Rand Paul launched his presidential campaign Tuesday, skewering the “special interests that use Washington D.C. as their own private piggy bank.” His campaign home page blared the headline “Defeat the Washington Machine.”
This sort of campaign against Washington is a cliché these days, but for Paul, it’s a real thing. He’s been fighting this fight since he entered politics. And that’s why the Republican Party needs him today.
Recall how Paul won his first political race: Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell had handpicked Secretary of State Trey Grayson for Kentucky’s open Senate seat in 2010. Eighteen Republican senators funded Grayson in the primary. Only one funded Paul. Grayson raised half a million dollars from PACs in the primary — 20 times what Paul raised from them. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce endorsed Grayson in the primary. Paul attacked Grayson for the “AIG Lobbyists” who threw fundraisers for him, which were swarming with lobbyists.
This was the K Street/GOP Machine. Rand Paul demolished it, beating Grayson by 23 points. That victory, on May 18, 2010, was the day the dam broke in the Tea Party flood.
Since he’s come to Washington, it’s been the same story: Rand Paul against the machine.
His voting record makes it obvious. Paul has the second-highest lifetime Senate score with the pro-free-enterprise Club for Growth — 98 percent, behind only Mike Lee of Utah. Check the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s most recent voting scorecard, and it’s the opposite story: Only one Republican Senator has a lower lifetime rating than Paul — Ted Cruz.
Paul’s fundraising tells the same story. Paul’s RANDPAC raised $3.74 million in the 2014 elections. A vast majority of that was from donations smaller than $200. While some corporate money fills RANDPAC’s coffers (such as donations from the PACs of Koch Industries, Goldman Sachs, and Wal-Mart), corporate PACs account for just $163,499 of all RANDPAC’s donations — that’s 4.4 percent.
Compare that to ERICPAC, run by former House Majority Leader Eric Cantor. ERICPAC raised $4.1 million last cycle, and $2.0 million of it (or 49 percent) was from corporate PACs. This includes contributions from many top K Street lobbying firms.
Cantor’s fundraising and the Chamber’s voting scorecard represent the traditional way the GOP establishment works. And it’s not that different from the traditional way the Democratic establishment works.
Democrats talk like peace-loving populists, Republicans talk about free enterprise and limited government. And then both get together for big wars, corporate welfare, overspending, and a rigged tax code pocked with high rates and indefensible and inscrutable loopholes.
This system is good for lobbyists and for lawmakers (who are properly classified as “future lobbyists”) and the big companies that can afford them. It’s bad for transparency, free enterprise, the economy, good government, taxpayers, and small businessmen who can’t afford to play the game.
It’s a bipartisan system that enriches the insiders at everyone else’s expense. It’s the Washington Machine against which Rand Paul is running.
Paul’s “Issues” page on his website inveighs not only against high taxes and overregulation, but also against “corporate subsidies.” As some other conservative candidates tack towards K Street and the special interests in seeking the nomination (think of Scott Walker’s flip-floppy language when asked about the ethanol mandate in Iowa), Paul could put distance between himself and the GOP field (except, probably, Cruz).
In the general election, raging against the Washington machine will be even more crucial. Mitt Romney’s struggles in 2012 were mostly traceable to his closeness to the machine, and his insulation in the K Street bubble.
Romney surrounded himself with old-school Republican revolving-door lobbyists, and spoke to donors about low-income people lacking personal responsibility. And Romneycare, which neutered the GOP’s strongest attack on President Obama, was largely the work of health-industry special interests seeking a wider pipeline of taxpayer money.
If Hillary is the nominee, her greatest weakness may be her unsavory ties with the Washington Machine. She has a history of blending campaign contributions with policies.
The Clinton network is inextricable from the Democratic K Street network. A true free-market attack on the Washington Machine in 2016 would turn on its head the typical narrative where Democrats stand with the people against the powerful.
And if any conservative is to govern as a conservative after winning the White House, he will have to treat K Street and the GOP establishment with suspicion. “Too often,” Paul said Tuesday, “when Republicans have won, we’ve squandered our victory by becoming part of the Washington Machine.”
In a crowded field, the odds are against Paul being the Republican nominee. But the party would benefit if they made Rand Paul their conscience.
Timothy P. Carney, The Washington Examiner’s senior political columnist, can be contacted at [email protected]. His column appears Tuesday and Thursday on washingtonexaminer.com.
