Congress - Behind the Moderates' New Resolve

David Baumann
National Journal Magazine

Whether they are "RINOs" or pure-bred elephants, members of the moderate Republican Main Street Partnership firmly believe they are an endangered species. And these moderates are warning their leaders that if things don't change on Capitol Hill, they may soon go from endangered to extinct -- and take the GOP majorities with them. 

Moderate Republicans have long complained that conservatives have hijacked the congressional agenda and have unfairly lampooned them as "Republicans in Name Only." The middle-of-the-roaders have felt marginalized -- forced to choose between party loyalty and constituents who in another era would have been called "Rockefeller Republicans." Usually, though, the moderates have caved to pressure from their leaders and voted the party line. But during the past month, the centrists -- armed with election results they find disturbing, sagging GOP poll numbers they find alarming, and legislation they find nauseating -- have held firm and won several high-profile victories during the budget reconciliation debate. 

.In the House, moderate Republicans forced GOP leaders to drop from their budget reconciliation bill a provision authorizing oil drilling in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge. In the Senate, the opposition of moderate Sen. Olympia Snowe, R-Maine, forced Republicans to scale back their tax-cut reconciliation measure by eliminating extensions of the income tax breaks for capital gains and dividends. And in both chambers, moderates were able to ease proposed entitlement cuts, such as to the Medicaid program, as part of budget reconciliation. 

At the center of the moderates' success story is the Republican Main Street Partnership. Although this group of centrist leaders from government, business, and education has often stayed in the background since its founding more than a decade ago, it now is emerging as a pivotal player in Washington. 

On the night of November 9, for instance, when the contentious ANWR provision was stripped from the House's budget reconciliation bill, it was Sarah Chamberlain Resnick, the Republican Main Street Partnership's executive director, who announced the deal to reporters at the Capitol after moderate members stood their ground in closed-door negotiations with the GOP leadership. The move was a sign that the partnership, in the words of moderate Rep. Christopher Shays, R-Conn., is taking on an "ever-growing role." Rep. Michael Castle, R-Del., who serves as the group's president, said that the partnership "held people together on the budget vote."

 The partnership was formed after the 1994 elections, and now counts 10 senators, 48 House members, and five governors among its members. Senate Republican moderates have enjoyed more legislative power than their House counterparts in recent years because the Senate is more narrowly divided and its rules allow individual members more leeway to force their prerogatives. In Castle's view, however, changing political dynamics in the House are providing new opportunities for his group. 

In the past, conservative Democrats often supplied the votes to pass GOP legislation in the House. But as partisan acrimony has increased, and as the number of conservative Democrats has dwindled, "Democrats are voting in a bloc" to frequently oppose the Republican agenda, Castle noted, making every Republican vote all the more important to the GOP leadership these days.

 "This has emboldened the moderates" on the Republican side, Castle said. "They now have the votes to pass or defeat key legislation. You've heard a lot more from moderates because we are players." Castle added that during the budget reconciliation debate, GOP leaders "seriously negotiated with us." 

The trouble that moderates have been making on the Hill lately has infuriated many conservatives. Paul Weyrich, chairman of the conservative Free Congress Foundation, has suggested that the moderates, particularly those who have risen to committee or subcommittee chairmanships, deserve a "good spanking" from the leadership. "Liberal Republicans are like spoiled children," Weyrich wrote in a recent online commentary piece. "When parents discipline their children, the children often scream bloody murder. But as soon as the children realize their parents are serious, children obey their parents." 

Of course, it remains to be seen whether the moderates' recent victories will ultimately hold when House-Senate negotiators craft compromises on the budget reconciliation and tax bills. Provisions that the moderates oppose could creep back in at the behest of conservatives, meaning that the centrists could be tested once again, when they cast votes on the final versions. 

For now, the moderates are vowing to stand firm. "We will not waver in our position" on ANWR throughout the upcoming conference negotiations, Rep. Charles Bass, R-N.H., told reporters at a November 10 press conference, where he was flanked by other members of the Republican Main Street Partnership. 

Beyond the points that the partnership is scoring on the Hill, it is also planning an aggressive effort to influence the 2006 elections. The partnership is gearing up for a high-stakes battle with the Club for Growth, the conservative group that has attracted significant media attention during recent elections for trying to oust moderate Republican incumbents. 

The partnership, which has a full-time staff of five, hopes to use its political action committee to raise some $7 million during this election cycle to support moderate candidates. The chairman of the partnership's board of directors is former Maine Gov. John McKernan, Snowe's husband. 

Shays said the partnership's PAC can serve as a way for moderate Republicans outside Washington to support like-minded candidates, rather than contributing to other party groups -- like the National Republican Congressional Committee -- that are geared simply to electing any Republican. "They've been contributing to an agenda that they don't believe in," Shays said. 

Castle said that as the moderates look ahead to the 2006 elections, "you have to have your head in the ground to think that the Republicans don't have problems." Shays particularly cited the legal and ethical problems facing numerous Bush administration and congressional Republican officials. "I think most of our Republican colleagues don't get it," he said. "There's an ethical problem in the White House. There's an ethical problem in Congress." 

Many congressional conservatives believe that the answer to the GOP's problems is to move to the right and appease conservative-base voters by scheduling debates on spending cuts and other pet causes. But Shays contends that Republicans from rock-hard conservative areas do not fully grasp the impact of forcing their centrist colleagues to vote on such issues. "You have all of these members forcing all these tough votes," he said. "They don't affect [the conservatives'] districts." 

Conservatives have only limited sympathy for the moderates. "I never begrudge people for standing up for what they stand for," said Rep. Mike Pence, R-Ind., the chairman of the conservative Republican Study Committee, a group of more than 100 House Republicans that in recent months has been beating the drum for deep budget cuts. But Pence noted that moderates have adopted the Democrats' arguments in battling the budget. "It is a source of frustration when members of our own party embrace that rhetoric," he said. 

Another conservative was blunter in decrying the moderates' recent tactics. "The reason why they vote the way they do is that they are advocates for higher spending and bigger government," said former Rep. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., the president of the Club for Growth. "We don't consider losing that kind of Republican any loss."

 For Toomey, the battle with the Republican Main Street Partnership is somewhat personal. In 2004, Toomey lost a hard-fought race for the Republican Senate nomination to incumbent Arlen Specter, R-Pa., a moderate who received financial support from the partnership and is one of its members. 

The Club for Growth already has several moderate Republican incumbents in its sights for 2006. "We don't think you should automatically get a pass just because you have an 'R' after your name," Toomey said. "Some people don't care about ideas or principles. It's just what jersey you're wearing." The club will support conservative challenger Tim Walberg in his Republican primary campaign against Rep. Joe Schwarz, R-Mich., a partnership member. The club may also support a conservative challenger to moderate Sen. Lincoln Chafee, R-R.I. "We're going to do what we have in the past, and we're going to do it more aggressively," Toomey said. 

Resnick, the partnership's executive director, questioned why the Club for Growth is willing to risk the GOP majorities in Congress by waging divisive primary challenges against moderates. "I realize [the club's] philosophy is pure and all that," she said. "But the Republican Party -- to maintain a majority -- must be made up of a variety of faces. Like us or not, our members will vote for Denny Hastert for speaker. We are Republicans first, and we want to maintain the majority."

 Likewise, Castle said that the my-way-or-the-highway attitude of the Club for Growth and other conservatives could be the downfall of the GOP. "To me, it violates all principles of how you run a political party," he said.