springer's candidacy was "very distracting" for voters who should be concentrating on important issues, like the sorry state of the Ohio economy.

"The media is talking about Jerry Springer, not the 50,000 Ohioans whose homes were foreclosed on because of George (Voinovich's) and George (Bush's) policies," White said.

For his part, Voinovich stayed out of the Springer spotlight Wednesday, calling it "an issue for Ohio's Democratic voters."

But Ohio GOP Chairman Robert Bennett said he never considered Springer a serious candidate. Still he estimated that a run against Springer could have cost Republicans and Voinovich as much as $20 million.

He said Springer's decision not to run saved "probably about $10 (million) to $12 million."

As Springer left his hotel Wednesday afternoon for an appearance on CNN, he signed autographs for Yolanda Queen and her mother, Jan, from the southern Ohio town of Jackson.

"He came to our county, and it was like he was one of us," said Yolanda Queen, who works with the mentally ill and is a local party official. "He knows that Ohio has another part of the state. Most of them think the world revolves around Cuyahoga County." She predicted Springer would be back someday.

"When he's ready to run, I'm ready to help," she said. "He's made people stop and think. This effort hasn't been for nothing."

E-mail gkorte@enquirer com and shunt@enquirer.com

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