McCloskey to stand

Press, Volume CXI, Issue 32567, 29 March 1971, Page 15

McCloskey to stand

(N.Z. Press Assn.—Copyright) LOS ANGELES, March 28. Senator Paul McCloskey, Republican, will establish a campaign staff next month to challenge President Nixon in the 1972 Presidential primaries, the “Los Angeles Times” reports. A frequent critic of Mr Nixon’s Vietnam war policies, Senator McCloskey said yesterdav that his decision to run was partly based on pledges of financial support, including a large pledge of an undisclosed amount from the Los Angeles millionaire industrialist, Mr Norton Simon. Other reasons cited by Senator McCloskey were offers by more than 3000 people to work in his campaign, and the

failure of any other nation-ally-prominent Republican to challenge Mr Nixon.

A decorated Korean War Marine officer. Senator McCloskey said that he had been inundated with offers of support since his speech at Stanford University on February 11, when he had proposed a national debate on an impeachment of Mr Nixon, and had alleged that the President stepped beyond his constitutional authority in providing American troop support for the Laos and Cambodian operations.

Mr McCloskey said that he had tried unsuccessfully to persuade five Republican liberals to enter the primaries: Senators Mark Hatfield (Oregon), Charles Mathias (Maryland), and Charles Percy (Illinois), Mr John Lindsay (the Mayor of New York city) and Mr John Gardner, a former Secretary of Health, Education and Welfare.