This morning’s papers brought glad tidings: Tom (the Hammer) DeLay, after a long consultation with his pollsters and lawyers, has decided to resign from Congress, apparently next month. And in order to allow Texas GOPers to hand-pick a replacement (he has already won the primary for the November General Election), he is abandoning his Texas residency, which legally disqualifies him from the ballot, and formally becoming a resident of Alexandria, Virginia.It’s hard to exaggerate the power this unpleasant and ruthless man has wielded in Washington until recently, and hard to believe the lack of even minimal contrition he is exhibiting now that he’s been all but forced to resign. Just last week, he delivered a fiery speech to a Christian conservative gathering that implied he was a victim of discrimination for his faith. Indeed, his need to wallow in self-pity and invite his last-ditch supporters to do the same led him perilously close to expressing hatred of America: “We are, after all, a society that provides abortion on demand, has killed millions of innocent children, degrades the institution of marriage and all but treats Christianity like some second-rate superstition.” No wonder, then, that our infidel nation would contrive to find fault with DeLay’s crass and chronic money-hustling and power-muscling behavior in Washington and in Texas, eh?DeLay’s invincible arrogance was nicely illustrated by a couple of comments he’s made after disclosing his intention to resign. As Think Progress reports, he told Time Magazine that his proudest accomplishment in office was in skewing K Street campaign contributions to the GOP. And this morning, appearing on Fox News, he luridly suggested that the Republican-controlled Texas legislature would soon act to strip Travis County prosecutor Ronnie Earle of jurisdiction to pursue cases like the corporate campaign violations for which DeLay was indicted last year.The timing of DeLay’s announcement is pretty easy to figure out: as the Republican nominee for the General Election, he’s been able to amass a little over $1.2 million in campaign contributions.Now he can convert that money to his already-depleted legal defense fund, essentially tricking his contributors into banking his efforts to stay out of the hoosegow, as TPMMuckraker explained today. No wonder the Rev. Rick Scarborough, host of the pity party where DeLay made his Blame America First remarks last week, said of the Hammer: “This is a man, I believe, God has appointed … to represent righteousness in government.”The Bugman’s next move will apparently be to hook up with some conservative organization in his new home turf of Northern Virginia. Don’t be too surprised if he lands some lucrative consulting and lobbying contracts as well: After all, the Republican-controlled House remains largely his creature, even if he’s no longer directly pulling the strings.
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Editor’s Corner
By Ed Kilgore
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January 27: 2024 California Senate Race Gets More Interesting With Schiff’s Entry
Like most California political junkies, I’m already looking forward to a vibrant 2024 Senate race. I wrote up the latest development at New York:
In the conservative imagination, California is sort of an evil empire of leftism. It’s where white people have been relegated to a minority for decades; where tree-hugging hippies still frolic; where Hollywood and Big Tech work 24/7 to undermine sturdy American-folk virtues; where rampaging unions and arrogant bureaucrats make it too expensive for regular people to live.
But in truth California’s dominant Democratic Party has as many mild-mannered moderates as it does fiery progressives. One of them, Dianne Feinstein, has held a Senate seat for over 30 years. As the 89-year-old political icon moves toward an almost certain retirement in 2024 (though she now says she won’t announce her intention until next year), another ideological moderate has just announced a bid to succeed her. Los Angeles congressman Adam Schiff, though, has an asset most centrist Democrats (those not named Clinton or Biden, anyway) can’t claim: the rabid hatred of Donald Trump–loving Republicans, giving him the sort of partisan street cred even the most rigorous progressives might envy.
It’s why Schiff begins his 2024 Senate race with something of a strategic advantage. The first-announced candidate in the contest, Congresswoman Katie Porter (also from greater L.A.), is a progressive favorite and more or less Elizabeth Warren’s protégé as a vocal enemy of corporate malfeasance. Another of Schiff’s House colleagues, Oakland-based Barbara Lee, has told people she plans a Senate run as well; Lee is a lefty icon dating back to her lonely vote against the initial War on Terror authorization following September 11. And waiting in the wings is still another member of California’s House delegation, Silicon Valley–based Ro Khanna, who is closely associated with Bernie Sanders and his two presidential campaigns.
Obviously, in a Senate race featuring multiple progressives, the national-security-minded Schiff (who voted for the Iraq war authorization and the Patriot Act early in his House career) might have a distinct “lane,” particularly if he draws an endorsement from Feinstein. (Schiff is already suggesting his campaign has her “blessing.”) But he may poach some progressive votes as well by emphasizing the enemies he’s made. Indeed, his campaign’s first video is mostly a cavalcade of conservatives (especially Donald J. Trump) attacking him.
It’s probably not a coincidence that Schiff is announcing his Senate bid immediately following his expulsion from the House Intelligence Committee by Speaker Kevin McCarthy for his alleged misconduct in investigating Russia’s links with Trump and his campaign (and in making the case for Trump’s impeachment). Schiff was also a steady prosecutorial presence on the January 6 committee that McCarthy and most Republicans boycotted).
Complicating the contest immeasurably is California’s Top Two primary election system. Schiff and his Democratic rivals will not be battling for a party primary win but for a spot in the 2024 general election, given to the top two primary finishers regardless of party affiliation. The Golden State’s Republican Party is so weak that it might not be able to find a candidate able to make the top two in a Senate primary; two Democrats competed in two recent competitive Senate general elections in California (in 2016, when Kamala Harris defeated Loretta Sanchez, and in 2018, when Feinstein trounced Kevin DeLeon). If that’s the case, though, it’s unclear which Democrat might have the edge in attracting Republicans. Porter’s campaign is circulating a poll showing she’d beat Schiff in a hypothetical general election because Republicans really hate Schiff despite his more moderate voting record.
For all the uncertainties about the 2024 Senate field, it is clear that the two announced Democratic candidates will wage a close battle in one arena: campaign dollars. Both Schiff and Porter are legendary fundraisers, though Porter had to dip deeply into her stash of resources to fend off a tougher-than-expected Republican challenge last November. Big remaining questions are whether Lee can finance a viable race in this insanely expensive state with its many media markets, and whether Khanna, with his national Sanders connections and local Silicon Valley donor base, enters the contest. There are racial, gender, and geographical variables too: Until Harris became vice-president, California had long been represented by two Democratic woman from the Bay Area. With Los Angeles–based Alex Padilla now occupying Harris’s old seat, 2024 could produce a big power shift to the south and two male senators.
In any event, nobody is waiting around for Feinstein to make her retirement official before angling for her seat, which means a Senate race that won’t affect the partisan balance of the chamber at all (barring some wild Republican upset) will soak up a lot of attention and money for a long time. At this early point, Schiff’s positioning as the moderate that Republicans fear and despise looks sure to keep him in the spotlight.