Blum determined to change lawmakers’ image
Freshman GOP rep intent on changing lawmakers’ image
CEDAR RAPIDS, Iowa — Freshman Republican Rep. Rod Blum says he did not come to Congress to make friends, and he is doing everything he can to prove it. With a career in public office that spans just four months, Blum has made it his central focus to change the way Congress treats itself.
“It’s not a vote against John Boehner. It was a vote against the status quo.”
Rep. Rod Blum
Freshman Republican Rep. Rod Blum says he did not come to Congress to make friends, and he is doing everything he can to prove it.
With a career in public office that spans just four months, the wealthy former businessman has made it his central focus to change the way Congress treats itself by supporting efforts to strip away the trappings of elective office.
Blum, 60, started a caucus for lawmakers who support term limits. He co-sponsored legislation to end lawmakers’ access to first-class travel and luxury car leases. He supports ending the congressional pension system, and he’s introduced a bill to institute a lifetime ban on lawmakers ever becoming lobbyists.
His actions have delivered few allies and cost him early party support in his competitive eastern Iowa district, but Blum says he is just getting started.
“It comes from 587 days of campaigning for this position and listening to people. It may have been the No. 1 topic. The anger out there against members of Congress is very high,” Blum told USA TODAY.
“I think people are really, really tired of what they perceive to be the ruling class, the political class,” he said. “Their pay goes up. They can fly first class. They can drive fancy cars. And taxpayers are paying for this.”
Blum sent a message when he cast the first vote of his career against Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, to lead the party in the U.S. House. He was one of 25 lawmakers who voted against the speaker and one of just three freshmen.
“No, absolutely not,” Blum said, when asked if he had any lingering regrets about his opening act of party disloyalty. “It’s not a vote against John Boehner. It was a vote against the status quo.”
GETTING COLD SHOULDER
His provocations have garnered few cheerleaders inside the Beltway. Just three GOP colleagues have joined his term-limits caucus. He is notably absent from the House Republican campaign operation’s “Patriot Program,” a fundraising arm for the party’s most vulnerable incumbents, despite representing the second most Democratic-leaning district currently held by a Republican.
Even before he distanced himself from the Washington establishment, Blum was a top target for Democrats. Not only does the district tilt in their favor, but the larger, more diverse presidential year electorate will be more favorable for the party than the smaller, older, whiter and more conservative midterm electorate that delivered Blum’s upset victory last year.
But his eastern Iowa district does not fit neatly in the Democratic column. More than onethird of the district’s voters are registered independents. And his populist, anti-Washington message has cross-party appeal.
At least three Democrats are vying for the party’s nomination to take on Blum. Andy McGuire, chairman of the Iowa Democratic Party, cast Blum as an out-oftouch millionaire aligned with the Tea Party wing of the GOP and not middle-class workers.
His vote for a more conservative version of the GOP budget and his vote against a funding bill for the Department of Homeland Security have provided early fuel for next year’s campaign.
Blum is a conservative, even if he avoids the term.
WHAT HE STANDS FOR
He supports repealing President Obama’s health care law and opposed his executive actions to delay deportations for millions of undocumented workers. He wants to lower current individual and corporate tax rates, and he voted for a more conservative version of the GOP budget. While his views align with Tea Partystyled conservatives in the House, his rhetoric is more in line with a representative from a swing seat.
“I’ve met a lot of really cool Democrats,” he said. He’s cosponsored legislation with freshman Democratic Rep. Gwen Graham of Florida and started the term limits caucus with Rep. Beto O’Rourke, D-Texas.
Despite bipartisan allies, Blum concedes his initiatives won’t pass. “It’s kind of like asking turkeys to vote for Thanksgiving,” he said.
Shunned by congressional party leaders, Blum nonetheless spends an inordinate amount of time for a freshman with the GOP presidential field, who are eager to court his district’s voters ahead of the Iowa Caucuses.
He has not self term-limited but estimates that he will not be in Congress 10 years from now. He’s working on another piece of legislation that would tie lawmakers’ salaries to wage growth for American workers. “People feel like the politicians in D.C. are so disconnected from reality and ... from their everyday lives. I would like to do my part to align the incentives with the people.”