GOP Stands Pat on Senate Leaders

Senate Republicans voted Tuesday to keep their leadership intact despite the party’s setback in last month’s congressional elections, shunning the sort of major shake-up that rattled the House GOP.

The single challenge--a bid by maverick Sen. Charles Hagel of Nebraska to unseat Sen. Mitch McConnell of Kentucky as chairman of the Republican Senate campaign committee--was easily brushed aside on a 39-13 vote.

Majority Leader Trent Lott of Mississippi said Senate Republicans will begin today to hammer out a formal agenda for the next Congress and pledged new cooperation with Democrats.

Also Tuesday, the Democrats picked their leaders for the new Congress, reelecting Sen. Tom Daschle of South Dakota as majority leader. Daschle pledged to try to “reach out in partnership” to Republicans in an effort to “deal with the problems at hand.”

Hagel’s bid to unseat McConnell, always regarded as a longshot, ended up not being close. McConnell, although not popular among some senators, had the strong backing of the rest of the GOP leadership. Lott had personally urged Hagel not to run.

Although Hagel, elected to the Senate just two years ago, criticized McConnell for failing to exploit key issues that voters might find attractive, many GOP senators appeared reluctant to place strategy for the 2000 campaign in the hands of a relative newcomer.

As of now, 19 incumbent Republican senators will be up for reelection in 2000, including several first elected in the GOP congressional landslide of 1994. The party controls the Senate, 55 to 45, but with so many Republican seats at stake, its hold on the chamber could be jeopardized.

In last month’s elections, Republicans lost five seats in the House and failed to add to their Senate majority--outcomes that defied predictions and typical trends for midterm elections.

The GOP setback prompted a backlash in the House, forcing the resignation of House Speaker Newt Gingrich of Georgia and the defeat of Rep. John A. Boehner of Ohio as head of the GOP Conference. Many GOP House members charged that their leaders failed to provide Republican candidates with winning issues and spent too much time on negative campaigning and on criticizing President Clinton.

Hagel had sounded a similar theme, but analysts said there was not the same level of anger in the Senate.

In back-to-back news conferences, Senate leaders of both parties sketched out similar agendas. For instance, both Republicans and Democrats back major initiatives in education, and both want to bolster the Social Security system.

But analysts remain skeptical that compromise can be achieved on such major issues.

Although Democrats want to provide more federal aid for public school systems, for example, Republicans want to distribute vouchers that parents can use to finance tuition for their children at private and, in some cases, parochial schools.

Lott also served notice Tuesday that Republicans would not countenance either cutting benefits or raising payroll taxes as part of any fix for Social Security. Democrats have yet to unveil specific proposals for dealing with the soon-to-be-ailing system.

Besides Lott and McConnell, Republicans elected Sen. Don Nickles of Oklahoma as majority whip, Sen. Larry E. Craig of Idaho as chairman of the Republican Policy Committee and Sen. Connie Mack of Florida as chairman of the Senate Republican Conference.

Besides Daschle, Democrats elected Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada as whip, Sen. Barbara A. Mikulski of Maryland as secretary, Sen. John B. Breaux of Louisiana as chief deputy whip, Sen. Richard Durbin of Illinois as assistant floor leader and Sen. Bob Kerrey of Nebraska as deputy vice chairman.