WASHINGTON – He may be struggling to gain traction in the Republican presidential race, but Jon Huntsman’s adult daughters – dubbed the Huntsman Hotties – are providing some of the best entertainment of the campaign.
Abby, 25, Liddy, 23, and Mary Anne Huntsman, 26, are front and centre in their father’s long-shot bid to win the Republican presidential nomination, tweeting regularly under the handle Jon2012Girls to promote his campaign.
Fresh off donning fake moustaches to mock Herman Cain’s notorious “smoking man” campaign ad with a YouTube spot of their own, the eldest of Huntsman’s seven children have now recorded a song to the tune of Justin Timberlake’s dance hit “SexyBack,” with the chorus: “We’re bringing Huntsman back.”
In the tune, the girls call the rest of the Republican field a “circus act,” taking good-natured aim at almost all of them by name while crooning that their father stands for “sanity.”
“Herman Cain, we like your pizza but you can’t explain how 9-9-9 will get us back in shape,” they sing in reference to Cain’s tax plan. “So pass the pizza, man, we won’t complain.”
They pointed their Twitter followers to a link to the song with this tweet: “Spotted: Herman Cain rolling up in style to the Hilton Garden Inn in Manchester with a 6 car motorcade … jamming to this.”
Cain isn’t the only target of their parody song. The girls also skewer Mitt Romney’s flip-flops on abortion, Newt Gingrich’s hostility towards the news media and Texas Gov. Rick Perry’s verbal blunders.
Huntsman’s campaign staff reportedly didn’t authorize the song, with one of them telling the Washington Post on Thursday that the girls have “kind of gone rogue.”
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Staffers have long been uneasy about the Jon2012 Twitter stream – 15,000 followers strong and growing. It features some unvetted and zany tweets, including one that featured a photo of Liddy “planking” a hotel room chair.
“Any suggestions for Orlando hotspots?”read the accompanying message. “Clearly bored. Plank you and good night.”
Another took aim at Romney: “How does Romney know anything about China? He’s only been there once and it was for the Olympics. Panda Express doesn’t count.”
The girls admitted in a recent New Yorker interview that the Panda Express tweet, in particular, caused some consternation among their father’s campaign workers. They were also baffled when the girls referred to the moustache of David Axelrod, a chief strategist for President Barack Obama, as a “flavour saver,” not understanding the reference and then fearing it was something pornographic.
By all accounts, Liddy, the youngest of the Jon2012Girls, is the creative force behind their efforts. Her dream is to become a writer for “Saturday Night Live.”
“She’s the wild child,” Abby Huntsman told the New Yorker. “She is the No. 1 reason we feel my dad is qualified to be president: because he came out alive after raising her.”
Liddy has indeed subjected her father to the types of headaches that will cause spasms of recognition to any parent of a headstrong teenager.
At 16, when her father was in a hard-fought race to become Utah governor, Liddy chose the son of his Democratic opponent as her new boyfriend. She told her dad he couldn’t win the 2004 election because the boy was so upset about his own father’s impending loss.
Huntsman, instead, sat down in front of the girl’s computer, posed as his daughter in an instant message exchange and attempted to console the tearful boy.
Seven years later, and the former China ambassador’s kindness has apparently been rewarded.
“We’re behind the guy who’s right on track,” croon the girls in “Huntsman’s Back” as they refer to their father as “the real job creator” with the “awesome China policy.”
The increasing popularity of the Jon2012Girls comes as Huntsman struggles to pull himself out of single digits in polls of Republican primary voters. His failure to resonate has puzzled some pundits who note the telegenic candidate’s solid record of job creation in Utah, his foreign policy experience, his smarts, his electability potential and a large, loving and photogenic family.
While a recent poll put him at 11 per cent in New Hampshire, one Republican observer doesn’t think he has a chance of becoming the party’s next flavour of the month.
“He doesn’t really have a natural constituency in the Republican party, that’s the problem,” said Jack Pitney, a one-time congressional aide who now teaches politics at Claremont McKenna College in California.
“His big issue is foreign policy, but that doesn’t seem to be exciting a lot of Republican voters right now. It just doesn’t bring the crowds to their feet. And even though he has a solid conservative record, he’s identified himself as a moderate on a lot of issues, and that doesn’t sell to Republican primary voters.”
Will his daughters generate some buzz and enthusiasm among the young and wired of the Republican party?
“It’s an amusing sideshow, but it isn’t going to change anything,” Pitney said.
“After all, if we elected candidates who had colourful daughters, John McCain would be president right now.”
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