After tour, Klobuchar is ready to work

11/27/2006

Armed with to-do lists, Minnesota's senator-elect is aiming for progress and foresees "a different Congress" in 2007.


Rob Hotakainen,
Star Tribune
Last update: November 26, 2006 – 9:53 PM


WASHINGTON - After meeting President Bush for the first time and getting a glimpse of her tiny transition office on Capitol Hill, Democratic Sen.-elect Amy Klobuchar is back in Minnesota, trying to whittle away the 27 items on her
11-year-old daughter's to-do list.


Buy a hamster. Buy a dress. Arrange a sleepover. Go to Ikea. Make plans to go to Disneyland next month.


Then there's the more daunting to-do list facing Klobuchar after she is sworn in as Minnesota's 42nd U.S. senator on Jan. 4 -- the things she campaigned for: Start bringing the troops home from Iraq. Clean up Washington. End the tax cuts for the rich. And visit each of Minnesota's 87 counties every year for the next six years.


The youngest of 10 new senators, Klobuchar, 46, said the incoming freshmen are confident they can make a difference despite the partisan gridlock that has often paralyzed Washington in recent years.


"I consider myself a progressive, and that means progress," she said.


Klobuchar said that freshmen will make up 20 percent of the Democratic caucus and that they're focused on improving congressional ethics and helping the middle class by making it easier to pay for college tuition. She said they want to make health care more affordable and will insist, despite resistance by the White House, that the government negotiate with drug companies to get lower drug prices for Medicare beneficiaries. Klobuchar said most of the newcomers ran as outsiders and are serious about making a mark.


"We are very focused on results," she said. "We want to get some things done, and we made that very clear to the leadership."


She expects senators to spend more time in Washington next year, working longer and harder: "It's going to be a different Congress. It's not going to be a two-day-a-week Senate. ... We were elected for a reason, and that's to get some things done."


Klobuchar, who will rank 98th in seniority, is interviewing prospective staff members and has set up a temporary shop in a one-room office in the basement of the Senate Dirksen Office Building. The room has two desks and she can share a copy machine with other freshmen.


She's also making plans for the swearing-in ceremony: The same people she cooked Thanksgiving dinner for at her Minneapolis home -- including her mother, her father, her daughter, her sister, her husband and his five brothers and some nieces and nephews -- are all expected to attend.


"They're going to be descending with their Vikings stocking hats and various other things," Klobuchar said.


After a year of campaigning, Klobuchar had to make plans for a weeklong orientation in Washington immediately after her landslide victory over Republican Rep. Mark Kennedy.


"It's been nice to be home, let me tell you," she said in an interview last week.


During her orientation week, Klobuchar and Bush discussed their mutual interest in bicycling. She met with the new senators and the incoming majority leader, Sen. Harry Reid of Nevada. She learned that she'll be getting a mask to protect her in the event of a chemical attack. And she landed a seat on the Agriculture Committee, her first choice. She'll serve on three other panels: Commerce, the Environment and Public Works and the Joint Economic Committee.


Klobuchar said it's "a humbling thing" to be elected as a senator: "You see these Senate desks where people have carved their names."


She's no stranger to Washington: Twenty-six years ago, she was a summer intern for then-Vice President Walter Mondale. Her job involved doing a furniture inventory, crawling under desks and recording serial numbers.


Klobuchar said she was surprised by the cordial tone she encountered on Capitol Hill and left her orientation impressed with the spirit of bipartisanship. Talk of ending the partisan rancor is always in favor after an election, and it's back big time this year.


"This is the time to put aside the bruises and the divisiveness of the campaign," said Sen. Norm Coleman, R-Minn.


He said that he has met privately with Klobuchar and that "there's a strong commitment to work together in the best interests of Minnesota." Coleman said he foresees them working together on issues related to agriculture, energy, methamphetamine and the arts. And he said there's a personal connection between the two: Klobuchar's daughter takes dance lessons from Coleman's sisters-in-law.