Monday, April 17, 2000
Fighting for right to raise money
McConnell fierce foe of campaign reform
BY Derrick DePledge
Enquirer Washington Bureau
Senator McConnell
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WASHINGTON — Bradley Smith already had been likened to Larry Flynt, Slobodan Milosevic and the Unabomber, so the Columbus, Ohio, law professor was ready for just about anything when he appeared before the Senate Rules and Administration Committee.
Sen. Mitch McConnell, the Kentucky Republican, had asked the senators to look at two nominations to the Federal Election Commission (FEC): Mr. Smith, a young scholar at Capital University Law School, and Danny Lee McDonald, an 18-year commission veteran up for another term.
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THE MCCONNELL FILE
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• Born: Feb. 20, 1942, in Sheffield, Ala. Raised in Louisville.
• Family: Married to Elaine Chao, former director of the Peace Corps and president of the United Way. Three daughters, Elly, Claire and Porter, by a previous marriage.
• Religion: Baptist
• Education: University of Louisville, B.A.; University of Kentucky, J.D.
• Experience: Intern for former U.S. Sen. John Sherman Cooper; legislative assistant to former U.S. Sen. Marlow Cook; deputy assistant attorney general, Ford administration; judge-executive, Jefferson County, Ky.; U.S. senator.
• Committees: Rules and Administration, chairman; Appropriations subcommittee on foreign operations, chairman; Agriculture, Nutrition and Forestry; National Republican Senatorial Committee, chairman.
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Republicans and Democrats usually settle on their own FEC nominees, a tradition intended to preserve harmony. But some Democrats have taken exception to Mr. Smith because of his skepticism of campaign-finance reform, elevating a routine confirmation hearing into an election-year philosophical scrum.
Everyone in the room knew Mr. Smith was in for trouble. Mr. McDonald was a bystander with unlucky timing.
Mr. McConnell turned on Mr. McDonald with preci sion.
“I have a letter,” he began, “(that) makes some very serious allegations regarding your fitness to serve as commissioner.”
A constitutional law expert had written to say Mr. McDonald should be dumped for failing to embrace the First Amendment sufficiently. There was more, such as the FEC rulings Mr. McDonald endorsed that were challenged as improper by the courts. Or the time Mr. McDonald claimed the U.S. Supreme Court “just didn't get it.”
The pressure was suddenly off Mr. Smith.
“I guess that's just the nature of the business,” said a wary Mr. McDonald, who was not expecting an interrogation. “He's a tough chairman, but I've always found him fair.”
A caption on one of the editorial cartoons on the wall in Mr. McConnell's office suite reads: “Senator McConnell dispenses with his critics.”
The drawing, by Nick Anderson of the Louisville Courier-Journal, is of a fiendish Mr. McConnell gnawing on remains in a boneyard. “It keeps you humble,” the Kentucky senator explained.
Mr. McConnell, 58, is what some refer to as a professional politician. He was a student president in high school, college and law school, an aide in the U.S. Senate and a judge-executive in Jefferson County, Ky.
Through guile and ambition over 16 years as a senator, Mr. McConnell has become one of the Republicans' most dominant voices. Along with the rules committee, he is chairman of the appropriations subcommittee on foreign operations and the National Republican Senatorial Committee, the panel responsible for recruiting and promoting Republican candidates across the country. On Monday afternoons when the Senate is in session, he is one of a handful of insiders to talk strategy with Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott, R-Miss.
Mr. McConnell is conservative and, when pushed, a cool partisan avenger. He promises to raise as much money as legally possible to elect other Republicans and retain the party's majority in the November elections.
“There ought to be some place in American politics for strong conviction,” he said. “There isn't any question that it is harder to reach agreement if you have a pool of people who really believe in something than it is if you have a pool of people who don't believe in anything.
“There is no question that this is a more ideological place today than it was earlier. I happen to think it's a good thing. I don't think it's something to be condemned. It does make reaching compromise harder, but not im possible.”
The thing that really sizzles good-government groups like Common Cause and Public Citizen is Mr. McConnell's refusal to accept the view that politics is hopelessly ruined by money.
Over the past decade, he personally has foiled a half-dozen swipes at campaign-finance reform by arguing that most spending limits are a threat to free speech.
Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., Mr. McConnell's rival in the Senate, scored a string of primary victories by shaming what he sees as an “iron triangle of big money, lobbyists and legislation.”
“There is a perception that scandalous behavior or corruption are pervasive when, in fact, they aren't,” Mr. McConnell said. “It takes no courage at all to run around screaming about scandal that doesn't exist, or corruption that doesn't exist.”
Mr. McConnell also is suspicious of two other good-government obsessions: special interests and pork-barrel spending.
In political shorthand, the tobacco industry and chemical manufacturers are special interests, but what about your father in the AARP, your brother in the autoworkers union or your grocer, doctor, mortgage lender or favorite department store? Each has lobbyists or trade associations dedicated to pressing Congress for narrow concessions.
“My favorite definition of a special interest is a group that's against what I'm trying to do,” Mr. McConnell said.
Last year, while many conservative Republicans dismissed what they considered excess federal spending, Mr. McConnell's staff announced the senator had helped corral over a half-billion dollars in federal money for Kentucky. The take included $124 million in emergency relief for tobacco farmers, the first such allocation in history.
“Tobacco farmers are no less worthy than corn farmers, or wheat farmers,” he said.
Although Mr. McConnell is comfortable with his advocacy on behalf of tobacco — as well as Kentucky staples such as bourbon, horse racing and coal mining — he admits it is not a personal crusade.
“There is no question I would have considerably less interest in this subject if I were from Wyoming,” he said. “Part of my job is to try to help my people.”
Mr. McConnell already had a reputation in Louisville as a talented fund-raiser when he upset Sen. Dee Huddleston in a 1984 contest in which he was outspent.
At the time, he was the first Republican elected to statewide office since the late 1960s. Neither of his two re-election campaigns — over Harvey Sloane in 1990 and Steve Beshear in 1996 — were especially easy given Kentucky's Democratic tradition, but he made certain he collected more than enough money.
Over three Senate campaigns, Mr. McConnell has raised $11.9 million to his opponents' $7.3 million. The National Republican Senatorial Committee collected $78 million during the 1998 election cycle and Republicans expect Mr. McConnell to achieve a similar pull for the 2000 contests.
“You shoot him with a pistol and he comes back with a cannon,” said Mark Guilfoyle, a Kentucky lobbyist and Democratic strategist who thinks Mr. McConnell's success is dependent on fund raising. “The answer is money, money, money. You're free to define the other guy and insulate yourself.”
Now that Mr. McConnell is the state's GOP chieftain, Democrats are watching to see whether his national aspirations open trap doors at home. No single issue, such as campaign finance reform or his opposition to a constitutional amendment against flag burning, is likely to cause him much heat from voters.
He sides with conservatives on economic and social policy and is something of an internationalist on foreign affairs, supporting free trade and U.S. engagement abroad. But Mr. McConnell may encounter some difficulty if his adversaries cast him as a national player too distracted for Kentucky concerns. Gov. Paul Patton has been mentioned most often as a potential challenger in 2002.
“Mitch is tough. He has an amazing ability to raise money,” said Terry McBrayer, a lobbyist and Democratic strategist close to Mr. Patton. “To defeat Mr. McConnell you're going to have to have somebody like the governor.
Is he vulnerable? “Everybody is beatable,” Mr. McBrayer said.
The FEC confirmation hearing in March was the first in a series of rules committee discussions on campaign-finance reform, a chance for Mr. McConnell to use his juice as chairman to tug the debate in a direction in which he is comfortable.
Mr. McConnell left Mr. Smith and Mr. McDonald with encouragement and a warning. He said he would recommend both nominees to the rest of the Senate for confirmation as long as other senators honored tradition.
“If Professor Smith is not confirmed,” he said, “then that'll be a signal that we're going to operate in a new way around here in terms of the deference that is given to each party in naming their own members of the commission, which might cause me to reverse my position on you, Commissioner McDonald.”
“I won't take it personally, Mr. Chairman,” Mr. McDonald replied.
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