FROM THE
JUNE 19, 2000 ISSUE

JAY NORDLINGER
Rosie O’Donnell, Political Activist

KATE O'BEIRNE
The Anti-Hillary Hope

CARL CANNON
The Problem with the Chair

was a nobody," Rep. Rick Lazio told me. He was explaining the gratitude he had felt 20 years before, when former senator James L. Buckley — in response to a letter from Lazio — invited the young law student to lunch. Five days after his announcement that he would run against Hillary Clinton for the seat Jim Buckley once held, Lazio was greeting a crush of well-wishers among the 6,000 guests in the Washington Convention Center for the Republicans' annual House-Senate dinner. President Bush, Bob Dole, and scores of congressmen were at the congressional committees' biggest fundraiser of the year, but the black-tie crowd jostled around the party's newest celebrity. Rick Lazio was a nobody no longer.

As Lazio reminisced about his law-school days in Washington, he was interrupted with a cheerful greeting of "Hi, Senator," from Sen. Rod Grams of Minnesota. Republican members of Congress are confident that they are now fielding an aggressive, articulate, and telegenic winner in New York, and one who is more of a team player than his moderate reputation would suggest. Lazio's ethnic good looks and ready Ultra-Brite smile could land him in the cast of Friends, but he is far more disciplined and determined than the coffee-klatsch crowd at Central Perk.

Lazio's father, a small businessman with an auto-parts supply store in Lindenhurst, N.Y., shared his interest in local politics with his only son — the youngest child of four. During his freshman year at Vassar College, Lazio organized other College Republicans in the mid-Hudson area to assist Sen. Buckley's (unsuccessful) 1976 reelection campaign. Michael Moriarity, who became close friends with Lazio at American University Law School, explains that his fellow New Yorker was more focused on his future plans than many of his classmates were. He knew he wanted to go back home to be a prosecutor, but was not preoccupied with politics. "Rick was not the kind of guy you'd expect to see struggling to shake hands with the president," Moriarity laughs.

Lazio returned to New York, where he was an assistant district attorney in Suffolk County from 1983 until 1988. He then went into private practice, and won election to the county legislature in 1989. The following year, Lazio married Michael Moriarity's sister, Patricia. The Lazios and their two young daughters live near his brother-in-law, who advises the candidate during campaigns.

In 1992, Lazio challenged Tom Downey, an 18-year veteran, who had been elected to Congress at the age of 25. Downey was considered a formidable incumbent, but Lazio pounded away at his 151 overdrafts at the House bank, and at a widely publicized junket Downey took to Barbados. Although outspent $1.4 million to $276,000, Lazio won with 53 percent of the vote (President Bush, meanwhile, got 40 percent of the district's vote, just nipping past Bill Clinton).

At the request of the newly elected member, Judge James Buckley administered the congressional oath of office to Lazio. Lazio has been reelected by wide margins, winning 64 percent of the vote in 1996, for example, when President Clinton trounced Bob Dole in the district, 54 percent to 34 percent. It's easy to see how Lazio's genial, outgoing personality would make him a natural retail campaigner. A former Lazio staffer recalls, "He'd disappear on a weekend at home without a phone or pager, and we'd later find out that he had spent the afternoon at the mall just saying hello to people."

During his eight years in the House, Lazio has also built a reputation as a skillful legislator. As chairman of the housing subcommittee, Lazio was chief sponsor of a major bill to restructure federal housing programs. The GOP-backed reform necessarily tackled issues of race, poverty, and urban policy, and was viewed as an affront by the Black Caucus, whose members felt a proprietary claim on housing programs. In 1997, the bill went to the floor of the House under a rare open rule, which meant it was subject to virtually unlimited debate and amendment. One veteran GOP staffer remembers watching the partisan battle on the floor and marveling at Lazio's confidence and tenacity. "They threw everything at him, with the goal of making Republicans look like racists, and it was amazing: He just fought them off."

During the three-week debate on the housing bill, 60 amendments were offered, with Democrats objecting to the "new American tragedy in the making" and the "abandonment of the poor" they claimed Lazio's legislation represented. Democrats argued that the bill would "destroy the last remnant of the social safety net" and howled that the imposition of a new eight-hour-a-month work requirement for public-housing occupants was "forced servitude."

Day after day, Lazio defended his reform against demagogic attacks, at one point declaring, "We are not going to cower, we are not going to be intimidated, we are going to stand firm for what we believe in, for the principles of work and responsibility and decency." The bill passed the House 293 to 132, and a year later, the final version was approved by the Senate 96 to 1.

A senior GOP aide explains that Lazio had to have a complete mastery of the details of the complicated legislation and be able to keep "coming back at liberals without flinching." The aide concludes, "I don't think there are more than a half-dozen House members who are capable of it."

There also aren't too many members who have Lazio's working relationships with colleagues across the ideological spectrum. He serves as one of Tom DeLay's 20 deputy whips and, along with Missouri Republican Jim Talent, is an assistant majority leader to Dick Armey. Members describe Lazio as an effective bridge between the conservative leadership and the GOP moderates (to whom he is equally close). "He's a team player, so people are more likely to work with him, even if they don't agree with him," explains a leadership aide.

Everybody can find something to agree with in Lazio's legislative record. In 1998, Lazio bucked the leadership by supporting McCain-style campaign-finance reform; but he supported the Republicans' $792 billion tax cut and has voted in favor of school vouchers, as well as requiring a super-majority to raise taxes. He supports the deployment of a missile-defense system, has voted to withdraw American troops from Haiti, and wants U.S. funding for the U.N. to be made contingent on reform.

Lazio voted against the Patients' Bill of Rights, and against increased funding for legal services, but in favor of the National Endowment for the Arts. He casts labor-friendly votes on the minimum wage, and supported the parental-leave bill President Bush vetoed. Still, Lazio has a rating of 62 percent from the National Taxpayers Union; in the New York GOP delegation, he was outscored only by Staten Island congressman Vito Fossella (barely). Sen. Moynihan's rating is 7 percent.

On a series of votes since 1993, Lazio has generally opposed the NRA's position. He supported the Brady bill and the ban on so-called assault weapons, but he also supported the right of private citizens in Washington, D.C., to own guns, and he opposes gun licensing and registration as too "intrusive."

Lazio describes himself as pro-choice, though he supports the ban on partial-birth abortion and has voted against federal funding for abortions. He has also voted to prohibit assisted suicide. In 1999, he received a 53 percent rating from the National Right to Life Committee, whose legislative director, Douglas Johnson, says, "We can approach him on every issue and feel we can get a fair hearing. On a number of occasions, he's been persuaded."

In recognition of Lazio's fundraising prowess, he was made House chairman for the May dinner, having amassed a war chest of $3.5 million, among the largest of any incumbent. He calculated that a large campaign account would provide the necessary credibility when the time came for him to make a bid for the Senate nomination — and he was right.

Rick Lazio's supporters contend he is more than ready for the toughest race of his career. "Despite the altar-boy appearance, Rick can be as tough as anyone I've seen. Not an angry tough, but he will stake out a position and stick to it," according to Moriarity. If Rick Lazio buries Hillary Clinton's political ambitions in New York this year, he will be Senator Somebody when Judge Buckley administers his oath next January.

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