Name: Joe Donoghue
Hometown: Hagerstown, Md.
Position: Legislative director for Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz.
Age: 47
Alma mater: Georgetown University
——-
Washington Examiner: How long have you been in Washington, and how did you end up working for Sen. McCain?
Donoghue: I came to Washington in ’87 to go to school, right out of high school, so it was my freshman year in college. I needed a part-time job, I like to say “book money and beer money.” One of my older brothers had worked here on the Hill for a while and he suggested I try and find something up here because it would look good on a resume someday.
So I went around to a few different offices, just asking if anybody needed part-time help. And sure enough, I go to McCain’s office and they needed somebody to work 20 hours a week in their mail room, so I started working 20 hours a week in their mail room.
To tell the truth I didn’t know if he was a Republican or a Democrat, and I honestly didn’t care. I was getting paid $6,000 a year and I thought I was the richest kid in the world.
Examiner: So what does a legislative director do?
Donoghue: You’re mainly responsible for kind of implementing the senator’s legislative agenda, helping him develop a legislative agenda, coming up with good ideas, from things that he has worked on in the past to either kick-start them up again, things that didn’t get accomplished or new things for him to work on.
But with my senator, it’s more, the guy has a hundred ideas a day, and a hundred things he wants to get done a day. He’s incredibly driven, so it’s more kind of implementing what he wants done, and doing what we can to get it accomplished. Sometimes we are very successful at it, and sometimes we are not.
Examiner: Is it a bit frustrating considering how little Congress is actually doing these days?
Donoghue: Very. Compared to what we used to be able to do, when we were able to amend bills and we would bring a bill to the floor and we would work on it for a couple of weeks, and you could file and offer three or four of them, particularly to appropriations bills.
There were times we could have an appropriations bill on the floor and McCain would want to have three or four different amendments to strike things that he thought were wasteful or abusive, and we would actually be able to debate those, and have votes on them. It’s been a long time since we’ve been able to do that. So it’s frustrating in that respect.
Examiner: [The National Defense Authorization Act is] something that does pass every year?
Donoghue: Every year, thankfully. And a lot of that at least lately, in the last few years, the credit for getting that thing done goes solely to McCain, because he really pushed it hard. There was some talk last year, some folks were saying up here that we don’t need to do the NDAA, that it’s a waste of time.
That was said last year, and he said, “No, we’re doing it.” It’s incredibly important to the men and women in the military for their training and equipping and their morale and their pay raises and things like that. So he pushed it really, really hard.
Examiner: So you said when you first went to work here, you didn’t even know what party McCain was with?
Donoghue: When I was 18 years old, yes.
Examiner: But now you’ve been working with him a long time. He’s one of the most high-profile members of Congress. So what’s it like working for him?
Donoghue: I think in all seriousness, it sounds corny, I think I’ve got the best job in this town, because I get to do what I do for a guy like that, with the integrity that he has and his discipline.
I won’t lie. He can be tough to work for, but it’s also an honor to get up every morning and work for somebody like that. Somebody you trust. Somebody who you know in every instance is going to do the right thing.
Examiner: What is his general demeanor like?
Donoghue: He’s very funny. Very, very funny. He honestly is, I think that’s what a lot of people don’t realize about him. I think if a lot of people knew what a great sense of humor he has, they would like him a lot more than they do already.
Examiner: So what do you do to relax? Are you the kind of person, who when you’re not at work, you’re still at work? Or do you manage to disconnect?
Donoghue: I disconnect pretty well. I will admit to checking my email way too often, though on the weekends and in the evening. But I do a pretty good job of disconnecting.
I come from a very large Irish-Catholic family. I’m the ninth of 13 kids, so I’ve got lots of nieces and nephews and that’s a lot of fun to do on the weekends, to sort of play Uncle Joe and spend time with them. And I love to do anything I possibly can outside.
Examiner: Now anyone who works in Washington, whether they are in then media or in politics, we’re bombarded with cultural depictions of what we do, whether it’s “House of Cards,” or “West Wing,” or Veep. Do you watch any of these shows that have to do with Capitol Hill and the things that you do?
Donoghue: I watched the very first episode of “House of Cards,” and I didn’t watch anything after that because I thought it was comical that people really thought that’s how D.C. operates. It operates much more like “Veep” than it does like “House of Cards,” especially around here.
The thing that got me about “House of Cards” was that they depicted the guy as having like one staffer and that the member did all of it, all of that work, everything he did himself, which made me kind of laugh.
Examiner: Could somebody today do what you did? Just walk around, knock on a door and end up with a job on Capitol Hill?
Donoghue: I would hope so. I really do. If somebody popped in the front office and they were just interested in finding a part-time job, I would talk to them. I think I would talk to them just because It would make me happy that somebody is still operating that way and they didn’t call in a favor through their mom or dad or something.
Examiner: I think you’ve made a tactical mistake here …
Donoghue: What’s that?
Examiner: Well, when I put that in the article you’ll have people lined up outside.
Donoghue: Oh, I know that. That’s very true. I didn’t think of that. This is why I was nervous about this [Interview]. But I would hope there are still enough young people out there who are not opposed to pounding the pavement to get a job.
