Shays: DeLay Should Quit As House Leader
By LOU KESTEN Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON - Private GOP tensions over Tom DeLay's ethics controversy spilled
into public Sunday, as a Senate leader called on DeLay to explain his actions
and one House Republican demanded the majority leader's resignation.
"Tom's
conduct is hurting the Republican Party, is hurting this Republican majority and
it is hurting any Republican who is up for re-election," Rep. Chris Shays,
R-Conn., told The Associated Press in an interview, calling for DeLay to step
down as majority leader.
DeLay, R-Texas, who was admonished by the House
ethics committee last year, has been dogged in recent months by new reports
about his overseas travel funded by special interests, campaign payments to
family members and connections to a lobbyist who is under criminal
investigation.
A moderate Republican from Connecticut who has battled with
his party's leadership on a number of issues, Shays said efforts by the House
GOP members to change ethics rules to protect DeLay only make the party look
bad.
"My party is going to have to decide whether we are going to continue
to make excuses for Tom to the detriment of Republicans seeking election," Shays
said.
Rick Santorum, the No. 3 Republican in the Senate, said Sunday that
DeLay needs to explain his conduct to the public.
"I think he has to come
forward and lay out what he did and why he did it and let the people then judge
for themselves," Santorum told ABC's "This Week." "But from everything I've
heard, again, from the comments and responding to those, is everything he's done
was according to the law.
"Now you may not like some of the things he's
done," said Santorum, who is up for re-election next year in Pennsylvania.
"That's for the people of his district to decide, whether they want to approve
that kind of behavior or not."
DeLay's spokesman, Dan Allen, told AP that
the congressman "looks forward to the opportunity of sitting down with the
ethics committee chairman and ranking member to get the facts out and to dispel
the fiction and innuendo that's being launched at him by House Democrats and
their liberal allies."
Responding specifically to Shays' remarks later,
Allen added that DeLay's "effective leadership has helped to build and maintain
the Republican majority in the House and that's exactly why liberal groups
funded by George Soros have set their sights on him."
The majority leader
was admonished three times last year by that committee. The committee has been
in limbo since March, when its five Democrats balked at adopting
Republican-developed rules.
House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif.,
said last week that the controversy was distracting DeLay from dealing with more
pressing problems before Congress.
Santorum, however, said DeLay is "very
effective in leading the House" and "to date, has not been compromised."
A
senior Democratic senator, Christopher Dodd of Connecticut, had this advice for
the Republicans who control both the House and Senate: "Be careful about how
closely you embrace Mr. DeLay."
Dodd cited the new rules for the ethics
committee that House Republicans rammed through in the wake of DeLay's
difficulties. Those rules require a bipartisan vote before an investigation can
be launched. DeLay's office also helped mount a counterattack last fall against
Rep. Joel Hefley, R-Colo., who was the ethics committee chairman when it came
down against DeLay.
"Unfortunately, in his particular case, there's a
process that he's tried to change so they could actually reach a determination
as to whether or not he's innocent or guilty of the things he's been charged
with," Dodd said. "But this is not going to go away."
DeLay "becomes the
poster child for a lot of the things the Democrats think are wrong about
Republican leadership. As long as he's there, he's going to become a pretty good
target," Dodd said on ABC.
DeLay, who took center stage in passing
legislation designed to keep alive Terri Schiavo, also has found that President
Bush and congressional colleagues are distancing themselves from his comments,
after her death, about the judges involved in her case.
"The time will come
for the men responsible for this to answer for their behavior," DeLay said,
raising the prospect of impeaching members of a separate and independent branch
of government. Later, he complained of "an arrogant and out of control judiciary
that thumbs its nose at Congress and the president."
Bush, declining to
endorse DeLay's comments, said Friday that he supports "an independent
judiciary." He added, "I believe in proper checks and balances."
Senate
Majority Leader Bill Frist of Tennessee said last week that the judges "handled
it in a fair and independent way," although he had hoped for a different result.
Democrats have said DeLay's remarks were tantamount to inciting violence
against judges.
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