Sen. Boxer to Get Seat on Key Panel

In a friendly swap of political power, California Sen. Barbara Boxer will take over the Senate Appropriations Committee seat reserved for Democratic colleague Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

The maneuver, announced Tuesday, gives Boxer an influential Senate position that should pay political dividends as she plots her reelection strategy to retain her seat two years from now.

“It’s a great day for California, and I am very pleased to take a seat on this powerful committee,” Boxer said. “The most important thing is that this makes me the best senator I can be. My committee assignments are blending into a very powerful package for my state.”

Boxer will retain her seats on the Senate’s Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs Committee, the Budget Committee and the Committee on Environment and Public Works. But the Appropriations Committee is considered one of the most influential on Capitol Hill because of its control of discretionary federal spending.

On her new committee, Boxer said, she will focus on several areas important to the state, including education, transportation, border control and law enforcement.

Feinstein said Boxer approached her a couple of months ago about the swap.

“Sen. Boxer asked if I would defer to her for the next two years, and I agreed to do it,” Feinstein said. “I have a full legislative agenda as it is, and she can well and ably represent California’s interests on the committee.”

Feinstein will retain her seats on the Foreign Relations Committee, the Judiciary Committee and the Committee on Rules and Administration.

The Senate Democratic Steering and Policy Committee, of which Boxer is a member, approved the switch Tuesday, and it is expected to be ratified by the full Senate Democratic Caucus today.

Feinstein was assigned the Appropriations Committee seat in 1992--making her the first Californian in a quarter-century to serve on the powerful panel. But she had to give it up two years later after a reorganization--prompted by the Republican takeover of the Senate--trimmed the size of the committee.

Under Senate rules, she retained what amounted to a right of first refusal on the appropriations position because of her previous service.

The deal between the senators allows Boxer to serve on the panel during the next Congress and Feinstein to lay claim to the slot again in 1998--if she chooses.

The agreement was immediately labeled a political gesture by one of Boxer’s top political foes.

Rep. David Dreier of San Dimas is one of several California Republicans considering a run for Boxer’s Senate seat in 1998.

“It would appear that there is the recognition that Barbara Boxer is going to need a lot of help to get reelected,” said Dreier, who is a next-door neighbor of Boxer in the Capitol Hill residential area of Washington.

“Whether winning a seat on an Appropriations Committee in a stronger Republican majority Senate is [the way to do that] is a question that is still out there,” he said. “I can only surmise that it’s a political decision.”

Boxer acknowledged that the new role will be an electoral advantage.

“If [with the appropriations seat] I am a better senator and I get more done, then I have a better story to tell,” she said.

Members of both houses vigorously compete for assignments to their respective appropriations committees because the panels have their hands on the federal purse strings. Their members are renowned for reaching compromises across party lines that keep federal money flowing to all regions of the country.

The seats also allow members to take credit for shepherding through programs and projects that benefit their home states--and their standing with voters.

In recent years, critics of wasteful federal spending have been more vigilant in spotlighting dubious “pork barrel” projects--those in which appropriators’ home-state affiliation appears to override policy concerns.

But in the halls of Congress, appropriators are still considered invaluable guardians of state interests during legislative horse-trading over increasingly scarce federal funds.

After Feinstein was named to the appropriations panel, a couple of run-ins with then-Chairman Robert C. Byrd, the veteran West Virginia Democrat, marred her tour of duty.

The autocratic Byrd whittled Feinstein’s seniority on the committee by putting her last, behind Democratic freshman Sen. Patty Murray of Washington, even though Feinstein had a seniority edge by being elected to complete Gov. Pete Wilson’s unfinished Senate term.

Byrd also thwarted Feinstein’s effort to win more federal education funds for California.

The seniority slap-in-the-face proved more damaging than it first appeared. When the committee reorganized in 1994, Murray held her seat, but Feinstein was sent packing.