During the dark days of Republican profligacy, when earmarks
were the rule and GOP House and Senate members routinely voted for
massive discretionary spending bills (many loaded with pork and
earmarks) there was one man who bucked the tide of red ink: Rep.
Jeff Flake (R-Arizona).
“I believed the earmarks game was robbing us as Republicans of
our identity as fiscal conservatives,” said Flake.
Indeed, Flake was even willing to challenge earmarks of the
highest-ranking Republicans, including then- House Speaker J.
Dennis Hastert (IL), who lost his job when the GOP was decimated in
the 2006 elections for many things, including earmarks and
spending, not to mention two seemingly-endless wars.
Flake routinely tried to kill indefensible earmarks for such
unworthy projects as the National Cowgirl Hall of Fame or a museum
dedicated to teapots. For this, he was punished severely by the
powers that be, i.e., his fellow Republicans.
Jeff Flake’s story is
told with sympathy by Michael Leahy in his recent article in
The Washington Post (“House earmarks gadfly is case study
in survival,” July 11, 2011).
While noting the fall from political grace by John Edwards,
Anthony Weiner and John Ensign for personal and moral failings,
Leahy claims these episodes “tend to obscure the quiet stories of
unlikely political comebacks in Washington, those devoid of
titillation.”
“Jeff Flake’s story serves as a reminder that Washington is rife
with second acts,” he reports.
Leahy describes how Flake was “pummeled and left for dead” by
GOP colleagues due to his sustained criticism of pork-barrel
spending. Indeed, even current House Speaker John Boehner, who has
not dabbled in earmarking during his long career, was party to the
Arizona congressman’s public humiliation, which started when Jeff
Flake was stripped of his seat on the prestigious House Judiciary
Committee in 2006 — dashing his hopes of becoming committee
chairman.
“I thought I might be the [committee] chairman someday,” Flake
recalled. “And then I was suddenly off after Boehner talked to
me…Of course it was hard…But you have to keep going.”
Evidently, Flake had supported some earmarks for Arizona
defense-related projects. “I had signed 11 letters with the
delegation for defense [projects] in our state,” he confessed. “At
the time I’d signed them, I guess I said to myself, ‘Well, this is
defense. This is different.’…It really wasn’t in many ways.”
After being criticized in 2003 for this apparent inconsistency
in his record, Congressman Flake said he would not ask for any more
earmarks. He kept on fighting the practice going forward. By 2006
he was “irking” earmark sponsors by inviting them to stand in the
House chamber during spending debates and explain the need for
their measure.
Flake’s colleagues basically had enough when, just two days
before the 2006 midterm elections, he appeared on 60
Minutes to blast earmarking by both parties. After the
Republicans took a beating, and Hastert lost his Speaker’s job, he
lost his job on the Judiciary Committee for what Flake describes as
“bad behavior.”
Leahy reports that Flake’s account is neither confirmed nor
disputed by Mr. Boehner’s office.
Whatever one thinks of Jeff Flake’s actions, he took his
punishment like a man. Again, Leahy tells the story:
“The moment might have forever ruptured the two men’s working
relationship, but Flake did not publicly express
bitterness. He maintained contact with Boehner,
occasionally asking the leader about the possibility of landing a
seat on the Appropriations Committee, where, Flake argued, he would
be the rare member aggressively pushing for cuts.”
“The request ‘was kind of laughed at,’ Flake recalls.”
Fortunately for Flake, the political winds not only shifted, but
did so with gale force. Now earmarkers, both
Democratic and Republican, do everything within their power to
avoid having the scarlet “E” affixed to their chests. The worm, as
they say, has turned. Flake now speaks for a
vibrant and growing constituency in the GOP and the nation.
At 48, Flake now has his seat on the Appropriations Committee
and a shot at an open Senate seat in Arizona for which he has
already announced he is running. He remains
philosophic in regard to his political journey. “You have your best
chance around here if you don’t complain and if you keep working,”
said the aspiring Senator. “It helps to know you’re going to have
some tough days here.”
