Giuliani's Daughter Caroline Backs Barrack Obama
August 6, 2007
Is Giuliani’s Daughter an Obama Supporter?
By MARC SANTORA
Rudolph W. Giuliani’s daughter, Caroline, has done her best to keep out of the spotlight as her father runs for president, choosing to keep complicated family matters private. And for his part, Mr. Giuliani has tried to shield both her and his son, Andrew, from attention.
But the very public nature of the way young adults socialize via the Internet, posting private musings for all the world to see, thrust her into the limelight today with word that her online profile suggested she supported Senator Barack Obama’s presidential bid.
On her profile in Facebook, the popular online social networking site, Ms. Giuliani, 17, listed her political views as “liberal” and noted her membership in a group called “Barack Obama (One Million Strong for Barack).”
As word of her supposed Democratic allegiances ricocheted across the Internet after the online magazine Slate broke the news, visitors to her profile found that she had already moved to alter history. She quit the Obama fan club at 6:01 a.m., and, after Slate posted its article, she took down her entire page.
Mr. Giuliani alluded to his daughter’s differing political outlook during a campaign stop in Iowa, noting, with apparent regret, that his children “don’t work on my campaign.”
“My daughter, my daughter I love very much; I have great respect for her and I’m really proud of her,” he said. “I don’t comment on children because I want to give them the maximum degree of privacy.” Mr Obama, who was campaigning in Le Mars, Iowa, was asked what he thought about the support from such an unexpected corner.
“That’s very nice,” Mr. Obama said. “We think it’s wonderful that we are attracting support from young people all across the country. I can’t wait to meet her.”
Facebook is a social networking Web site that launched in 2004 and now claims to have about 30 million active members. Caroline Giuliani’s profile was available only to people who attended Trinity, her high school in Manhattan, or Harvard University, where she will soon be enrolled.
There are more than 500 groups on Facebook dedicated to the Obama campaign. The one that Ms. Giuliani signed up for is one of the largest, with over 300,000 members.
Mr. Giuliani does have an account on the other major social networking site, MySpace, where “Hail to the Chief” greets visitors. He currently has 7,083 friends. Mr. Obama’s MySpace page shows more than 160,000 friends.
But Mr. Giuliani, alone among the major candidates in either party, has no profile on Facebook. Even if his daughter wanted to “friend” him, she could not.
Ben Werschkul contributed reporting from Clear Lake, Iowa, and Jeff Zeleny from Le Mars, Iowa.
Copyright 2007 The New York Times Company
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