Congressman Clueless
A year after East Texas voters elected political novice Steve Stockman to fight in Newt Gingrich’s Republican revolution, Stockman’s harebrained ideas and headline—making gaffes have made him the laughingstock of his own party.
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SUNSET, OUTSIDE THE CAPITOL BUILDING. A giant Christmas tree glistened in the foreground, the Washington Monument glows on the horizon. The freshman Republicans descended the Capitol staircase en masse for a press conference that would later air on the evening news. Stockman, last to arrive, scurried to take his place behind the podium with his colleagues. It was frigid outside, and reporters were rumbling about the hundreds of thousands of people who will be without funds because of the shutdown. But the freshmen—a few with freezing children in tow—had chosen this spot to show their strength and solidarity. One congressman explained that balancing the budget was “giving our children and grandchildren the best Christmas present they could hope for.” Another resurrected the themes of 1994, mentioning “the value of trust, of honoring commitments.” Still another intoned, “Keeping your promises is not ‘extreme.’ We were determined to change business as usual in Washington and that involves keeping our promises.” Steve Stockman, lost in the crush, kept his trap shut.
Just twelve short months ago, he was described by the Washington Post as a leader of the freshman class. Now even the other freshmen treat Stockman as if he has congressional cooties. Perhaps it was psychologically imperative that he descend from head of the class to class clown—clearly, he’s still most comfortable in the role of black sheep. Friends in Congress insist that the impressionable Stockman just got in with the wrong crowd—meaning his constituents on the right-wing fringe. Whatever the reason, Stockman torpedoed his grab for respectability by acting like a kid in what used to be a grown-up’s job.
Truth be told, Stockman was treated unfairly in his first and most famous national appearance. In the confusion that followed the bombing of the federal building in Oklahoma City last April, his office received a fax detailing the time and place of the attack that killed 169 people. Stockman, unlike hundreds of other public officials who had also received the fax, turned it over to the authorities. But in defending himself—it was initially reported that he had received the fax before the explosion—Stockman refused to budge from his allegiance to a repeal of the assault weapons ban or his loyalty to militia groups. The nation needed reassurance; Stockman stubbornly stuck by his clique: “Just because somebody’s part of a group, we cannot blame the whole group,” he said.
Then, too, Stockman was drawn to dramatics over substance, making himself a mouthpiece of the paranoid. In March, for instance, he had written a letter to Janet Reno, suggesting that a secret compound at Fort Bliss was being created to spy on militia groups (“Information is scarce, but…” his letter on the subject began). In June Guns and Ammo published Stockman’s zany pro-gun screed (he later contended that the periodical used the story “to promote the magazine at my expense”). Last fall, as first reported in Roll Call, he got into a very public squabble with the mother of a murder victim who refused to allow Stockman to name a bill repealing almost all gun-control laws after her son. He did not seem to understand why members of the public would be offended by his appearance on Radio Free America, which is widely believed to be anti-Semitic: likewise, the prayer meetings that began each day in his congressional office, and the staff and consultant links to the John Birch Society and the Gun Owners of America. Even though the Gun Owners of America has been linked to white-supremacist organizations, Stockman does not see the group as extreme. “The Gun Owners of America and the NRA are close,” he insists. “Both are pro- gun. One group is small; one is huge.”
And he did not learn from his mistakes. In December, while much of Congress was mired in budget negotiations, Stockman provided the comic relief. The Family Research Council, a right-wing group long opposed to sex education in schools, had shown him a video attacking the research of Alfred Kinsey. The Children of Table 34, narrated by Efrem Zimbalist, Jr., revealed that Kinsey had relied on a pedophile’s diary to research orgasm rates in young boys. After viewing the film, Stockman called for a government investigation of the report, claiming that all sex education in America should be halted because it was based on Kinsey’s faulty research. In a letter to his colleagues, Stockman was even more rabid: “Our children have been taught that . . . any type of sex is a valid outlet for their emotions. They are taught that the problem with sex is not that it is wrong to engage in homosexual, bestial, underage, or premarital sex, but that it is wrong to do so without protection.”
Throughout the year, Stockman also faced ethical misconduct charges that amounted to one almost every two months. The Houston Chronicle caught him fudging his education and work history. He returned a campaign contribution when it was discovered that the “constituent” was a four-year-old. Two investigations and one inquiry by the Federal Election Commission have been launched against him: The first investigation, involving a loan he made to his campaign, was dismissed. The inquiry involves his failure to repay the $80,000 debt to the Suarez Corporation, the mail-order house that financed his first race. The other investigation, which is still pending, surrounds Stockman’s production of campaign literature disguised as a neighborhood newspaper (SERVICEMEN DON’T WANT SODOMITES IN THE MILITARY was one headline). His actions weren’t venal as much as they were careless, the actions of someone who just couldn’t be bothered with rules. And the cumulative effect of Stockman’s activities has not been hard to divine. Even though he did work on some important projects—a bill to end the sale of alcohol to minors in Louisiana, thus lowering the number of highway deaths in Texas—he has rendered himself powerless in Congress. “When his bills come up,” said one Democratic operative, “they’re basically DOA.”
“ONE THING IS FOR SURE,” STOCKMAN says, echoing another freshman promise and referring to his predecessor, “I’m not gonna be here forty-two years. I’ve got a life.” It is the end of a full day. Darkness has settled over the capital, and Stockman is on his way to meet a colleague, Frank Cremeans, for dinner. Stockman is a big fan of Cremeans’, a Republican freshman from Ohio who also enjoys the support of anti-government forces. Stockman says with a laugh that Cremeans raised more money at a recent Stockman fundraiser than Stockman himself: “He tells them, ‘I’ve got a list of who’s goin’ to heaven, and you’re not on it.’”
Cremeans, a slight, white-haired man in a snug-fitting suit, meets up with Stockman in the tunnel. “He’s one of my favorite guys,” Cremeans says, slapping the younger man on the back.
“Because I’m a lost puppy,” Stockman says, grinning, “an orphan.”
“When Newt talked about Boys Town, all I could see was Steve’s face,” Cremeans says, grinning back.
The men arrive at the Senate dining room to find it closed but sweet-talk the employees into a lonely guy’s dinner of hamburgers, Senate bean soup, and apple pie à la mode, which is delivered in and eaten in reverse order. They lament the absence of fundraisers this time of year. “Frank and I think dinner is a six-inch plate with a toothpick,” Stockman says, making a circle with his hands. They compare presidential candidates—Stockman backs Phil Gramm, Cremeans supports Steve Forbes—and they worry out loud about the congressional gift ban that will soon take effect. “I’m nervous,” Stockman says, thinking of his Democratic adversaries. “I’m afraid we’re gonna get set up.”
Of his own race this fall, Stockman is buoyant. He has no primary opposition and weak Democratic contenders. And, right wing or no, the money that always flows toward incumbents has begun moving his way. Exactly one bank contributed $1,000 to Stockman’s 1994 campaign; this year, thanks to his support of a bill that would essentially repeal Texas’ homestead exemption and allow second mortgages, he collected $10,000 in banking contributions from January to June.
Finished with the meal, the two men sit back, slumped in their chairs, hands in their pockets, pleased with themselves.
“Here it is, twenty to eight and all we’ve had is two pieces of pizza,” Cremeans says, dinner having apparently made no impression.
“All these perks,” Stockman gripes, in on the joke.
The discussion shifts again to politics, fundraising, and publicity. “We’ve been on the front page of the London Times twice,” Stockman says proudly. “First for our fax and then for Kinsey.”
“Steve,” Cremeans says, his voice imbued with wonder, “you’re a momentmaker.”
Hearing him, Stockman grins, glad to be home at last.
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