Romney Sets Foray Into Giuliani Country

BOSTON — Governor Romney of Massachusetts is planning to plunge into the heart of Giuliani country next week in an attempt to raise big dollars for his campaign.

The Romney campaign has scheduled a $2,300-a-head leadership reception, to be followed by a general reception at $500 a ticket, for March 21 at the Sheraton New York Hotel and Towers. Mayor Giuliani's campaign is holding a $2,300-a-person fund-raiser at the same location tomorrow, at which the master of ceremonies will be comedian and television personality Dennis Miller.

The receptions come as all the presidential campaigns are engaged in a round of furious fund-raising activity, typical for the first quarter in the year prior to the presidential election. How a candidate performs in the first three months of this year will determine the so-called Money Primary, the first major test of presidential campaigns.

While Mr. Giuliani served as a popular mayor of New York, he doesn't yet have all of the city's big donors locked up. Next week's Romney event will be headlined by the co-chairmen of Mr. Romney's finance committee in New York, a quintet of heavy hitters — Stanley Druckenmiller of Duquesne Capital Management; William Harrison; Stephen Lessing of Lehman Brothers; Harvey Schiller of
GlobalOptions Group; Julian Robertson, the founder of Tiger Management Company, and William Weld, the former governor of Massachusetts and an attorney at McDermott, Will & Emery.

Mr. Romney, the founder of Bain Capital, an investment firm, has a host of relationships throughout the financial community. While Mr. Druckenmiller worked formerly with investor George Soros, his political résumé differs from that of his former colleague. Mr. Druckenmiller donated $2,000 to Mr. Giuliani's Senate campaign in 1999 when his opponent looked to be Hillary Clinton, according to the Federal Election Commission. He also gave $5,000 to Mr. Giuliani's political action committee in 2004, as well as $1,000 to the Republican candidate who replaced Mr. Giuliani in 2000, Rick Lazio.

Mr. Robertson, of Tiger Management, divvied out $995,000 in soft money during a 10-year period, as well as another $196,630 to an array of candidates — mostly, but not all, Republicans — among them President Bush, presidential candidate Steve Forbes, Charles Schumer for his 1997 Senate campaign, and Senator Lieberman.

Mr. Romney is also making use of his ties to the Olympic world. Between 1999 and 2002, Mr. Romney, serving as the chief executive officer of the Salt Lake City Organizing Committee, transformed the Winter Olympics from a fiscal fiasco into a success. Mr. Schiller is a former executive director of the U.S. Olympic Committee and CEO of YankeeNets.

Mr. Romney has also won friends for his policy positions. Philip Rosen, a partner at Weil, Gotshal & Manges, accompanied Mr. Romney during his trip to Israel earlier this year. Mr. Rosen, a member of the host committee for the March 21 event, went with Mr. Romney to the Gaza Strip, the West Bank, and the Lebanese border within sight of Hezbollah flags. Visiting the Gaza Strip, Mr. Romney "saw that some of the places the Jewish communities were evacuated from were the same places they've been firing on the Jewish state," Mr. Rosen, a board member of the Republican Jewish Coalition and an ally of Likud politician Benjamin Netanyahu, said. "He saw that had the evacuation not taken place, the range, and the distance of the missile firing would not have been possible."

Mr. Rosen was also with Mr. Romney when he made a strong speech warning of the danger of Iran at the Herzliya Conference. "The two days in Israel convinced me this guy has a clarity I've rarely seen in guys on the issues I care about," Mr. Rosen said. He added that Mr. Romney also helped pull together a group of pension fund leaders to put the idea of divesting from companies who do business with Iran on the table. "It's not just talking, it's doing."

Mr. Rosen emphasized that while he supported Mr. Romney, he also viewed Mr. Giuliani favorably. "I support Mayor Giuliani. I think if Governor Romney wasn't running, there's a chance that I would have been in the Giuliani camp," Mr. Rosen said, adding, "I'm a big fan of Rudy Giuliani."

Robert Ryan, a longtime Republican operative in New York politics, warned against reading too much into these early fund-raising efforts. "It's so early that people are playing the field," Mr. Ryan said. "People are hedging their bets. I don't think any candidate who is coming to New York is going to be shut out because either Hillary Clinton or Rudy Giuliani are from the state."