Posted on 09/30/2005 9:22:22 PM PDT by andie74
WASHINGTON - (KRT) - Even before he was elected to Congress in 1996, Roy Blunt from Missouri signaled his intention to be a major player on Capitol Hill.
And he did it in the universal language of politics - money.
In a move of unusual perceptiveness, Blunt - himself a man of modest means - began sending contributions from his own campaign coffers to 21 Republicans throughout the country running for Congress for the first time.
Blunt won his own election, as did 20 of the recipients of his largesse. When he arrived in Washington, he already knew and had aided about two-thirds of new Republican members.
"That's how you get into leadership," said Bill Allison, an analyst at the Center for Public Integrity, a nonpartisan watchdog group. "It's not your personality or your charm. It's whether or not you can bring money to the party."
Since that first election, campaign finance reports and other documents show that Blunt has collected several million dollars in corporate and individual contributions that he has passed on to colleagues and given to other Republican efforts.
It has served him well.
After just three years in Washington, Blunt was plucked from the backbench to be chief deputy whip, a key vote-counting position. Wednesday he became House majority leader, unanimously chosen by his Republican colleagues to fill in temporarily for the indicted Tom DeLay of Texas.
Should DeLay's legal troubles prove politically lethal, many expect Blunt to take over the job full-time.
Blunt's meteoric rise through the seniority-obsessed House - where 435 ambitious people jockey for advantage - is also a testament to his hard work, political skills and experience, observers say.
Unlike most new House members, Blunt had deep political experience, having run for statewide office four times in Missouri. He was twice elected secretary of state, and ran losing races for lieutenant governor in 1980 and for governor in 1992.
"I think Roy probably came into Congress with more experience and accomplishments than the average congressman," said Sen. Jim Talent of Missouri, a Republican who served with Blunt in the House for four years. "It helped him hit the ground running in a lot of respects. He was never really a freshman."
It began during the 1996 race, for an open seat in which Blunt raised nearly $1 million, almost 10 times what his Democratic opponent raised in the heavily Republican district in southwest Missouri.
"He had some good advice," said a Washington lobbyist with longstanding ties to Blunt. He would not allow his name to be used, citing his firm's ban on speaking to the media.
"Some people told him, `One of the things you want to think about is who are your friends going to be in Congress.' So he started making some friends. ... Most people just show up in Washington and get what they get. Roy's more of a forward-thinker than that."
He also did something smart - and early. While still a candidate, Blunt paid a call on DeLay, then majority whip.
"Without Tom DeLay, a lot of this wouldn't have been possible for Roy," said Gregg Hartley, Blunt's former chief of staff and now a leading lobbyist. "They're good friends. They're good colleagues. Roy has learned a lot."
Well-regarded even before he was sworn in, Blunt landed a seat as the freshman delegate on the Steering Committee, which makes committee assignments - an excellent spot for a skilled politician to gain favors.
"Every member of Congress has to go to you to get what they want," the lobbyist said of the Steering Committee.
Blunt also made it a point to work late into the night, making dozens of fundraising calls and attending other members' fundraisers virtually nightly. And during that first term, Blunt raised more than $200,000 for the party and its candidates, a remarkable sum for a freshman, most of whom are still trying to find the quickest way from their offices to the House floor.
"There is probably no other member of the House that appears at as many events as Roy," Hartley said.
A few months after DeLay appointed Blunt chief deputy whip shortly into his second term, Blunt took the next step by opening a leadership political action committee, the Rely on Your Beliefs Fund.
The first year the PAC took in $383,000 and distributed it to candidates and party committees.
"It's unusual to be successful at it that early in a career," Erik Smith, a longtime aide to former Rep. Richard Gephardt, a Missouri Democrat. "A lot of people have (leadership PACs). A lot of them sit and don't do anything."
Since then, the Rely on Your Beliefs Fund has become one of the most successful PACs in town, taking in millions of dollars and spreading the wealth to candidates and committees.
The PAC collected $1.4 million in the 2002 cycle, when Blunt became majority whip. In the 2004 cycle, it raised $1.8 million, and during the current election cycle it has banked nearly $700,000 so far.
"It is part of the job," said Burson Taylor, Blunt's spokeswoman. "It's one of the priorities to maintain and grow the majority in the House. He certainly does a lot of it for members in their districts, sometimes in Washington as well."
An analysis by The Washington Post found that one way Blunt maintains the hectic pace is that he is among the top users in Congress of private corporate jets. The Post reported that Blunt and DeLay were the most frequent users in the current congressional leadership.
"That means he's going places to help people," Smith said. "You don't use them to take the family to Miami Beach for the weekend. You use them to do events for people that otherwise wouldn't be possible. Flying commercially to places like Helena or Grand Forks would take the better part of a day."
Such financial wizardry cannot be overestimated as a factor in Blunt's ascendance, because "like all aspects of campaign finance, (its importance) intensified a lot in the last 10 years," Talent said. "That is valued more today than it would have been 15 or 20 years ago."
But people in both parties also say Blunt's rise was due to more than just his fundraising prowess. They also cite his political skills.
"The man is the single best listener that I've met in the 25 years I've been in politics," said Julie Dammann, chief of staff for Sen. Kit Bond, a Missouri Republican. "He has the ability to not say anything in a meeting, where people keep talking to fill the void and say something they shouldn't say. And he doesn't have the need to say something all the time.
"He understands the difference between a yes, a conditional yes and a no. Members sometimes hear what they want to hear. Blunt hears what you say and then has a system in place to follow up."
Blunt also had good timing. In the late 1990s, the Republican House leadership went through some upheaval, with big-name leaders stepping aside for a variety of reasons and opening up slots for the next generation. That, combined with his fundraising expertise, made Blunt a natural.
"It was a combination of opportunity and competence," Dammann said.
Bond pointed to Blunt's losing campaigns as an explanation for Blunt's hard work and skill.
"There's nothing like getting the experience of one of those campaigns to make you better," Bond said. "It made him better."
Thought you might be interested PING
Money talks,
BS walks.
or so I was told at a young age.
Ping
And he rates an A from GOA as well!
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