Posted on 09/03/2002 5:44:30 AM PDT by GailA
In campaign season, chief NRA lobbyist scopes the field
By James W. Brosnan brosnanj@shns.com September 2, 2002
WASHINGTON - When Tennessee's Democratic candidate for governor, Phil Bredesen, goes dove hunting with Rep. John Tanner (D-Tenn.) today, one former Tanner aide will be paying attention from afar.
Chris Cox, a native of Jackson, Tenn., is the chief lobbyist for the National Rifle Association and the key person who will determine whether Bredesen or Rep. Van Hilleary (R-Tenn.) gets the NRA's endorsement. Ditto for the Senate race, which pits Rep. Bob Clement (D-Tenn.) against former governor Lamar Alexander.
During the Clinton-Gore administration gun-control fights, the NRA became identified almost exclusively as an ally of the Republican Party. But since Al Gore lost his home state of Tennessee amidst a barrage of NRA commercials, Cox has watched as Democratic candidates in many states scramble to get back on the NRA's good side.
But it's their views, not their prowess with a firearm that will be the determining factor.
"You are seeing a number of folks who recognize how the political winds are blowing. We certainly have a difficult job in making the decisions on who is the better candidate and who is the Johnny-come-lately," said Cox.
The NRA endorsed Hilleary in the GOP primary for governor, but that doesn't guarantee an endorsement for the general election. No choice was made in the Senate primary. Cox expects the NRA's choices in Tennessee will be made by late September.
In Arkansas, the NRA will back incumbent Sen. Tim Hutchinson (R-Ark.) over his Democratic opponent, Atty. Gen. Mark Pryor.
In Missouri, Sen. Jean Carnahan, a Democrat who was appointed to the Senate after her dead husband won the 2000 election, is feeling the heat on guns in her campaign against Republican Jim Talent, a former congressman.
On Friday at an annual skeet shoot and fish fry on a farm in the Missouri Bootheel, there was Carnahan with a 20-gauge Browning Citori shotgun on her shoulder, blasting clay pigeons.
"I am not opposed to sportsmen using guns," said Carnahan, who hit nine of 15 clay targets.
Republicans, noting her strong support for a wide array of gun-control laws, charge that her interest in sport shooting is attributable to a poll last week that showed her support among male voters weakening.
Cox, at 32, is young for such a powerful job. He was picked earlier this year by NRAs executive vice president Wayne LaPierre to replace the NRA's longtime chief lobbyist, James Jay Baker, who retired.
Cox supervises a staff of 76, including lawyers, lobbyists here, regional lobbyists for state legislatures, researchers and public relations specialists. He wouldn't reveal his salary. The NRA's lobby disclosure for 2001 reported expenses of $725,000 for Baker, Cox and five other lobbyists.
When in the Washington area, he splits his time between the NRA's Fairfax, Va., headquarters and a small suite above Bullfeathers, a restaurant three blocks from the Capitol.
But this fall, Cox will spend quite a bit of time on the road endorsing candidates. On some of trips, he will be joined by NRA president Charlton Heston, 77, who recently disclosed that he is suffering from symptoms of Alzheimer disease.
Cox said Heston is committed to serving out his term, which ends this spring, and is working on a schedule of campaign events.
"He's not paid by the NRA. He's in his golden years. He volunteers his time and reputation because he wants his grandkids to have the same rights as he had," Cox said.
Cox traces his own roots with the NRA to a firearms safety course he took as a child before going hunting with his father, a surgeon.
After graduating from Rhodes College, he joined Tanner's congressional staff, where gun control became one of his key issues. In 1995, he joined the NRA lobbying staff. Cox speaks with fervor about the NRA, calling it the nation's "oldest civil rights organization."
"We've been around for 131 years. We protect the rights of law-abiding firearms owners. We are mainstream America," he said.
The NRA's chief lobbyist is a hot spot. Baker left in 1994 amidst complaints that he failed to stop the Clinton administration from passing the Brady Act, which mandated a waiting period for background checks on prospective gun buyers. But Baker's replacement, Tanya Metaska, roused resentment in Congress over hard-ball tactics, and Baker returned in 1999.
Tanner said, "No group that has the longevity and the credibility they all desire to have can expect any member of Congress or any public official to do their bidding every time. That is unreasonable."
Like Baker, Cox is an advocate of grass-roots pressure.
"NRA's power is not in Chris Cox or Wayne LaPierre. It's in over 4 million law-abiding people who believe in their freedoms. Come election time, they vote their freedoms first," Cox said.
Members are urged to attend lawmaker election workshops with NRA staff. But the NRA also backs up its choices with independent ad campaigns.
One target in 2000 was Gore.
"You saw Al Gore run for the U.S. House of Representatives in Tennessee as a strong pro-NRA, pro-Second Amendment candidate. After moving to the Senate, he still had a strong Second Amendment record. And once he started eyeing a higher office, he turned his back on Tennessee. He turned his back on law-abiding gun owners in our state. You can get away with that for a while, but eventually it comes back to get you," Cox said.
Gore not only backed the Clinton administration's push for a mandatory three-day waiting period on gun purchases but also advocated state registration for new handgun purchases.
"I don't think he did a good job of explaining his position," said Tanner. "The president can't take anybody's gun away from them."
By Election Day, Gore's campaign was reduced to running radio ads by his former college roommate, actor Tommy Lee Jones, defending Gore on the gun issue.
Gun-control advocates dispute the impact of the issue on Gore's loss.
While the NRA takes some credit for his defeats in Tennessee and West Virginia, some of its strongest efforts were in Pennsylvania and Michigan, which Gore carried, noted Nancy Hwa, spokesman for the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence.
Tanner believes Republicans have tried to co-opt the NRA. Cox said it might surprise people to learn the NRA has endorsed more than 50 Democratic House candidates.
Legislatively, Cox suffered a defeat when Congress passed the campaign reform act. Starting next year, it will limit the NRA's ability to run ads within 60 days of an election. But Cox is confident an NRA lawsuit will end in a Supreme Court ruling that the restriction is unconstitutional.
Currently, Cox is helping the Air Line Pilots Association in its fight to allow pilots to carry firearms in the cockpit.
The NRA's biggest priority for the next Congress is legislation to bar cities and other entities from suing gun manufacturers for the cost of gun violence. More than half the House members are sponsors, and the Senate is close to the same. Cox said Tennessee and 20 other states have passed similar laws.
The gun lawsuits are "the equivalent of a drunk driver hitting somebody and having the unfortunate victim suing General Motors," Cox said.
Contact Washington correspondent James W. Brosnan at (202) 408-2701.
The Kansas City Star contributed to this report.
Algore also did a 180 on gay issues - going from being heavily involved with the Phelps "Godhatesfags" church in 1988 to being ardently pro-gay four years later as part of the Klintons' campaign and then in his own 2000 campaign.
Scandals of antigun politicians - from Kalifornia to Manhattan!
And she is not opposed to armed Secret Service agents protecting *her*.
But, she believes that law abiding citizens are not entitled to protect themselves with anything more lethal than a pea shooter.
I agree with your sentiment. However, if they didn't exist somebody else would carry the water for the socialist gun-grabers. They would just do it under a different name. The Devil has plenty of flagpoles to run his banner on.
Some good news for Hutch.
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