‘The Hammer’ Is in Position to Succeed Armey at No. 2 Post

The expected announcement today by House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-Texas) that he will not seek reelection is likely to set off a scramble between the GOP’s conservative and moderate wings for the key leadership post.

Majority Whip Tom DeLay of Texas, one of the House’s most powerful--and most controversial--members, was already calling Republican colleagues Tuesday to line up support for the No. 2 leadership job. DeLay is highly regarded among colleagues for fund-raising and political skills that help elect Republicans and promote the GOP agenda, but he also has become a favorite target for Democrats because of his hard-nosed tactics, conservative bent and leading role in the impeachment of President Clinton.

Others mentioned as possible candidates were Reps. Rob Portman and John A. Boehner of Ohio, J.C. Watts Jr. of Oklahoma and Jennifer Dunn of Washington. Rep. Christopher Cox of Newport Beach said that no one should count out a California Republican, though he said he has no plans to seek the post.

“There is going to be a major fight for the soul of the Republican caucus,” said Marshall Wittmann, a political analyst at the conservative Hudson Institute.

The majority leader--second in command to the speaker and the man whom former Speaker Newt Gingrich said “keeps the legislative trains running on time and the workers toiling at their posts”--plays a critical role in shaping the House’s agenda. Armey became majority leader in January 1995, after the GOP took over the House in the 1994 elections. His departure comes as another former economics professor and Texas Republican, Sen. Phil Gramm, plans to retire, stripping Congress of two of its most senior and forceful free marketeers.

House Republicans would select a new majority leader only if they hold on to their slim majority in next year’s congressional elections, but the jockeying has begun.

The race promises to further shake up a House GOP often divided between conservatives, who constitute the majority of the membership, and moderates, whose role is critical in passing legislation.

Armey, 61, an architect of the GOP’s “contract with America” whose taste for partisan ferocity has been as high as his 6-foot-2 frame, is expected to announce in a speech on the House floor today that he will not seek reelection to the seat he has held since 1984. He declined Tuesday to discuss his plans.

Rep. Sherwood L. Boehlert, a moderate Republican from New York, said he would like the party to select “someone who plays well on national television, is a good spokesperson . . . someone who would move a little bit more to the center.”

Stuart Rothenberg, a political analyst who writes a nonpartisan newsletter, said the race is DeLay’s to lose. “However controversial he is, enough members like him,” Rothenberg said.

The question he and other political analysts ask is: Does DeLay want the job?

As the House GOP’s third-ranking leader, responsible for making sure there are enough votes to pass Republican-sponsored legislation, DeLay already is powerful. But if he moves into this high-profile position, analysts say, the man nicknamed “the Hammer” for his tactics could become more of a Democratic target.

“If Democrats could vote, Tom DeLay would be the next majority leader,” Wittmann said.

But because of his position as a leader of the conservative movement, Rothenberg noted, “to the extent he is majority leader, it is that much tougher for him to differ with the president.”

“He’s got it good now, and he’s as influential as he’s going to be,” Rothenberg said. “On the other hand, if you don’t move up, somebody else is going to move up--[perhaps someone] you don’t like.”

A DeLay ally acknowledged that many Republican moderates would be uncomfortable with him in a more prominent leadership position but said “they don’t have the votes” to defeat him.

One Republican whom moderates might rally around, the DeLay confidant said, is Portman, a member of the leadership who is very close to Bush.

But one leadership aide said that being a close Bush ally might not be a great selling point among House Republicans these days. There is some feeling that Bush has been pursuing legislative strategies that give short shrift to House GOP concerns.