Russell Senate Office Building, May 19
“What’s going on?” asks a bald man in a yellow shirt. He looks like a tourist, and he’s standing outside Arizona Republican senator John McCain’s offices in the Russell Senate Office Building, and his voice echoes lightly off the foyer’s marble floors and high, curved ceilings.
“Senators’ meeting,” someone answers, and the tourist moves on. I’m not sure who answered him; it’s hard to tell. About 40 reporters, photographers, and television cameramen are gathered outside Room 235, a back entrance into McCain’s office that’s been frequented recently by moderate senators scrambling to head off the coming showdown over President Bush’s judicial nominations. Well, actually, they’ve already failed to head off the showdown over Bush’s nominees–it started on Wednesday, when majority leader Bill Frist brought the nomination of Texas Judge Priscilla Owen to the Senate floor. And it shows no sign of ending anytime soon.
Yet there’s still a chance the moderates will be able to strike a deal that would prevent Republicans from ending the filibuster of judicial nominations–the infamous “nuclear option,” or “constitutional option,” or “fairness option”–while guaranteeing the majority a vote on Owen’s, William Pryor’s, and Janice Rogers Brown’s nominations, and perhaps on some others. The moderates have until next Tuesday, when leader Frist is expected to call a cloture vote–a vote ending debate–on Owen’s nomination, which would then set in motion a dizzingly complex series of events that’s altogether too abstruse to get into here, but which possibly would end up paralyzing the Senate.
Come to think of it, that’s not quite right either: the Senate’s already paralyzed. Minority Leader Harry Reid shut down committee meetings on Wednesday after Frist brought up Owen’s nomination; before that, Frist denied some Republicans’ attempts to have the full Senate vote on John Bolton, President Bush’s nominee to be the next ambassador to the United Nations, before bringing up Owen. Also, congressional reporters are incredibly bored, since they can’t cover committee hearings on auto safety and defined-benefit pension plans. Instead they’ve all shown up in front of McCain’s office, waiting for one of the moderates to emerge with news of a deal. It’s been, suffice it to say, a long wait.
Who are the moderates working toward a compromise? Here comes one of them: Connecticut Democrat Joe Lieberman, who greets the reporters with smiles and says, “Good morning. Time for another secret meeting” before vanishing inside. Next is Maine Republican Susan Collins–“Guess I’ve found the right spot,” she says on seeing the press–then Louisiana Democrat Mary Landrieu. There are others, such as Collins’s fellow senator from Maine, Republican Olympia Snowe, and Virginia Republican John Warner, Nebraska Democrat Ben Nelson, Arkansas Democrat Mark Pryor, Ohio Republican Mike DeWine, West Virginia Democrat Robert Byrd, and Colorado Democrat Ken Salazar. Every so often a senator leaves McCain’s office, and every so often one enters, and each time this happens the cameras flash, and the reporters lean forward, tape recorders in hand, and ask all sorts of questions. Most of which involve: “When are you going to have a deal?”
And most of which are answered: “Not anytime soon.”
Certainly not before Monday. I spent the better part of Thursday on Capitol Hill, racing between the stakeout outside McCain’s office and the floor debates on the Owen nomination in the Capitol, and by the time I left the Russell building for the last time, a little after 6 p.m., there still was no sign of an impending compromise. More, CNN reports that most of today’s negotiations will take place by phone, which doesn’t seem like a positive development, because . . . well, you try having phone negotiations with Robert Byrd.
Then again, any sort of negotiations are tough. “You get 10 senators in a room, and get at least 11 opinions,” Ben Nelson jokes as he leaves McCain’s office after the first meeting of the day.
“I hate to be redundant, but the discussions continue,” says Lieberman, as he leaves. Message: No deal.
Hours pass, and before long the herd congregates outside Russell 235 once more, waiting for signs of a compromise. It’s around 3:30 p.m., and many of the moderates–they’ve already been dubbed the “Gang of 12”–are inside McCain’s office.
Suddenly the herd lets out a collective moo–John Warner’s escorting Robert Byrd down the hallway toward McCain’s office. Warner is much taller than Byrd; he tilts his head so that he can hear Byrd, and Byrd can hear him, and gently places his hand on Byrd’s arm, steadying the frail octagenarian. It’s touching. Almost.
“We’ve just been working together,” Warner says to the cameras, smiling shyly.
Byrd smiles too. “Hope springs eternal.”
They walk inside and close the door behind them.
This second meeting of the day lasts awhile. It’s also attracted a new visitor–Pennsylvania Republican Arlen Specter, who hasn’t said how he’d vote on the “nuclear option” if the opportunity arises. Reporters begin to talk to one another–maybe this means they’re closer to announcing something, one says. It’s gotta happen soon, says another.
The senators begin to emerge. First out is Nelson, the conservative Democrat from Nebraska. Someone asks where he’s going, and if there’s been a deal. He nods his head. “I’m just going to go announce it on Hardball . . . ” he says. Then he pauses. “Just kidding!”
Matthew Continetti is a staff writer at The Weekly Standard.
