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 Touting one's humble beginnings has been part of U.S. presidential
contenders' playbook going back to Abraham Lincoln's talk of his log
cabin youth. But the 2016 hopefuls are working harder than ever to
convince voters they are just like them.
In burnishing their working- and middle-class credentials the
hopefuls are following a shift in the political debate from jobs and
a fragile economic recovery during the 2012 campaign to one now
centered on income inequality.
That reflects a deepening sense that seven years after the Great
Recession any gains have gone to the wealthy, while millions of
Americans continue to struggle.
"The divide between the governing elite and the voters has never
been so big," said David Carney, a New Hampshire-based Republican
strategist.
Most of today's presidential candidates, he noted, come from
privileged backgrounds, leaving them open to criticism that they
can't relate to the money worries of so many families.
John Weaver, a former advisor to 2008 Republican nominee John
McCain, said candidates understand that.
"Wide swathes of the country, geographically and demographically,
have been left behind. Politicians are clever enough to figure that
out."
 Many respondents in Reuters polls say a candidate's wealth would
influence how they vote. The number of those who say they would be
much less or somewhat less likely to support a "very wealthy"
presidential candidate rose to 42 percent in March 2015 from 39
percent in November 2012.
To be sure, Americans have elected plenty of rich presidents, such
as John F. Kennedy in 1960.
Tim Albrecht, a Republican strategist from Iowa, calls the current
phenomenon of candidates playing down their wealth "the Romney
effect."
Mitt Romney, the 2012 Republican nominee, often came across as
distant or indifferent, a factor in his general election loss. The
$250 million fortune he amassed as a co-founder of private equity
firm Bain Capital didn't help.
HUMBLER THAN THOU
With a crowded field - at least 12 Republican hopefuls have declared
so far - even just a few percentage points could separate front
runners from also rans, making it crucial to appeal to as many
people as possible.
Thus the humble roots card from many candidates, even if most are
still among the wealthiest Americans.
While many of them skew quite wealthy - such as former
Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, worth about $59 million - a few
have more modest nest eggs, such as Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker,
whose most recent financial disclosure suggests a net worth that is
perhaps in the tens of thousands, but is possibly even negative.
The humbler-than-thou game nonetheless favors candidates such as
Florida Senator Marco Rubio, who often talks of his Cuban immigrant
parents, his father a bartender, his mother a maid, and his own
student debt. It is no coincidence that reforming student loans is
one of his policy proposals.
His net worth was $443,509 in 2013, according to the Center for
Responsive Politics, a non-profit group that tracks money in U.S.
politics.
And Walker often talks about penny pinching, bragging in New
Hampshire this year that he once stacked so many coupons and
discounts that he bought a sweater at discount department store
Kohl's for $1. His disclosure for the 2014 calendar year shows a
modest range of assets.
At the other end of the spectrum are Republicans Fiorina and former
Florida Governor Jeb Bush and Democrat Hillary Clinton.
They are most vulnerable to criticism that they are out of touch not
just because of their considerable personal wealth but also because
of their association with powerful political families.
Clinton's husband, former President Bill Clinton, was ridiculed when
he said recently he would keep giving paid speeches as she runs for
office to "pay our bills."
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He charges well into the hundreds of thousands of dollars for his
speeches. The couple have earned more than $25 million for speeches
since 2014 alone.
Hillary Clinton appears acutely aware that Republican opponents and
others could make her wealth an issue in the campaign. At her first
rally on Saturday, Clinton talked about her mother's childhood:
lacking food as a child, working as a housemaid in her teens.
Bush, the scion of a wealthy family, has earned millions since
stepping down as governor, including $3.2 million in board fees and
stock grants, the New York Times reported in 2014. He has so far
avoided discussing the issue on the trail.
TALKING MORE ABOUT CLASS
Jesse Rhodes, a professor of political science at the University of
Massachusetts Amherst, said deepening economic inequality in the
United States has been accompanied by more frequent and more
positive references to class by politicians.
Rhodes co-authored a recent paper that analyzed party materials
going back to the 1952 campaign and showed a rising use of terms
such as lower-, working-, or middle-class.
Fiorina has also pushed back against being tagged as elite.
She's often talked about working as a secretary in a small real
estate firm early in her career, rather than her wealth or her
Stanford University education.
According to a recent Federal Election Commission disclosure, she
and her husband are worth around $59 million.
New Jersey Governor Chris Christie says he doesn't consider himself
a wealthy man. According to tax documents released by his office, he
and his wife made almost $700,000 in 2013.
Mike Huckabee, the former governor of Arkansas, talks of being born
"blue collar, not blue blood." Nevertheless, he is now reportedly
worth seven figures, in part thanks to a contract at Fox News
reportedly worth $500,000 per year.
"Governor Huckabee is the son of a small town firefighter from Hope,
Arkansas. The governor worked numerous, full-time jobs to put
himself through school," a Huckabee spokeswoman, Alice Stewart, said
when asked whether voters might perceive him as unable to relate to
their everyday financial concerns.
A review of candidacy kick-off speeches from 2012 and 2016
candidates shows a marked shift: In the current crop of speeches,
not only do more hopefuls talk about their own or their parents'
working-class backgrounds, they spend considerably more time on
those subjects.
Republican Senator Ted Cruz, for example, this year talked about his
mother's "working class family" and his father starting out making
50 cents an hour as a dishwasher.
Not all White House contenders feel they need to play down their
wealth.
Real estate mogul Donald Trump made it a key plank of his election
platform when he announced his White House run on Tuesday, boasting
he had a net worth of $8.7 billion and that he would use his
billions to fund his campaign.
"I'm really rich, I'll tell you that," he said.
(Additional reporting by Alana Wise; Editing by Tomasz Janowski and
Ross Colvin)
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