Hands-off Buchanan becomes hands-on

Hands-off Buchanan becomes hands-on

100 days by Matt Walsh | Publisher

Freshman Congressman Vern Buchanan has earned kudos for reaching out to constituents and is winning respect in Washington.

It's not like his days in business, when Vern Buchanan spent time in his expansive Sarasota Ford office, sitting relaxed on the office sofa as he discussed the next business deal, the low hum and gurgling of the aquarium in the background.

Those were the days. When Buchanan delegated the day-to-day details to his companies' managers and observed their operations from a perch above. He always looked in control, as though he had complete control of the agenda.

In fact, Buchanan said Saturday at the end of a 75-minute interview in his second-floor congressional office at Fruitville Road and Orange Avenue in Sarasota: "Business is easier."

Freshman Congressman Vern Buchanan, the District 13 Republican, is on the verge of passing his first 100 days in office. It's a different life. "Very humbling," he says.

And very hands on. Buchanan has quickly found out the non-stop life of a congressman and how it goes from the international scene of flying in an Apache helicopter over Iraq one day to signing a Florida cookbook the next; from having dinner with former Secretaries of State Henry Kissinger and Madeleine Albright one night to talk about China to a luncheon with independent truckers.

He's winning kudos.

"One of the concerns people had was that he would treat the position as a title," said Bob Waechter, former chairman of the Republican Party of Sarasota County. "He is absolutely doing the job. Overall, I'd say very, very well."

Adds Adam Putnam, R-Bartow, the third-ranking Republican in Congress: "He's been able to learn the process and procedures of this archaic institution well. And he's been able to do it despite all the distractions of the (election) lawsuits. He's developing respect among his colleagues."

And about those votes? Buchanan surprised many Republicans in his first two weeks in Congress when he cast five votes in agreement with congressional Democrats.

"Yes, he made some difficult votes," Waechter says. But a short time after those votes, Waechter hosted a luncheon at which Buchanan explained his positions (see page 4). "No one could argue he didn't think it through," Waechter says. Even Buchanan's primary opponent, Tramm Hudson, who attended the luncheon, said he understood Buchanan's votes.

Putnam expressed no qualms with Buchanan's votes, either. "He's a pretty independent thinker," Putnam says. "He's elected by the people in his district to reflect their values and their interests. A lot of Republicans voted the way he did. There wasn't a hard party line.

"I'd say Vern has been able to maintain a balance between national issues and the unique needs of his district," Putnam says.

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Buchanan's life is ruled by a 3½- by 8½-inch card. At 6:30 each night one of his staffers hands him a new card that details where he's supposed to be and with whom he'll be meeting from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. the next day.

The week starts on Mondays in the district, typically with a series of meetings, events or announcements of legislation Buchanan has filed or co-sponsored. By 1 p.m., he's on a flight to Washington to begin the Tuesday-through-Friday morning Capital work.

On those days, starting each day at 6:30 with a walk or exercise at his D Street home in Washington, D.C. (purchased from former Florida Congressman Clay Shaw), Buchanan follows that with the only time in the day for thinking, strategizing and solitude. By 8:30 or 9 a.m., he's in his House office meeting with staff to discuss upcoming votes ("We always check to see what we said during the campaign," Buchanan says). And they map out the congressional routine of hopscotching from committee to committee and when to be on the House floor for votes. Of the 200 votes the House has cast so far in the 110th Congress, Buchanan has missed only three votes.

Waechter says Buchanan has forfeited attending some events in his district because he was reluctant to miss floor votes.

Afternoons typically include meeting with constituents who have traveled from Florida. "If they've made the effort to come up, I want to meet them," Buchanan says. Last Friday he met with 25 Junior ROTC students from Lakewood Ranch, while also casting 10 votes on the House floor.

Weekends are more meetings and festivities. Last Saturday morning, Buchanan met with board members from the Pines of Sarasota. Then it was off to a series of events, including the Manatee Republican Party's Lincoln Day dinner. Sundays are left for church and time with his family. But Sally Tibbetts, Buchanan's communications director, says Buchanan frequently turns that into a work day, too.

Says Tibbetts, who has worked 10 years on the Hill for four congressmen and one senator: "His work ethic has impressed me. He is personally reaching out to people, meeting with them and soliciting their views. He doesn't presume to know everything."

After Buchanan met in March with the Sarasota/Manatee Metropolitan Planning Organization, Chairman Fred Tower wrote a thank-you letter, noting Buchanan's visit was the first by a federal elected official since the MPO formed in 1978. "As noted by the board members," Tower wrote, "your work ethic evidenced by your extensive outreach efforts to organizations, jurisdictions and the community is impressive."

In the nearly 100 days he has been office, Buchanan has met with representatives from more than 150 groups and companies - from the Friends of the Earth to pharmaceutical company executives to Hardee County commissioners to the consulate general of Israel to Florida soliders serving in Iraq. (Buchanan was the first congressional freshman to travel to Iraq and Afghanistan.)

"Until you do this, you have no idea how much there is and how many different groups there are," Buchanan says.

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In his four months in Congress, Buchanan has concluded he can pursue one of two tracks - a path to becoming a House Republican leader, which he says requires hardcore partisanship, or the path of a statesman, "doing what's right for the country."

"A lot of Washington is about scoring points," Buchanan says. "But I want to move the mindset up there on what's right for America. That's going to be my focus."

Asked if that is freshman idealism, Buchanan says, "Some of it is. But if we continue to be complete partisans, there are going to be a lot of things that don't ever get done."'

LEGISLATION

BILLS BUCHANANHAS INTRODUCED, CO-SPONSORED

• HR 411: The Tax Relief for Families Act - would make permanent middle-class tax cuts, including the sales tax deduction, child tax credit, repeal of the marriage penalty and higher education deduction; 65 co-sponsors, referred to House Ways and Means Committee.

• HR 1538: The Wounded Warrior Assistance Act - included Buchanan's amendment to study the feasibility of a standard soldier-patient tracking system, passed the House and referred to the Senate.

• HR 1579: Creates the standard soldier-patient tracking system, was revised to address committee concerns and passed by the House.

• HR 1735: The Clay Moore Child Abduction Prevention Act - would establish minimum 30-year prison for illegal immigrants convicted of kidnapping a U.S. child; referred to House Judiciary Committee; just begun the effort to secure co-sponsors.

• HR 1375: The Earmark Accountability and Reform Act - introduced legislation that bans last-minute earmarks and grants the president a line-item veto on funds directed to specific projects or recipients without a hearing; referred to the Rules and Budget committees.

• The Small Business Growth Act - one provision of the bill passed the House to extend deductions for all or part of a business investment in one year, instead of spreading the tax savings across several years; referred to Ways and Means.

Our View

Buchanan explains his votes

In his first two weeks in Congress, Rep. Vern Buchanan, R-Longboat Key, surprised his conservative Republican constituency by casting five of his first six votes in the 110th Congress with the Democratic Party.

With one of those votes, House bill No. 6, which repealed tax cuts for oil companies, Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform, a staunch opponent of all tax increases, said Buchanan broke a written pledge signed with Norquist's group. The nationally known pledge - the Taxpayer Protection Pledge - solemnly binds congressional members to oppose all tax increases.

Not to worry, though, Buchanan says. "I'm not turning into a Democrat," Buchanan said last weekend at his downtown Sarasota office on Fruitville Road and Orange Avenue.

Buchanan's votes didn't concern the House Republican Conference chairman, either - Rep. Adam Putnam, R-Bartow. Told that Sarasota Republicans began wondering after Buchanan's early votes of their new congressman's political loyalty, Putnam chuckled as he drove to the airport Monday. "I've never heard anyone call Vern a liberal," Putnam said, emphasizing the word never.

To reinforce the point, of the 200 votes Buchanan has cast in his nearly first 100 days in Congress, 95.5% of them have lined up with his fellow Republicans. Nine votes deviated from the party.

Contrast that with the votes of, say, Republican Rep. Connie Mack, who represents Lee and Collier counties. Mack has 10 votes this session that go along with the Democrats. Rep. Tom Feeney, the most conservative of Florida's congressional delegation, has eight votes that parted ways from his fellow Republicans.

"At the end of the day," Buchanan says, "I just want to do what's right for the people, the will of the people."

In his four months in Congress, Buchanan says he has concluded there are at least two approaches to being a congressman: "If you want to be in leadership, it's about building numbers in your party," he says. "The other role is to be more of a statesman - represent the community and its best interests. That's the road I'm trying to run down - do what's right for the district and the country.

"I'm not trying to be a hardcore partisan," he says. "I'm trying to represent all of the people."

And be assured, he said: "I'm not going to change my 'no new taxes' view."

Buchanan explained the early votes that called into question his political loyalties as follows:

HR 1: Implementing the 9/11 Commission recommendations. Among many things, the bill would require airlines to inspect 100% of their cargo on passenger planes within three years and would require that all ship-bound cargo headed for the United States be inspected for radiation.

Buchanan: "When we looked at the bill, I just felt there was more we could be doing for homeland security."

HR 2: Increases federal minimum wage.

Buchanan: "We weighed the whole thing," Buchanan said.

If the bill were approved, Buchanan figured out the federal minimum wage and Florida's newly mandated minimum wage would both be at about $7.25 an hour in two years. "We'd be there anyway," he said.

If the federal bill didn't get passed, Buchanan said, Florida's minimum wage would be higher than the minimum wage in neighboring states, making Florida less competitive in attracting new jobs.

HR 4: Allows the federal government to negotiate directly with pharmaceutical companies for lower prescription drug prices - on behalf of private insurers that run the drug benefit program for Medicare. The bill overturns a 2003 law.

Buchanan: With more than 30% of District 13's over age 65, Buchanan said, "If we can get a better deal for our seniors, I'm willing to give them (the federal government) the opportunity to do it.

"Now, if I were wearing my chamber of commerce hat, I might look at it differently," Buchanan said.

HR 5: Cuts interest rates on student loans. The Republican Conference, which represents the party's point of view, objected to the bill because it claimed Democrats didn't live up to a promise Speaker Nancy Pelosi had made to cut student loan interest rates in half. Instead of cutting all federal student-loan interest rates in half, the Democrats' bill would phase in reduced rates over five years only for undergraduate students.

Buchanan: In spite of the Republican Conference's position, Buchanan voted for the rate cuts. Buchanan believes making college affordable as much as possible is "a great equalizer."

HR 6: Repeals tax cuts to oil companies. It also would require oil companies to renegotiate oil leases in the Gulf of Mexico so they would be required to pay royalties.

This is the bill for which Americans for Tax Reform say Buchanan broke his pledge not to raise taxes. ATR President Norquist told The Longboat Observer:

"Buchanan needs to recognize that 60% of adults own shares of stock in 401(k)s and mutual funds, which own the stocks of oil companies. I realize Congressman Buchanan is new to politics, but when you raise taxes on business, you're stealing from the 401(k)s."

Buchanan: "The way I looked at it, the oil companies didn't need this tax break after recording record profits," he said. "I'm also opposed to drilling in the Gulf." Buchanan said a proliferation of oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico would be too much at risk because of hurricanes.

HR 1227: Gulf Coast Hurricane Houseing Recovery Act. The Congressional Budget Office estimates this bill would increase direct spending by $224 million in 2007, $469 million through 2012 and $269 million through 2017. Implementing the bill would incur new discretionary costs of about $1.3 billion over the 2008-2012 period.

Buchanan: A spokesman said the congressman supported the bill because it "will provide immediate assistance to the displaced families of the Gulf Coast by increasing flexibility to use funds that were already allocated to the relief effort."

H Res 202: Provides funding for all House committees, including $3.73 million for the expenses of a new Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming: $1,666,667 shall be used prior to Jan. 3, 2008, and $2,058,800 shall be used between Jan. 3, 2008, and Jan. 1, 2009. The resolution also asks for an across-the-board increase of 4.23% from the levels of the second session of the 109th Congress. The levels for the second session of the 110th Congress represent an across-the-board increase of 3.19% from the levels of the first session of the 110th Congress.

Buchanan: Even though Republicans opposed the creation of the new global warming committee and Democrats supported it, Buchanan also supported the resolution as a formality to keep Congress operating.

EARMARKS

When Congressman Buchanan and Republicans rejected a resolution in early January prohibiting congressional members from accepting and using earmarks, many voters thought Buchanan's negative vote was his way of saying he supports the use of congressional earmarks.

Earmarks involve the practice essentially of extorting votes from House members. One lawmaker promises to "earmark" funding for another lawmaker's special district project in exchange for a favorable vote on the first lawmaker's bill. In 2006, earmarks totaled $17 billion in the House.

Says Buchanan: "I won't do private earmarks. But I'll do not-for-profit and public earmarks.

"Generally, I'm against earmarks," he says, "but at the same time, if that's the game, then you have to play. If that's the game, I want to make sure we get our fair share back for our community."

EARLY VOTES THAT DEVIATED FROM GOP

In his first month in office, Republican Congressman Vern Buchanan voted with Democrats on five bills that Republicans generally opposed. Buchanan's votes are compared below to those of fellow House members from Florida - Tom Feeney, Florida's most fiscally conservative representative, and Connie Mack, Republican who represents Lee and Collier counties. The five votes - HR 1, 2, 4 through 6 - were among nine votes in which Buchanan sided with the Democratic majority. Of Buchanan's 200 votes altogether, he has voted with Republicans 95.5% of the time.

BILL Buchanan Feeney Mack GOP

HR 1 / Implements 9/11 Commission recommendations Yes No Yes No

HR 2 / Increase federal minimum wage Yes No No No

HR 4 / Allows government to negotiate prices with pharmaceutical companies Yes No No No

HR 5 / Cuts interest rate on student loans Yes No No No

HR 6 / Repeals tax cuts to oil companies Yes No No No

HR 1227 / Gulf Coast Hurricane Recovery Act Yes No No No

H Res 202 / Funds House committees, including Global Climate Committee Yes No No No