Burner camp disputes Reichert's green credentials

Congressional candidate Darcy BurnerThe news of Rep. Dave Reichert (R-Auburn) being called the "Greenest Republican in Congress" today by the interest group Republicans for Environmental Protection may have gone over well in some circles across the 8th District, but the Darcy Burner campaign was not one of them.

Burner spokesman Sandeep Kaushik responded pointedly and at length to Reichert's award, as well as the general perception that he is a green-leaning, moderate Republican. Kaushik suggests that Reichert frequently conspires to pass anti-environmental legislation during the primary procedural voting periods, and that once they become destined for a floor vote he switches his position and votes with the Democrats.

Here is Kaushik's full statement:

Claiming that Congressman Reichert is the "greenest Republican" is like claiming Camel Lights are the healthiest cigarette. Leave aside the strange coincidence that his environmental ratings have suddenly shot up just as he is going into the toughest reelection battle of his career.

The deeper truth is that Congressman Reichert is gaming the system to make his environmental record appear on the surface to be far greener than it actually is. For instance, this Republican group gives him credit for voting for H.R. 6, the "Creating Long Term Energy Alternatives for the Nation Act." But the truth is that Reichert voted six times in lockstep with Republican leadership on preliminary and procedural votes to kill this bill. Only after those votes were lost and it was clear the bill was going to pass did he flip flop and vote for it on final passage (you can read a detailed examination of how he voted on this bill here). Yet despite opposing this bill multiple times he gets full credit as a supporter of this legislation.

This is not an isolated example. Congressman Reichert has followed this pattern more than 25 times in the current Congress - voting to kill, stop or weaken environmental and other progressive legislation in every preliminary vote before (once the outcome is determined) flipping on final passage, and then cynically claiming credit for supporting the legislation. This pattern shows that he is not acting independently or as a moderate, but is actually manipulating his votes on bills to create a false impression of his actual positions on these issues.

Here is an even clearer example: at the end of February Congress voted on H.R. 5351, a bill that would have eliminated $13.6 billion in corporate welfare subsidies for Big Oil and put the money instead into renewable energy development. Reichert voted for this bill, but only after - on the same day - voting for the Republican alternative that would have stripped the bill of its key provisions and keep the oil company subsidies in place. You can read an unintentionally hilarious report about how he voted on both sides of this legislation here.

When you combine this flip flopping and vote manipulation with the fact that Congressman Reichert still refuses to acknowledge that global warming is caused by human activity, and has taken more than $60,000 in campaign contributions from oil interests, according to the Center for Responsive Politics, and tens of thousands more from logging interests, and you get a much more accurate picture of his full environmental record.

The bottom line: far from being a "green Republican," Congressman Reichert is demonstrating through his actions that he is just another typical Washington, D.C. politician, who cares more about playing the standard inside-the-Beltway games with his voting record than he does in offering true leadership on important environmental issues. We are confident that if the press does it job in looking more closely at Reichert's voting record, voters are going to see through this ruse. This year especially, with the country off on the wrong track, they want real solutions, not political games. That is why Darcy Burner is going to be elected to Congress this November.