Kennedy and Gregg Team Up to Rebuild the Gulf Coast
WASHINGTON, Oct. 13 – In an unusual ideological pairing, Sens. Judd Gregg (R-N.H.) and Edward Kennedy (D-Mass.) have crossed party lines and crafted a bipartisan proposal that would create a new federal agency to supervise the recovery of the entire Gulf Coast region.
The senators held a press conference on Tuesday in which they sketched out their plans to create the Gulf Coast Recovery and Disaster Preparedness Agency whose director would be confirmed by the Senate and report directly to the president-a move designed to appeal to lawmakers from both parties who have called for fiscal responsibility in Hurricane Katrina spending.
“They both had been speaking publicly about the need to have some centralized oversight in the expenditure of federal funds in the Gulf Coast,” said Erin Rath, a spokeswoman for Gregg. “They were in step on the major concept behind the proposal and have worked for over a month to draft this plan.”
The legislation is expected to be successful given the influence both senators wield in their respective parties. Gregg is chair of both the Senate Budget Committee and the Appropriations subcommittee on homeland security and Kennedy, who has served in the Senate for more than 40 years, is the ranking Democrat on several committees.
“On its face, it is an odd relationship given that they are at different ends of the spectrum ideologically,” said Mark Wrighton, a political science professor at the University of New Hampshire. “But on a personal working level, it is not that odd; bipartisan efforts attract votes from both sides of the aisle.”
Both men have worked alongside each other for several years on the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, although they were generally closer in proximity than in political opinion.
“That personal working relationship is what you are seeing now,” Wrighton said.
Kennedy is the patriarch of one of America’s most prominent families and perhaps the most outspoken member of the Democratic Party, while Gregg is a legislator who avoids public discourse on divisive issues and prefers to work behind the scenes, Wrighton said.
Despite being at odds on many issues like abortion and same-sex marriage, Gregg and Kennedy have joined together in the past with successful results. In 2003 the senators developed legislation that updated the nation’s special education laws.
“Sen. Gregg and I have tackled many important issues together in the past, and I’m pleased that we’re again working together to ensure that the region is equipped to rebuild effectively and efficiently,” Kennedy said in a statement to the Union Leader. “We share a strong commitment to bringing everyone to the table.”
Both men were brought together on a more personal level during the attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, when they sat together and watched on television as the events unfolded.
“They were together on 9/11,” said Laura Capps, a spokeswoman for Kennedy. “They were in the Russell Building in the Senate with the first lady. The first lady had just arrived for an early education hearing in the Russell Caucus room when the planes hit.”
The three later held a press conference outside the Russell Building and stood side by side behind Laura Bush.
Like 9/11, Hurricane Katrina has been a unifying force for the nation and its legislators, according to Jennifer Donahue, a senior political advisor at the New Hampshire Institute of Politics.
“I think the most successful efforts in legislation are bipartisan efforts and Katrina has galvanized that,” she said. “With Gregg and Kennedy together on this, it is showing that the full spectrum is covered ideologically.”
Though Donahue thinks the legislation will be successful, she said it would be interesting to note the White House’s reaction to the proposed creation of another government agency whose leader would be a presidential appointee confirmed by the Senate.
“It will be interesting to see how the White House reacts to this particularly at a time when a lot of appointees are up for examination like Harriet Miers and FEMA’s Mike Brown,” she said. “People may have viewed the idea differently if it came from the president now as opposed to coming from a bipartisan senatorial effort.”
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