Pahrump gets a look at Dodd, up close

Michael J. Mishak

Sunday, April 15, 2007 | 7:23 a.m.

U.S. Sen. Chris Dodd leaned hard into the kitchen table at Fire Station No. 55 in North Las Vegas on Friday, perched on the edge of his seat, hands clasped, introducing himself and his vision for America to a group of eight firefighters.

The firefighters, clutching cups of coffee, stared back, listening intently as Dodd, a Democratic presidential candidate, made his case.

A day earlier, the group had been asking themselves, "Chris who?"

"None of us recognized him immediately," firefighter Dennis McAdorey said. "We had to Google him."

Dodd, who often jokes about not being recognized in his home state of Connecticut, is working to change that. Despite spending 33 years in the House and Senate, authoring influential legislation such as the Family and Medical Leave Act, he's competing against the margin of error in local and national polls on the 2008 presidential race.

Over the past two weeks, the top three Democratic contenders have aggressively courted voters in Iowa and New Hampshire. Nevada, at least for the moment, is where second-tier candidates such as Dodd are making a stand.

And voters, by most accounts, are excited, savvy and eager to participate in the process.

This is the reality for the Dodd campaign: It's Bally's, not Bellagio. The long - shot candidate travels by commercial airline and tours the state in a minivan, accompanied by a handful of staffers, including the Nevada state director , who started work only last week.

"You give a guy like me a chance," he told about 50 people at a town hall-style meeting Friday night in Pahrump . "I'm out here working hard. I don't have as much money as the other candidates. But I don't think people want to be told by the national media that this race is over with."

Competing against the well-heeled, star-studded campaigns of anointed frontrunners Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama and John Edwards, Dodd has been treated like an also-ran from the start. His campaign is eager for attention, hungry to break out of the pack.

But when reporters came around last week, it wasn't to talk about the speech he made in Iowa calling for the withdrawal of troops from Iraq and a funding cutoff for the war by March 31, 2008. They wanted to talk about Don Imus, the radio talk-show host whose racist insult against the Rutgers University women's basketball team had landed him in the media's cross hairs - and cost him his job. Dodd holds the distinction of being the only candidate to launch his bid for the presidency on Imus' show.

Luckily for the Dodd campaign, Nevadans weren't interested in hearing about "all that crap," as a Pahrump resident put it. The firefighters at the kitchen table in North Las Vegas, for instance, wanted to talk about government funding for emergency workers, health care, the methamphetamine epidemic, energy independence and the war in Iraq.

It's in these small settings that Dodd says he functions best. It's also the way he says he's won eight elections in Connecticut - and he hopes it will earn him critical support among the grass roots in the early states on the road to the White House.

Dodd seems to be enjoying it all. He's quick to crack jokes in speeches and conversations, and connects with crowds through personal stories, told from the vantage point of a late-in-life father. At 62, Dodd has daughters ages 2 and 5, which has yielded this signature one-liner: "I'm probably the only candidate who gets mailings from AARP and diaper services."

In Pahrump, Dodd was a hit.

After all, his visit was historic. Nye County, let alone Pahrump, had never been visited by a presidential candidate, said Loyle Scarlett, a county party official.

"We're lucky if we can get somebody that's running for a state office to show up out here," Scarlett said.

Dodd emphasized his Western connections, noting that his wife, Jackie, is from Utah, and that he and his family have spent a significant amount of time in that state's "Happy Valley." He told the crowd he was familiar with growth and how it was affecting communities across the Southwest, particularly as it relates to water, and the lack of it.

For their part, the crowd was lively, eager to engage Dodd on issues, including global warming, health care, outsourcing, veterans' benefits, the national debt and government contracting in Iraq.

His biggest applause came when he was asked about illegal immigration.

Pahrump found itself in the national spotlight last year when it passed - then later repealed - an ordinance making English the official language of town business and placing restrictions on flying foreign flags.

As a start, Dodd, a fluent Spanish speaker, said he favored civil and criminal penalties for employers that hire undocumented workers. Although immigrants' culture and language should be preserved, he added, they should learn English.

Still, the long-term viability of Dodd's campaign wasn't lost on the crowd.

"I'm very happy with him," said Bob Parker, who's 75 and has lived in Pahrump for a decade. "He understands the issues. Whether he's going to have enough money to be a frontrunner is something else though."

With about $9 million in the bank, Dodd says he's in the race for the long haul.

"I had a great time," he said, getting into his minivan. "I'll be back."

Nevada will be waiting.

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