GOP Braces for Jeffords to Bolt Today

Sen. James M. Jeffords of Vermont has told aides and fellow lawmakers he will announce today that he is quitting the Republican Party, a decision that would hand Democrats command of the Senate, stymie President Bush on several policy fronts and offer a lesson in how one man’s change of heart can alter the course of politics.

Jeffords initially planned to reveal his intentions on the Senate floor Wednesday, and official Washington braced for an unexpected shift of power in the Senate. But Jeffords drew out the political drama that has been building all week, saying in a brief written statement that he had decided to return to his home state to tell constituents “my future political plans.”

Jeffords, a moderate who has feuded with the White House and expressed increasing frustration with his party, declined to disclose those plans before leaving Washington on Wednesday night. But sources close to Jeffords said he had informed other lawmakers and his office staff that he had made a final decision to declare himself an independent and support a Democratic takeover of the Senate. On Capitol Hill, many from both parties were talking about Jeffords’ lifelong career with the GOP in the past tense.

Other Republican senators made several last-ditch appeals to Jeffords on Wednesday, meeting with him twice and pledging to try to give centrists a more meaningful voice in the party. But Republican leaders were clearly discouraged.

“We talked about a variety of things to keep him on the team,” said Sen. Rick Santorum of Pennsylvania, chairman of the Senate Republican Conference. “But I’m not too sure he hadn’t already made up his mind last week.”

Sen. Larry E. Craig of Idaho, who sang with Jeffords in a Republican quartet, joked, “We’re going to be looking for a tenor.”

Still, Sen. John Warner (R-Va.) said efforts to keep Jeffords in the fold were continuing. Among the enticements offered to him was a Senate GOP leadership position, or at the least the right to attend leadership meetings.

Jeffords’ defection would tip the Senate’s 50-50 party split in favor of the Democrats, vaulting their members to leadership positions and giving their party control of the chamber’s legislative agenda for the first time since 1994.

“The Democratic Party just got itself a platform,” said Sen. Robert Torricelli (D-N.J.). “It’s a real change. You go from being the loyal opposition to actually constructing policy.”

Exactly when Jeffords would officially change his party allegiance remained unclear. Based on his comments to others, it would occur soon, though not immediately.

A switch would be a historic setback to Republicans, who gained control of both the White House and Congress for the first time in 46 years when Bush took office in January. Now they could see that power slip away after just four months.

Jeffords’ anticipated switch would trigger a cascade of career changes for other senators. Sen. Tom Daschle (D-S.D.) stands to become majority leader. He would replace Sen. Trent Lott (R-Miss.), who already is facing criticism for failing to do more to placate Jeffords.

Indeed, many in Washington spent Wednesday assessing who deserved credit among Democrats for one of the most meaningful recruitment efforts in Senate history, and who among Republicans deserved blame for Jeffords’ presumed departure.

On the latter point, many targeted Bush and the White House. Angered that Jeffords had opposed Bush’s push for a $1.6-trillion tax cut, the administration went on to block education funding the senator prized and provoke him with a series of what Jeffords perceived as slights.

In recent weeks, as top Democrats put their pursuit of Jeffords into high gear, some saw the White House as slow to react. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney finally met with him Tuesday. But by then it was too late, said critics who complained that the so-called charm offensive the administration aimed at members of Congress earlier this year has since fallen flat.

“You know what [the White House] did? Nothing,” said one Republican aide, who requested anonymity. “That’s the problem. They never reached out to moderates. They never reached out to centrists. They had these kind of showy meetings at the beginning of the administration and never followed up.”

Ari Fleischer, the White House spokesman, said, “The president clearly hopes that Sen. Jeffords will remain a Republican.” But Fleischer acknowledged that Bush dangled no incentives in his meeting with Jeffords this week.

“It was a discussion that was based on no offers,” Fleischer said, “but it was based on just a good dialogue between the two.”

Some GOP senators defended the White House. “I don’t think you can blame anybody else for a decision James Jeffords made in his soul,” said Sen. Robert F. Bennett of Utah.

Regardless, the outlook would dim for much of Bush’s agenda in a Democrat-controlled Senate. In a conciliatory gesture, Jeffords appeared to be timing his switch to avoid harming the compromise $1.35-trillion tax cut bill, which passed the Senate Wednesday and was headed for conference negotiations with the Republican-led House.

Signing that bill into law will allow Bush to take credit for achieving the largest tax cut in 20 years. But if Jeffords bolts the GOP, the White House faces new obstacles on future legislation, as well as likely delays--if not defeats--on a range of judicial and agency appointments that must be approved by the Senate.

Democratic control “is certainly an impediment,” said Nicholas E. Calio, the White House’s top lobbyist on Capitol Hill. “The tougher time quite clearly comes in having the Democrats in control of the committee agendas, because they can delay things.”

But he noted that the White House already was in the position of having to entice Democratic votes on most of its major legislative goals, such as easing regulations to spur greater energy production. “The game’s the same. Clearly there are Democrats willing to work on a bipartisan basis.”

California Expected to Be Beneficiary

For California’s two Democratic senators, a shift in Senate control would not result in significantly more clout, since neither Dianne Feinstein nor Barbara Boxer is in line for a committee chairmanship.

But Boxer and Feinstein predicted a Democratic Senate is likely to help California officials better promote state causes, including price controls on wholesale electricity supplies.

Democrats have wooed the soft-spoken Jeffords throughout his 26-year career in Washington. But top Senate Democrats, sensing Jeffords’ growing frustration, began to court him intensively in recent months.

Sen. Christopher J. Dodd (D-Conn.) appears to have played a key role in the effort. He opened what became weeks of dialogue with Jeffords on a Friday afternoon in Dodd’s office in the midst of the budget debate.

The two had a “heart to heart,” according to a Senate source. Jeffords expressed his growing concern that he no longer shared core values with his party, and Dodd responded in a low-key manner, encouraging Jeffords to consider his options.

It was clear, the source said, that Jeffords was going through some “soul searching.” Dodd would later be seen joking with Jeffords on the Senate floor, tugging at his elbow and urging him to “Come on, Jim,” nodding in the direction of the Democrats’ side of the aisle.

Two weeks ago, Democrats stepped up their efforts, when Daschle and Sen. Harry Reid (D-Nev.) held an early morning meeting with Jeffords and laid out a deal. The two Democrats indicated that if Jeffords switched he could be chairman of the Environment and Public Works Committee, a position Reid would otherwise get. Alternatively, they suggested Jeffords could retain his post as chairman of the Senate committee that oversees education, although Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) would be in line for that post in a Democratic Senate.

Jeffords’ anticipated defection partly reflects a long-standing frustration with his party’s rightward turn. The 67-year-old lawmaker comes from a long tradition of moderate New England Republicans. He favors abortion rights, environmental conservation and boosting federal aid for education.

This year, Jeffords was dismayed when Bush, as his first official act as president, banned federal funding for international groups that offer counseling on abortion. As the congressional session progressed, Jeffords took heat in Vermont for toeing the party line and voting to kill ergonomic rules designed to protect workers’ health. And he sharply disagreed with recent remarks by Cheney dismissing conservation as a key part of the solution to the nation’s energy woes.

But Jeffords’ loyalties to the GOP might not have been severed, those close to him say, if it weren’t for the nature of his conflict with the White House over Bush’s tax cut plan.

Jeffords thought Bush’s original proposal was far too large, and the senator was particularly upset that the administration wouldn’t guarantee funding for a special education program he helped create as a House member in 1975.

“Jeffords was really torn over the budget vote,” said one aide. And his political identity crisis was only worsened by what he considered efforts by the White House to punish him for failing to support the Bush plan.

Jeffords was not invited to a White House ceremony honoring the nation’s teacher of the year, even though she was from Vermont--and even though education is the senator’s signature issue.

Jeffords also expressed concern that the administration was planning to punish him by derailing a price-protection program that aids milk farmers in Vermont and other Northeastern states.

Republicans Turned Toward Zell Miller

Fretting that Jeffords was a lost cause, Senate Republicans on Tuesday stepped up their efforts to recruit Sen. Zell Miller (D-Ga.), who often votes with Republicans, supported the Bush tax cut and is considered a potential defector. But Miller issued a statement Wednesday saying he is staying put.

Switching parties is uncommon, but not unheard of, in the Senate. Sens. Ben Nighthorse Campbell of Colorado and Richard C. Shelby of Alabama both moved from the Democratic Party to the GOP in the mid-1990s.

Since the Civil War, 16 senators have switched parties while in office. But none had the impact that would accompany a switch by Jeffords.

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Times staff writers Nick Anderson, Edwin Chen, Janet Hook and Richard Simon contributed to this story.

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Who Might Benefit?

Here are the Democrats in line to head key committees should their party take control of the Senate:

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Senator Committee Home state Robert C. Byrd Appropriations W.Va. Carl Levin Armed Services Mich. Kent Conrad Budget N.D. Edward M. Kennedy Education/Health/Labor Mass. Jeff Bingaman Energy/Natural Resources N.M. Harry Reid Environment/Public Works Nev. Max Baucus Finance Mont. Joseph R. Biden Jr. Foreign Relations Del. Patrick J. Leahy Judiciary Vt.

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Note: The list may change as lawmakers decide to swap positions. Sen. James M. Jeffords of Vermont, whose anticipated decision today to defect from the Republican Party would lead to the Democratic takeover, may head the Environment panel.