A Heart to Serve Page 26

  The week after the Thurmond party, Don called me and we talked frankly about his chance of becoming majority leader. “It’s not in the cards. I don’t have the votes,” he said matter-of-factly, “but I am going to write a statement, and I’m thinking of going on one of the Sunday morning shows to express my concerns and that I think Trent should step down.”

  Then, to my surprise, Don dropped a real bomb. “You should be the majority leader,” Don said. “You have the support, you don’t have any negatives, and you have the positives. You are the kind of image we need right now.”

  Don’s statement was a powerful one, especially coming from someone who had been around the Capitol longer than almost anyone else on our team and was highly respected by his colleagues.

  When I hung up the phone, my mind was racing. Don’s suggestion was so radical it was hard to fathom. I had no designs on the role of majority leader. And even after I’d spent eight years in the U.S. Senate, a number of Republican senators had much more seniority than I. Some, like my good friends Thad Cochran of Mississippi and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky, had served more than twice as long as I had.

  A few days later, when Don and I met face-to-face, Don encouraged me again. “The fact is nobody else has the votes but you. Hang in there, and you will be the majority leader.”

  I appreciated Don’s comments, but I was not at all sure I wanted to be majority leader. I had come to Washington to be a policy maker. I stepped into the political realm by leading the Senate campaign committee, but I was ready to end my time in D.C. after a final four years devoted to substantive legislation—that’s why I had not run for the leadership position of the NRSC chair again. I knew the gamesmanship that went with the majority leader’s position, and dealing with the powerful personalities usually detracted from being a successful legislator. There were just too many people to try to keep happy. Without Don’s encouragement, I probably would not have even considered tossing my hat in the ring.

  The mood in the capital changed drastically on Thursday, December 12, when President Bush referred to Trent during a speech in Philadelphia at the White House Conference on Faith-Based and Community Initiatives. In the audience were Cardinal Anthony Bevilacqua, Reverend Franklin Graham, and other leaders of organizations providing hope and assistance to people of every race—“the armies of compassion,” as the president referred to them.

  The president began his remarks talking about the challenge of defending our freedoms from terrorism. He then moved quickly to the Lott affair. “We must also rise to a second challenge facing our country,” said President Bush. “This great and prosperous land must become a single nation of justice and opportunity. We must continue our advance toward full equality for every citizen, which demands the guarantee of civil rights for all.” The audience applauded enthusiastically, and then the president honed in on the issue. “Any suggestion that the segregated past was acceptable or positive is offensive, and it is wrong.” 3

  Although the president did not call for Trent to step aside, his remarks were pointed. “Recent comments by Senator Lott do not reflect the spirit of our country,” the president said. “He has apologized and rightly so. Every day that our nation was segregated was a day our nation was unfaithful to our founding ideals.” 4

  The president’s words were greeted with resounding applause by the audience, and a rush of nervous responses by conservative leaders. Leadership in Washington is often about signals, and to many, the unequivocal message President Bush was sending could hardly be missed: “Trent is on his own.” But I still wasn’t sure whether the president was merely trying to disassociate the party from any hint of racism, or had intentionally cut the props out from under Trent.

  The opposition had already latched on to the racial issue, with everyone from Senate Democratic Leader Tom Daschle and House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi to Senator Hillary Clinton offering blistering remarks. Members of the Congressional Black Caucus released a statement calling for a “formal censure of Senator Lott’s remarks,” as did former Vice President Al Gore. African-American activist Jesse Jackson was not satisfied with censure, instead calling for Trent’s resignation, as did Democratic senators John Kerry and Russ Feingold.

  As I went home that afternoon, I knew I could no longer keep my thoughts to myself. After prayerful reflection, I decided that I needed more minds on this problem than just my own. Karyn and I discussed this constantly. She said simply, “Follow your heart,” reminding me of all the late-night conversations in which I’d said that serving as majority leader was not a job I would like.

  That same night I had the first of many late-night conference calls with Mitch, Alex, and Ginny Wolfe—all of whom had just spent two exhilarating years with me at the NRSC—and my trusted advisor Emily Reynolds, who had helped shape my political plans since 1994. We initially broached the possibility of my becoming majority leader, discussing how it might work, what it would cost me in terms of legislation I hoped to pass regarding Medicare, and how it might affect Karyn and the boys. The more we considered these questions, the more drawbacks our group identified.

  Mark Tipps, my former chief of staff, and Gus Puryear, who had served as my legislative director and counsel, came in from Nashville and brought along a stack of files that had been used in the extensive vetting process for President George W. Bush’s vice presidential selection committee. I had been under consideration as a possible vice presidential candidate, so the Bush team wanted to meticulously sift through my background to see if there were any skeletons in the closet. Mark still had all the information they had returned to us, so he brought all the boxes to Ginny and Alex and said, “They’re going to vet him in ways they never have before, so here are all the files. You better start going through them.”

  All the while, Trent and his staff were assuring people that he would be returning as majority leader.

  Senate Republicans got together on a Friday night conference call organized by Senator Rick Santorum on behalf of the Senate leadership team, hoping to bring the issue to a quick resolution. Unfortunately, the call was inconclusive; some proposed a plan that would keep Trent out of the public eye for several months as the new Congress convened, hoping the storm would eventually blow over, while others feared this would lead to a never-ending siege.

  Don Nickles was the first Republican senator to post a less-than-supportive statement on his website late Saturday night, stating what many of his colleagues were thinking: “I am concerned that Senator Lott has been weakened to the point that may jeopardize his ability to enact our agenda and speak to all Americans.”

  Without naming anyone specifically, Don added, “There are several outstanding senators who are more capable of effective leadership, and I hope we have an opportunity to choose.” He reiterated that statement on national television on Sunday, December 15, 2002.

  People who didn’t know the complete inside story, including Trent, assumed that Nickles was attempting to enhance his own position. But Don had already indicated his personal plans to leave the Senate and had reiterated them to his colleagues. Besides, in my estimation, the most-likely person to replace Trent as majority leader was not Don, but Kentucky senator Mitch McConnell, the incoming Republican whip. Mitch maintained his support for Trent, telling ABC’s This Week, “I think he’s going to continue to lead us, and I think he can be very effective as our leader in the Senate.” To Fox News Sunday, Mitch was even more emphatic. “Senator Lott was elected to a two-year term, and he’s said he’s not going to resign, and in my view he shouldn’t. We need to stay together and pursue the president’s agenda.”

  Another possible contender also on the leadership team, Pennsylvania senator Rick Santorum, was publicly supportive on Meet the Press, emphatically stressing to interviewer Tim Russert, “I know Trent Lott. This is a man of tremendous integrity, [with] a deep faith, someone who believes all men are created equal, not just under the Constitution but more importantly in the eyes of our Creator, and his faith
has grown in that commitment.” Yet Rick, sensing what just might happen, began counting his own votes among his closest supporters in the Senate.

  Nevertheless, once Nickles opened the possibility of considering senators other than Lott for leader, other senators began to speak openly about the matter as well. Senator John Warner of Virginia, a longtime friend of Trent’s, suggested that Senate Republicans should gather together face-to-face to decide what to do. Nebraska senator Chuck Hagel echoed John’s sentiments. Both Mitch and Rick, however, remained supportive of Trent, and at least publicly played down the need for a conference, as did Lindsey Graham, the former House member who had just won the South Carolina Senate seat vacated by Strom.

  Lindsey remained strongly supportive of Trent and confidently assured his new Senate colleagues that things were not nearly as bad as they seemed. But his certainty was disturbing to many. They explained the sensitive issue was not simply whether Trent would be able to negotiate the negative media blitz and survive as majority leader, but whether the now almost universal interpretation of Lott’s comments, however unfair, would paint all Republican senators as racist for the next two years, stymieing any attempts we might make to move the country forward, and especially affecting the discussion of future Supreme Court justice nominations we were anticipating.

  I knew from my discussions with other senators that they felt Lindsey’s assessment was short-sighted. Things had not been getting better. I spoke in addition to every one of the other new senators just elected, and without exception they felt there was no way this issue was going to disappear. I told Lindsey, “We have to deal with this one way or another. We either have to come out together with an endorsement of Lott, or we need to have new leadership.” The newly elected senators—all of whom confided in me because of our relationship through the campaign committee—were disturbed that one of the first things they’d have to fight for was to prove that they were not racists.

  From my perspective, the evening Senate Republican conference calls led by Santorum as chairman of the Senate Republican Conference were pivotal. Most of us hung up the phones feeling that this issue was not going to simply disappear, that sooner or later, we were going to have to deal with it definitively. Trent, of course, was not on those calls.

  Meanwhile, on Monday, December 16, Trent appeared on Black Entertainment Television and touted his role as a strong advocate of affirmative-action programs.

  On Tuesday evening, Virginia senator George Allen telephoned Trent and told him, in essence, that he should step aside for the good of the team. Trent did not respond positively to such advice. His spokesman, Ron Bonjean, said, “Mr. Lott will be the majority leader in the next Congress.” Hinting that there could be reprisals for senators who abandoned ship, the official line coming from the Lott camp continued, “Mr. Lott hopes to persuade some senators he will be a force in the next Congress and will remember with disfavor those who have broken with him.”

  The Bush administration was under pressure to react to the situation. Wary of giving the impression that the president was attempting to control the Senate, White House Chief of Staff Andy Card gathered the White House staff and told them “not to play.” Secretary of State Colin Powell condemned Lott’s comment, and the president’s brother, Florida governor Jeb Bush, suggested, “Something’s going to have to change. This can’t be the topic of conversation over the next weekend.” White House press secretary Ari Fleischer denied White House involvement in leaks concerning Trent’s status, repeatedly offering the same tepid line: “The president doesn’t think Trent Lott needs to resign.” Ari stuck to his story even though the president offered not a single public word of support for Trent.

  People close to Trent later claimed reporters from the nation’s largest papers had revealed that Joe Allbaugh, the president’s former campaign manager (then at the Federal Emergency Management Agency) and a close advisor in the White House had leaked statements that the president wanted Trent to step down. The White House adamantly disavowed any knowledge of such shenanigans.

  Regardless, toward the end of the week, as it became increasingly clear to everyone but Trent that his future as leader was in doubt, I received a phone call from Mitch McConnell about a possible future leader. “Nickles says that he doesn’t have the votes,” Mitch said. “Santorum says he doesn’t have the votes. Most likely, you and I are the only two possibilities for the position. If there is an election between you and me, I don’t know how it is going to turn out. I may or may not have the votes. You may win. And I may certainly win. But we should work together.”

  I wasn’t surprised at Mitch’s straightforward approach, because I knew how focused he was, how determined he was to move up to the leader’s position after Trent. “My goal as a legislator is to someday be the majority leader,” Mitch admitted. “I’ve been here all these years, and the highest position I can attain is leader. Everything I have done in my political career has been moving in that direction. From serving my two stints as chairman of the NRSC, to moving my way up to majority whip, leader is the next step, and that’s what I want to someday do.” We continued our confidential conversations and made no public statements.

  About that same time, Rick Santorum called and told me that he was thinking hard about running for the leader’s position. A number of our fellow senators had suggested that he run, since he was reputed to have the strongest conservative voting record. But as we were talking, Ginny pulled out a voting scorecard analyzing every vote since 1994. To my surprise, it clearly showed that I actually voted more conservatively than Rick.

  “Wait a minute, Rick,” I interrupted him. “According to the rankings I’m looking at, you are the fourteenth-most-conservative senator, and I am number eight.”

  Rick chuckled, but my comment sent a message to him that I was doing my homework in a tough situation, and that I hadn’t ruled anything in or out just yet.

  Eventually, it was clear that more and more senators believed a change of leader was the best way to clear the stormy skies. By Thursday evening, even Trent’s closest allies let it be known that his support was no longer strong enough to stave off a change. On Friday morning, little more than two weeks after the fateful celebration in the Dirksen Building, Trent talked to Mitch and to Rick, informing them that he planned to make a statement. Trent’s staunchest supporters understood what that meant. When Rick and Mitch talked, McConnell said, “Well, I’m on the Bill Frist team now, and you need to be on the Frist team, too.”

  But Rick was still running a leader’s race, although it would last only about six hours. During that time, Rick and his staff made one last check to see if he might have the votes; they determined that he did not. Rick threw his support in my direction. It was now up to me.

  SERVICE IS ALWAYS A COMMITMENT, BUT SOMETIMES CAN BE A calling. I had a lot to think about. After a busy two years at the campaign committee, I was looking forward to Christmas with Karyn and the boys and visiting with my brothers’ and sisters’ families. Karyn, of course, reminded me of my habitual remark that majority leader must be “the worst job in the Senate.” But it was, after all, another opportunity to serve, albeit certainly not in a way I had ever anticipated. The realm of service would expand, no longer to a patient, or to a state, but now more to a country.

  Some political crystal ball gazers had begun tossing my name around as a future presidential candidate, but I had not made any overtures in that direction. People, however, were quick to share with me that serving as majority leader would likely be the death knell for any future political aspirations. In modern times, it was considered next to impossible to be elected as president after having led the Senate. Too many compromises had to be made, and too much water had to be carried for the administration. As leader, one becomes the target for the opposition party and the media always hungry for a negative story. I realized from the outset that if I consented to toss my hat in the majority leader’s race, doing so would likely cap my national political career. But
then again, I had come to Washington to serve as a citizen legislator—and that meant returning to Nashville to the life of a citizen after serving in the Senate.

  Helping our Republican conference escape the terrible storm in which we seemed perilously stuck was my immediate goal. Members from throughout the conference—senior, junior, older, and younger—were encouraging me to step forward to run for leader, to help heal the harm our party was suffering.

  “Do you think I should call Trent and talk to him?” I asked John Warner, who’d been hovering over the situation and offering me advice in a kindly, almost fatherly fashion since the storm had erupted.

  “No, no. I’ll handle that,” John assured me. “It’s too tender.”

  Trent later implied that I had been disloyal to him—that I should have called him and given him a heads-up. Moreover, he asserted that had I not let it be known that I would accept the job, he might have been able to recapture his position as leader. That is doubtful, although I understand how it might have seemed that way from where Trent was sitting in Mississippi and in Florida. I imagine he truly believed the crisis was dying down, and that by making myself available, I threw gasoline on the smoldering embers of a bonfire. But in reality, the controversy had not died down. It had escalated. Nevertheless, I was very careful to do nothing to undermine Lott in any way, and in fact, had to be persuaded to even allow my name to be considered.