Category Archives: Politics

Roanoke Congressman Bob Goodlatte’s growing influence on Capitol Hill (Roanoker)

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The fact that Virginia 6th District Congressman Bob Goodlatte is such a familiar face in Roanoke makes his regular appearances seem routine. Yet he serves as chairman of the House Judiciary Committee — a hugely powerful body that takes up legislation ranging from intellectual property and copyright law to immigration reform.

During a three-week stretch this summer, Goodlatte visited the Rio Grande section of the U.S.-Mexico border to obtain more information about the large number of children and teenagers, mostly from Central America, who have massed there. He appeared a few days later on Fox News to discuss the issue on “Lou Dobbs Tonight.” Soon after, the House of Representatives passed a bill sponsored by Goodlatte and that would permanently ban state taxes on broadband Internet access.

“I think he works very hard,” says Newt Gingrich, who took over as Speaker of the House in 1995, just after Goodlatte had completed his first term, and held that position until 1999. “He is very much a people person. He does his homework in a quiet methodical way. I believe he has a very substantial influence in the House on some key issues. People know he is a commonsense conservative who studies the facts, who knows everybody and whose basic approach is to try to bring everyone together to get to a solution.”

Read my profile of Goodlatte online at the Roanoker, or pick up the issue, now on newstands.

One note of disclosure: Reporters don’t write headlines, so I didn’t come up with the “Clark Kent” theme. I do think the David Suetterlein quote from which it was drawn, however, is one of the best lines I’ve heard about Goodlatte.

Politics can be hard on people: The dual fates of Creigh Deeds & Bob McDonnell

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Teddy Roosevelt famously praised those who engage in politics as the “man in the arena,” “who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly.”

Described thusly, politics sounds glorious — but it also extracts a toll on the lives of those who choose to participate.

Consider Creigh Deeds, D-Bath County, and Bob McDonnell, R-Virginia Beach, who engaged in the closest statewide race in Virginia history in 2005 before meeting again four years later.

Read the rest of my thoughts in a piece that was published on the op/ed page of the Roanoke Times on Sept. 14.

New Work for the Roanoker’s 40th Anniversary Issue: What $82 Million Can (And Didn’t) Do for Roanoke’s $14 Million Poff Building

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The $14 million Richard H. Poff Federal Building was heralded as part of Roanoke’s “new era” in the inaugural issue of The Roanoker in the fall of 1974.

A photo of the under-construction, 14-story tower ran alongside a cover-story essay by Founder/Publisher Richard Wells that cited the new federal building as part of downtown Roanoke’s reinvention.

No longer.

Today, the structure has become a different kind of symbol: One of governmental waste, malpractice and bureaucracy.

“It’s a slap in the face of the taxpayers,” says 6th District Congressman Bob Goodlatte.

The Poff Federal Building was selected for a $51 million renovation project funded through the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, better known as the federal stimulus.

But through a mix of mind-bogglingly bad (and allegedly illegal) bid management, cost overruns and all-around poor planning, the project cost has escalated to more than $80 million.

Read more at the story’s home on the Roanoker website, or find the full digital version here.

New work for Politico Magazine: Do Democrats Need a Bubba Strategy? 7/8/2014

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The so-called Bubba Strategy might be the only proven way of getting rural-minded residents of very red states or regions to vote Democratic.

It was first road-tested in the state in 2001, when in his landmark run for Virginia governor, Democrat Mark Warner sponsored a truck operated by southwest Virginia’s Wood Brothers Racing team in a NASCAR race, appeared with bluegrass musician Ralph Stanley and slathered the deeply working-class region in “Sportsmen for Warner” signs signaling his support by and for gun owners.

Read more about Bubba Strategy architect Dave “Mudcat” Saunders and what—if any—future the political strategy may have among national Democrats in my first story for Politico Magazine.

Since the story was published, it’s been discussed on MSNBC’s Morning Joe, Hardball with Chris Matthews and, of course, Fark.

New work: Politics story in Washington Post, 4/26/2014

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I worked as the lead political reporter in the Roanoke Times’ newsroom for more than seven years, but since leaving I really haven’t written a politics story (** well, aside from this Jan. 2014 Roanoke Business story about how western Virginia businesses make political contributions — but it’s more of a business story**).

That changed Saturday when the Washington Post published my story on former Virginia House Speaker Vance Wilkins’ attempt to comeback from political exile. Wilkins helped build a Republican majority in the state house, and in 2000 he became Virginia’s first Republican speaker. He resigned only two years later, one week after the Post published a story that he’d paid a former staffer $100,000 to settle a sexual harassment claim.

He’s quietly worked with a few candidates in Republican primaries but mostly had remained out of site in his Amherst County home. After a string of statewide Republican defeates, Wilkins re-emerged this spring to challenge Wendell Walker, a man who came up working with Jerry Falwell’s Moral Majority group in Lynchburg, for 6th District Republican Committee chairman.

The result, as reported yesterday after the convention: Wilkins failed.

Although he outperformed expectations of many Republicans I spoke to, but Wilkins ultimately couldn’t overcome Walker. The defeat means that although Wilkins may continue to be active in Republican politics, he won’t play nearly as central or public a role.

You can find my story in the Washington Post here, and you can find the follow-up (by Martin Weil, not me) here.

Who Southwest Virginia businesses supported in the 2013 elections

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My newest story for Roanoke Business magazine hit the stands this month. It looks at who businesses in the Roanoke and New River valleys supported during Virginia’s 2013 elections.

While most of the media attention focused on the competitive statewide races, most local businesses went the other way, with most of their dollars going to candidates in the lower-profile General Assembly elections.

Why?

1) Those races tend to be less competitive. Even when there’s a challenger (and in many cases there’s not) it’s usually easy to pick the winner. That makes campaign giving less of a gamble.

2) The stakes are lower and the districts are smaller, meaning that dollars (and potential influence) stretch farther.

3) Most importantly, the General Assembly is where laws and policy are made. The vast majority of bills that come through the legislature get hashed out at the committee level and pass with little or no controversy. Having a sympathetic ear at that level makes sense for businesses who may be affected by said laws and policy.

Final observation: A lot of businesses effectively outsource their campaign research, donating to trade organizations and their political action committees, which then focus their giving to the most influential legislators (often defined by seniority on a relevant committee).

You can read more in my story, either online or in Roanoke Business magazine, which is available on the way out of regional grocery stores or in the Roanoke Regional Chamber of Commerce.

UPDATED: 11th House District Special Election Preview

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Update, Friday, Jan. 10: This race turned out to be a blowout. You can read my quickie analysis (written & posted Wednesday, the day after the election) at Bearing Drift here. End of update.

The unexpected retirement of Del. Onzlee Ware, D-Roanoke, from Virginia’s House of Delegates late last year created a mad scramble to fill his seat.

That district likes entirely within the city of Roanoke and is therefore considered a safe Democratic hold. However, a fractious primary and splinters within the city party make it less so this year.

I brought five years of experience covering Roanoke city politics to this analysis, published Saturday as a guest column on Virginia conservative politics blog Bearing Drift.

The special election for Ware’s old seat takes place on Tuesday.