When Tom DeLay ran the House, the process of holding a vote on a controversy bill was circus-like. Amendments would be added secretly with give-aways for special interests, Republicans would be forced to change their votes if they disagreed with DeLay, and set time limits for the vote would ignored until DeLay was satisfied with the result. Abuse of power was not only tolerated; it was adopted as routine policy.
Of course, DeLay, now under indictment, has been pushed aside. Has the House changed? Not so much.
In the first major vote since Rep. Tom DeLay stepped down from the House GOP leadership, Republicans narrowly escaped an embarrassing defeat when nearly an hour of arm-twisting pushed through a bill designed to expand the nation’s capacity to refine oil into gasoline.
To Democratic shouts of “Shame! Shame,” House leaders held a five-minute vote open for 45 minutes as they worked to bring around balking moderate Republicans. The bill was fervently opposed by environmentalists and their Democratic and Republican allies, but under heavy pressure from House leaders, Rep. Wayne T. Gilchrest (R-Md.) switched his vote from no to yes, ensuring the bill’s passage by a vote of 212 to 210.
This was a political farce for at least two reasons. First, the legislation itself was a ridiculous gift to the oil industry. When Rep. Edward Markey (D-Mass.) called it a “leave-no-oilman-behind bill,” he wasn’t kidding.
Essentially, House Republicans crafted a bill to help the oil industry — which continues to already enjoy record-high profits — with taxpayer subsidies for more refineries, avoid environmental regulations, bypass federal regulation, and drill more federal lands. The GOP wanted many of these same provisions in July when Congress considered a broader energy bill, but the measures were rejected as overt corporate welfare for Big Oil. Instead, Republicans used Hurricane Katrina to justify the vote.
Second, the way in which the bill was passed was utterly ridiculous.
The chamber was scheduled for a five-minute vote. After five minutes was up, the nays outnumbered the ayes and the bill looked like it would be defeated. GOP leaders decided to keep the vote open. A half-hour later, opponents still outnumbered supporters, 210-212. That’s when the circus became almost comical.
[A]fter 38 minutes, Rep. C.W. Bill Young (R-Fla.) switched to yes. A minute later, Rep. Jim Gerlach (R-Pa.) switched to yes, after receiving assurances that a provision that calls on taxpayers to cover a refinery’s legal bills if it is vindicated in court would be stripped out, according to Gerlach spokesman John Gentzel.
Moments later, Rep. Jeb Bradley (R-N.H.) approached the front of the House chamber to change his vote from yes to no, only to find himself ignored as he motioned for attention. House Minority Whip Steny H. Hoyer (D-Md.) jumped forward to wildly shout that a member wanted attention.
“You see him. You recognize him,” Hoyer shouted, finally allowing Bradley to switch and momentarily give the opponents the upper hand. Then [Rep. Wayne T. Gilchrest (R-Md.)] changed sides, and the vote was gaveled shut.
Gilchrest had given his word that he would vote against the legislation. In this Congress, promises mean so little.
I realize that some of this sounds like inside-pool. The typical American doesn’t know or care about House procedure. This is hardly the stuff of a TV campaign ad next year.
But on principle, it’s painful. In 1987, when then-House Speaker Jim Wright (D-Tex.) kept a floor vote open an extra 15 minutes in a similar stunt, Republicans acted as if Dems had shredded the Constitution. At the time, a Republican congressman named Dick Cheney denounced the move as “the most arrogant, heavy-handed abuse of power I’ve ever seen in the 10 years that I’ve been here.”
That was then; now it’s a standard call in the Republican playbook. This oil-refinery vote was held open for 46 minutes. The vote on CAFTA was open for 63 minutes. Last year, a vote on an amendment to the Patriot Act by Bernie Sanders was held for 38 minutes. The year before, a vote on Bush’s Medicare scheme was open for three hours. In each instance, the vote was supposed to take five minutes, but Republicans would lose gracefully, so they rigged the process to get the results they wanted.
It was the first major legislative test since DeLay’s downfall. Apparently, the new regime isn’t any different than the old one.