Sen. Gillibrand (D-NY)
It’s clear that the possibility of a primary challenge from Rep. Carolyn Maloney* to Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand has the junior New York senator on the run. But in trying to run, it’s not quite clear that Gillibrand is taking smart political steps.
The news came this morning that Sen. Gillibrand was considering action to put a moratorium on Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell investigations for 18 months, while the groundwork on a full repeal could be accomplished, and that the amendment could come as soon as Tuesday.
Great news, right? Well, maybe.
It is not apparent that anyone else has been consulted on this — at least not the “introduction” part (or the part where someone with knowledge of Sen. Gillibrand’s plans talked to The Daily Beast’s Jason Bellini, who broke the story this morning).
Representative Patrick Murphy, who has taken the lead on the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell in the House, has never mentioned a moratorium. Even if Bellini is right that the Human Rights Campaign and the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network had “shopped the idea around,” it’s clear that Gillibrand jumped the gun or just flat-out took the idea for herself and ran with it.
Bellini’s piece quotes an SLDN representative as saying only that: “Gillibrand is one of those senators we’ve talking to about doing this.” An HRC representative, in a piece published at the Washington Blade later in the day, wouldn’t even go that far:
Allison Herwitt, legislative director for the Human Rights Campaign, said in a statement that HRC believes a moratorium amendment should be introduced only if there is enough votes to fully overturn “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell.”
“HRC believes that this temporary repeal amendment should only be offered and voted on if we are confident that there are sufficient votes to advance the issue of permanent repeal of ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell,’” she said. “It is not yet clear that threshold can be achieved this week. However, we remain committed to exploring every possible option available to stop the discharges of honorable men and women standing on the front lines protecting the safety and security of all Americans.”
In the Bellini piece, he wrote: “A Senate staffer familiar with the matter says Gillibrand may introduce her amendment on Tuesday to the Defense reauthorization bill.” Although Gillibrand’s spokeswoman said the decision to introduce the amendment is not “final,” she is quoted as saying that “this is part of an ongoing effort to repeal this policy.”
By the Blade’s piece, though, that was being walked back a bit:
“This is still, like, very much in the planning stages,” Lesser said. “[Gillibrand] is looking more big picture. She wants to repeal ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ overall, and she’s working with Sen. [Ted] Kennedy’s office and Congressman [Patrick] Murphy’s office to garner support for this through Congress. So that’s more of her focus — this bigger picture.”
So, the idea might be a good one, and certainly the repeal of Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell is Gillibrand’s goal. But, it’s not quite clear whether New York’s newest Senator is on the ball when it comes to consulting her staff, colleagues or coalition partners on her plans.
And when a primary challenge is headed straight at you, those are three groups you’d rather have fully on your side.
* = Error referring to Rep. McCarthy, rather than Rep. Maloney, has been fixed. -Ed.
[UPDATE: I just received this comment from Alex Nicholson, the Executive Director of Servicemembers United:
Servicemembers United is generally aware of several interim proposals to weaken DADT that have been shopped around to various Senate offices, and the organization has been involved in some of that work itself. SU has not, however, seen the text of this specific proposal, nor has Senator Gillibrand's office or SLDN been in contact with SU about this particular option as of yet.
So, Servicemembers United also had not been in the loop with Gillibrand on this issue.]
* * * * *
This wasn’t Sen. Gillibrand’s only stumble of the day.
In today’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearings on the nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court, Chairman Leahy finally cut her off from her introduction of Judge Sotomayor, which was repetitive of Sen. Schumer’s introduction that immediately preceded it — not to mention half of the Democratic senators on the committee, whose opening statements had preceded the introductions.
Then, she, oddly, asked Leahy for “20 more seconds” to wrap up.
Although, technically, it wasn’t Gillibrand’s fault that she was interrupted, it was certainly not the TV debut she’d hoped the introduction to be.
Popularity: 13% [?]
Chris Geidner is the award-winning senior political writer at D.C.'s Metro Weekly and has written for The Atlantic Online, Advocate.com, Salon and other publications, as well as at his blog, Law Dork. In 2011, he received the Excellence in News Writing Award from the National Lesbian and Gay Journalists Association for his coverage of "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" repeal. Prior to moving to D.C. in 2009, he served as an attorney on the senior staff at the Ohio Attorney General's Office and had earlier worked for a leading Columbus law firm. An extended biography can be found
Exactly what is she thinking? The Defense Appropriations bill is under VETO threat because of the F-22s. If she’s trying to buy brownie points for her primary, then it’s pretty disgusting, because she’s toying with the lives of many folks who really want to see this repealed.
Chris (the commenter)
Do you really think that the President would veto six hundred billion dollars for the military because he doesn’t want 3/10 of 1 percent of it going to some fighters that important Democratic Congressmen wanted to keep in the bill?
I don’t know why the White House would even issue such an un-believable veto threat, but I know even less about why people keep trumping the threat up.
What? He reiterated his threat TODAY. I think he’s pretty serious and he should be. The f22 is a symbol for spending by congress that doesn’t make any sense. If he backs down, then Congress will ride roughshod over him for his entire term.
I would bet anything that he wouldn’t do that. Congress is running out of time. It still has 12 appropriations bills, Sotomayor, Health care, and energy to pass by the end of October (in the case of appropriations bills, hopefully by the beginning of FY2010 on October 1). Most commentators agree that Obama’s agenda will be much more difficult to push after the new year. So you think he would actually alienate dozens of influential Democrats, whose help he needs passing his agenda, AND send Congress back to square one for passing the largest appropriations bill, just to save face on a bunch of stupid fighters?
No, I do not think the threat is credible.
I don’t know if it is fair to Sen. Gillibrand to argue that it is the primary challenge that has caused her to support our issues. In fact, she declared her support unequivocally for same sex marriage, ENDA, and ending DADT at the time of her selection.
A number of gay bloggers were suspicious of her positions then, pointing out that her voting record had been far more conservative as a Congressman. At the time — and now — I wonder if she is traveling the path Charles Goodell took. He was appointed to replace Robert Kennedy after the assassination by Nelson Rockefeller, and the howls of anger almost caused an earthquake. How dare a conservative Republican be chosen to replace Robert Kennedy!
But, whether because he realized himself who he was replacing, because he knew that representing an entire state was different from representing a small district, or even out of pure opportunism — which I doubted — Goodell became one of the most progressive and anti-War Senators — this was during Vietnam — and was the first Senator who called for Nixon’s impeachment, long before Watergate.
Neither seems to be the most skillful or smooth of politicians, but I see no reason to doubt Sen. G’s sincerity.