Nethercutt, trailing in polls, has pulled off big upset before

By Jim Brunner
Seattle Times staff reporter

JIM BATES / THE SEATTLE TIMES Rep. George Nethercutt isn't afraid to play hardball.

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The slogan reflects the unbending optimism Nethercutt has projected from the start of his uphill challenge to incumbent Democratic Sen. Patty Murray.

Though he has trailed in every poll, it would not be the first time Nethercutt, 60, has pulled off a major electoral upset. He entered Congress during the 1994 "Republican revolution" after defeating then-House Speaker Tom Foley, the first time in 134 years a sitting speaker had been ousted.

If elected, the Spokane congressman would represent a turnabout for a state that has tilted increasingly Democratic and rarely hands statewide posts to Eastern Washington politicians.

A Nethercutt victory likely would bolster the slender GOP majority in the U.S. Senate, where Republicans now hold a two-vote edge. And if President Bush is re-elected, Nethercutt would boost a White House agenda frequently stymied by Senate Democrats.

The Senate, Nethercutt argues on the stump, has become a "graveyard for good ideas," such as capping medical-malpractice lawsuits, confirming more conservative federal judges and opening up more oil drilling in Alaska.

Nethercutt says his relationship with the president would directly benefit the state. "We'd have somebody who can talk to the White House. We don't have that now," he said.

George Nethercutt Age: 60 Education: B.A. in English, Washington State University; law degree, Gonzaga University Family: Wife Mary Beth, two children Residence: Spokane Experience: Worked on staff of Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens for five years beginning in 1972. Returned to Spokane to join father in law firm specializing in adoptions and probate. Elected to U.S. House of Representatives in 1994, re-elected four times Campaign funds raised: $6.6 million

Nethercutt's alignment with Bush is clear. He has supported the president on more than 90 percent of votes in the U.S. House and met privately with the president before announcing his challenge to Murray last year. The president and vice president have headlined fund-raisers for him, and a steady stream of Cabinet officials have campaigned on his behalf.

Retired Major General Patrick Brady, a Vietnam veteran and medal-of-honor recipient who backs Nethercutt, boiled down the race succinctly in a campaign appearance for Nethercutt this month at a Bellevue VFW hall.

"You've got a miniature battle in this state between a female John Kerry and a mini George Bush," Brady said.

Nethercutt even sounds a bit like Bush, lacking the Texas drawl but sharing the president's regular-guy appeal. His vocabulary includes a healthy dose of "shucks" and "gosh," and he generally comes across as an amiable, gentlemanly figure.

That image has served him well in past campaigns, undercutting opponents' efforts to portray him as a mean-spirited right-winger. He often begins criticisms of Murray by saying "with all due respect to the senator."

But Nethercutt isn't afraid to play hardball. This year, he has aired controversial attack ads that use images of Osama bin Laden and the ruins of the World Trade Center to portray Murray as weak on terrorism. The ads replay a portion of Murray's comments to a high-school class two years ago, in which she suggested bin Laden was popular in poor nations because of his acts of charity, such as building day-care centers.

Nethercutt defends his ads as fair game. "It is Senator Murray's words speaking to students. I don't question her patriotism. I question her judgment. I defy her to tell us where he [bin Laden] has built a day-care center. She's never explained why she said that," Nethercutt said during a televised debate last week.

	SUSAN WALSH / AP President Bush attended a fund-raiser for Rep. George Nethercutt in Spokane in June. The Washington Republican has supported Bush on more than 90 percent of votes in the U.S. House.

Conservative

Representing Eastern Washington's 5th Congressional District, Nethercutt has amassed a voting record that suggests he would be a more conservative senator than either of Washington's last two Republicans to hold the office, Slade Gorton and Dan Evans.

"He wouldn't be in the moderate Republican group," said Lance LeLoup, a political-science professor at Washington State University. "He'd be a dependable vote for [Senate Majority Leader Bill] Frist, I don't think there's much doubt about that."

A former adoption attorney, Nethercutt strongly opposes abortion and has earned a perfect rating from anti-abortion groups. He consistently has backed tax cuts and voted to reduce government spending he considers wasteful. In 1995, he cosponsored bills to eliminate the departments of Education, Commerce and Energy.

He has been a staunch opponent of gun restrictions. Last year, Nethercutt helped block a lawsuit filed by the city of Chicago, which sought federal data on guns used in crimes. He inserted a measure into a massive spending bill that effectively prohibited the government from turning over the data.

In 1996, he voted against an anti-terrorism bill criticized by gun-rights groups because it expanded law-enforcement powers in response to the Oklahoma City bombing.

Nethercutt has strongly supported the Iraq war and dismisses critics who say the United States should have waited for international approval.

In 1997, he was one of just 54 representatives to vote for the United States to withdraw from the United Nations, a vote he now says was a protest against wasteful spending at the organization. This year, he derided the U.N.'s International Criminal Court as a "kangaroo court" and sponsored an amendment denying foreign aid to countries unless they agreed never to turn U.S. soldiers over to its jurisdiction.

Nethercutt has shown a willingness to clash with GOP leaders when it benefits his district. In perhaps his biggest legislative accomplishment, he led the charge to pass the Trade Sanctions Reform Act of 2000, which allowed for food sales to Cuba for the first time in 40 years.

His efforts came despite the heated objections of House Republican leaders, including the notoriously hard-nosed Majority Leader Tom DeLay. Since that bill passed, U.S. farmers have sold more than $565 million worth of food to Cuba, including a $4.5 million purchase of peas and apples from the Washington state.

Nethercutt also has been a leading proponent of diabetes research, founding the Congressional Diabetes Caucus and pushing for additional federal funding of health research and treatment. That work was inspired by his daughter, Meredith, a diabetic who has appeared in two Nethercutt campaign ads.

While Nethercutt has a seat on the powerful appropriations committee, including its defense subcommittee, he has not emerged as a key player.

"He stands out as a particularly engaging and likable foot soldier in the Republican revolution. I don't think he stands out as a major leader," said Loren Thompson, chief operating officer of the Lexington Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based think tank, who teaches defense-policy courses at Georgetown University.

D.C. insider

As a politician, Nethercutt has evolved from the outsider who railed against the Washington, D.C., establishment embodied by Foley to a firmly implanted D.C. insider himself. Nethercutt lives in a $680,000 house in Virginia and rents out his family home in Spokane, staying with his mother when he's in town. His wife, Mary Beth Nethercutt, works as a lobbyist with Jack Ferguson & Associates in Washington, D.C.

Any claim Nethercutt had to outsider status was erased forever in 2000, when he broke his well-publicized pledge to serve only three terms in Congress. He took a major beating in the national press and was labeled the "weasel king" in a Doonesbury cartoon, inspiring a former supporter to shadow him in a weasel costume.

Supporters say Nethercutt is an honest man who simply changed his mind. His constituents apparently agreed, re-electing him for a fourth term by a wider margin than ever before.

"I don't think he ever intended to mislead or say things in his heart he wouldn't be able to follow through with," said Bill Bialkowsky of Spokane, a longtime friend.

If he gets to the Senate, Nethercutt has said he would capitalize on his strong ties to Sen. Ted Stevens, R-Alaska, the powerful chairman of the Senate Appropriations Committee, to win key committee assignments. Nethercutt served as Stevens' chief of staff in the 1970s.

He'd use his clout to try to break the logjam in a Senate that uses filibusters to prevent legislation — or controversial judicial appointments — from coming to a vote.

"I think I would be able to have a powerful role to play in the direction the Senate takes, and a leadership position in the majority," Nethercutt said. "I think the role of the Senate is to make progress for this country — not to prevent it. It's so hopelessly divided, we have to replace some of the people who create the division."

Jim Brunner: 206-515-5628 or jbrunner@seattletimes.com

Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company

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