As the only senator to have voted against the Patriot Act and the only presidential hopeful to have voted against the Iraq war, Russ Feingold is sometimes tempted to say “I told you so.””Yeah, but I was taught it’s impolite to do that,” the Wisconsin liberal tells The Examiner in an interview. “And it also doesn’t help you get where you want to go.”
The White House is where Feingold wants to go. He is counting on his consistent opposition to the Iraq war to get him there.
“Heis, I think, the one Democrat who can say he’s 100 percent pure,” says columnist David Yepsen of the Des Moines Register.
Indeed, Feingold has become the left’s dark horse candidate in a contest crowded with Democrats who at least initially supported the war, including senators Hillary Rodham Clinton, John Kerry and John Edwards.
“People are prepared to live with a good candidate who says ‘I was wrong’ after the fact,” Feingold says. “But I think people would strongly prefer a candidate who had the judgment that’s right in the first place.
“They want somebody who stood up to the mistake of the Iraq war from the beginning. And I’m the only one — even on the long list — who actually voted against the Iraq war.”
From the outset, Feingold expressed skepticism about President Bush’s arguments that Saddam Hussein was linked to al-Qaida and had amassed stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction. In the years since, the stockpiles have not been found and the al-Qaida links have been disputed.
“I was the first member of the Senate to get on the floor and say, wait a minute, I don’t buy this connection to al Qaida,” Feingold recalls. “I don’t find the case on WMD, in terms of being an imminent threat, to be persuasive.
“I just had this sick feeling that people were buying into this out of fear, rather than rationality,” he adds. “I was so extremely opposed to the Iraq war — I was certain it was the wrong call.”
In August 2005, Feingold called for U.S. troops to leave Iraq by Dec. 31, becoming the first senator to advocate a specific timetable for withdrawal. Since then, many other Democrats — including Kerry and Edwards — have embraced withdrawal timetables.
Feingold hopes his willingness to take the lead on such thorny issues will pay political dividends in 2008.
“I mean, this is about being elected president,” he says. “And in the end, being president involves judgment.”
Feingold says Clinton, the early favorite for the Democratic presidential nomination, is “absolutely” too timid on the Iraq war issue. Unlike Feingold, the New Yorker voted for the war in 2002 and now opposes a timetable for withdrawing U.S. troops.
Feingold calls this “the wrong approach” and says it will make it harder for Clinton to win the Democratic primaries, which are dominated by liberal voters.
“Given some of the feelings among the grass roots of the Democratic Party, it’s certainly not a sure thing,” he says of a Clinton nomination.
“And I don’t know if I’m going to run, but I guarantee you, I wouldn’t choose not to run because I don’t think I can defeat her. If it was one-on-one, given the issues that I’ve taken, I think I’d have a shot. It would be an upset, but I’ve been out there in many, many states and people are looking for an alternative,” he adds. “There are a lot of people out there that want to have some choices here and I think they’re willing to vote accordingly.”
On the other hand, Feingold might be playing right into Clinton’s hands, according to Charlie Cook, publisher of the Cook Political Report.
“I’m not sure that Sen. Clinton minds someone running around saying she’s not liberal enough, that she’s too much of a centrist,” Cook says. “At the end of the day, the question is whether there really are a lot of liberals that won’t fall in behind her, behind the first woman to ever have a realistic chance of becoming president.”
While Feingold was one of 23 senators to vote against authorization of the Iraq war in October 2002, he was the only senator — from either party — to vote against the Patriot Act in October 2001. The move, regarded by some as a career ender at the time, is now seen by liberals as a career booster.
“We clearly did need a bill that had many of the provisions of the USA Patriot Act,” Feingold recalls. “But there were several provisions in there that were just plain overreaching.
“Yet the Democratic leadership, along with the White House, said no. No changes. And I tried that night to offer amendments, but I was allowed only a few minutes in a very rushed setting. The process was shut down in a way that I thought was irresponsible and really reckless in terms of our responsibilities as a Senate.”
So Feingold decided to oppose the bill on the Senate floor.
“When I went down to the well, I didn’t know what they were going to call it,” he says. “Then I saw that it was being called the USA Patriot Act. So I gulped a bit and realized I was going to be the only one who voted no.”
Afterward, Feingold was shocked to receive a standing ovation at an appearance in one of Wisconsin’s most conservative counties. To this day, he receives such ovations when he is introduced at political events throughout the country.
Years after Feingold’s solitary dissent, other Democrats came to oppose the Patriot Act. Last December, when Feingold led a filibuster against renewal of the legislation, Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid even boasted, “We killed the Patriot Act.”
Reid eventually voted to renew a revamped version of the Patriot Act that passed in March, by which time Feingold was one of 10 Democrats to vote no.
During that same month, Feingold endeared himself to liberals even further by introducing a highly controversial resolution to censure Bush for a terrorist surveillance program. Feingold said it was illegal for the administration to eavesdrop on international telephone conversations among suspected terrorists, a charge the White House strongly disputes.
A month after Feingold introduced his resolution, it had attracted the support of only two co-sponsors in the Senate, fellow liberals Tom Harkinof Iowa and Barbara Boxer of California.
“Again, just like in the Patriot Act, I’m looking at how people will look at this 50 years from now,” Feingold explains. “Why did the Congress allow the president to grab excessive executive power when it was simply unnecessary? So when people hear that, they’re going to say, well, that makes sense and it doesn’t sound outrageous at all.”
Most Democrats were leery of censuring the commander-in-chief during a time of war. Feingold says he is sensitive to the timing, which is why he didn’t go even further by demanding impeachment.
“I believe what the president did here was an impeachable offense,” he says. “I believe it’s a high crime and misdemeanor. I could have called for impeachment,” he adds. “I mean, look at what Republicans did with Bill Clinton on something that was very questionable in terms of high crimes and misdemeanors.”
Yet Feingold was the only Democratic senator to vote against a motion to dismiss the impeachment case against Clinton in 1999.
“I thought enough of a case had been made that the president had obstructed justice that I owed it to my oath to hear the evidence,” he recalls. “I was surprised that so many Democrats were willing to say there’s no reason to look at the evidence.”
By bucking his own party, Feingold risks alienating the very liberals he hopes to attract. In fact, some Democrats are still miffed that he voted to confirm Attorney General John Ashcroft and Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts.
“I believe substantial deference goes to the president on appointments,” explains Feingold, who is proud of his iconoclastic streak.
“I think it helps me because I think it tells everybody — independents, moderate Democrats, conservatives — that I’m just not locked down for anybody,” he says. “I call ’em as I see ’em.”
If elected, Feingold would become the nation’s first Jewish president and the first to have been twice divorced. He says he has heard these concerns raised “a hundred times.”
“I certainly am not proud of the fact that I’m twice divorced, but people can decide whether that has anything to do with being president,” he says.
“I’m extremely proud being Jewish,” he adds. “If that’s a negative for anybody, that’s up to them. I assure you, it’s not relevant to me. I would offer myself as a candidate for the highest office in the land only if I thought I could do the job.”
Russell Feingold
1953 » Born in Janesville, Wis., son of an attorney
1971 » Graduates from Joseph A. Craig High School, Janesville
1975 » Graduates from University of Wisconsin
1977 » Rhodes Scholar, University of Oxford, England
1977 » Marries Sue Levine. The couple will eventually have two children.
1979 » Graduates from Harvard Law School and joins private law firm
1982 » Elected to Wisconsin State Senate
1986 » Divorced
1991 » Marries Mary Erpenbach, who had two children from previous marriage
1992 » Elected to U.S. Senate
1999 » Only Democratic senator to vote against a motion to dismiss the impeachment case against President Clinton
2001 » Only senator to vote against Patriot Act
2002 » Co-sponsors McCain-Feingold campaignfinance legislation, signed by President Bush
2005 » Announces second divorce
2005 » First senator to call for specific timetable for withdrawing U.S. forces from Iraq
2006 » Introduces resolution to censure President Bush, calling his terrorist surveillance program illegal
Feingold’s positions on the issues
Abortion
Rated 75 percent pro-choice by NARAL Pro-Choice America; zero percent pro-life by National Right to Life.
Campaign finance
Co-wrote McCain-Feingold legislation to crack down on unlimited “soft money” political contributions.
Gun control
“I happen to be a strong believer in the Second Amendment and an individual right to bear arms.”
Iraq
Voted against Iraq war resolution; first senator to demand specific timetable for withdrawing U.S. troops.
Patriot Act
Only senator to vote against it in 2001.
Terrorist Surveillance Program
Calls it illegal, and introduced motion to censure President Bush.
What observers are saying
David Yepsen
Political columnist
Des Moines Register
PRO » “He’s Howard Dean without the steroids — a little cooler in temperature. So he can get that faction of the party without scaring the hell out of everybody else.”
CON » “Is he too far to the left? Even if caucus-going Democrats in Iowa like him and everything he says, will they see him as just too liberal to go the distance?”
Charlie Cook
Editor
Cook Political Report
PRO » “The $64,000 question for Feingold is whether there is any room to Hillary Clinton’s left in this race. The passion among the anti-war [activists] suggest, at least theoretically, that there is.”
CON » “I doubt if Feingold can raise enough money to effectively compete. Maybe he can become the Howard Dean of 2008, but that doesn’t happen often.”
Larry Sabato
Political scientist, University of Virginia
PRO » “A champion of the left, Feingold is lionized by liberals, including many bloggers, for his opposition to the Iraq war and the Patriot Act and his sponsoring of campaign finance reform.”
CON » “The very positions that attract the left may repel the right and middle in a general election. Feingold also has no executive experience.”
Americans for Democratic Action rating (2005)
100 percent liberal.
American Conservative Union rating (2005)
12 percent conservative.
About this Series
After studying the polls, consulting the handicappers and interviewing the candidates themselves, The Examiner has winnowed a list of some 30 potential presidential contenders down to 10. The result is Meet the Next President, a two-week series of in-depth profiles of the 10 people most likely to become the next leader of the free world. It’s a behind-the-scenes look at Democrats and Republicans, liberals and conservatives, front-runners and dark horses in the 2008 presidential sweepstakes – even before the 2006 midterms have been decided. With presidential campaigns starting earlier each election cycle, why wait?
