McCollum’s star is shining even brighter

11/26/2006

After six years of representing the Fourth District she's a senior player in the House, and U.S. Senate material.


Lori Sturdevant, Star Tribune
Published: November 26, 2006


The Nov. 7 polls had been closed for less than 12 hours when, over Humphrey Institute doughnuts and coffee, a little knot of notable DFLers huddled around a clipboard.


On it, a list-maker was jotting names of -- what else? -- potential candidates to challenge Republican Norm Coleman for his U.S. Senate seat in 2008.


It was laughably early -- but irresistible. I leaned in, looked and listened. At the top of the list was the name "Betty McCollum."I don't know if she'd leave the House," I overheard. "But if she wants it" -- meaning the DFL's blessing for a run at Coleman -- "she's our best candidate."


The congresswoman from the Fourth District laughed when I related those words. It was one of those careful "I'm not going to tip my hand" laughs.


"That's very flattering, but I love my job," McCollum said. "I just spent six years working to get into the majority."


That's just what a savvy soon-to-be four-term member of Congress is supposed to say right after an election that made her friend Nancy Pelosi speaker-elect, and gave her a good shot at a prized seat on the House Appropriations Committee. She's following the Bill Clinton rule: One race at a time.


McCollum, 52, won reelection without breaking a sweat. Since she overcame a four-way primary and a spirited three-way contest to succeed the late Rep. Bruce Vento in 2000, she has secured a firm grip on the St. Paul-dominated, DFL-loaded Fourth.


When Rep. Martin Sabo announced his retirement in the neighboring Fifth District, McCollum started a less visible campaign to win his seat on the House's money committee. That run is in a final sprint; the finish line is only days away.


Intracaucus competition for the spot is fierce. But McCollum has a special edge -- her friendship with Pelosi. The two women hit it off even before McCollum was elected in 2000, when Pelosi, about to make a move into caucus leadership, took the rookie under her wing.


The National Journal's Nov. 17 issue named McCollum as one of Pelosi's closest non-California friends in the House, adding that the two women share "ardent liberal views and a strong Roman Catholic faith." The Journal rated McCollum's chances of winning the Appropriations seat as "a good bet."


Now would be the wrong time for McCollum to even hint at a willingness to leave the House. "I'm making a full-court press" for Appropriations, she said. "If you let up for one second and stop pushing, people will think you don't want it."


So it's up to her admirers back home to point out that McCollum has risen from a junior to a senior player in state politics, and is now clearly U.S. Senate material. If she wants to take on her fellow St. Paulite Coleman in 2008, a crowded DFL field might as quickly empty for her as the Republican one did for Rep. Mark Kennedy in 2005.


No one could claim that her big-city base would disadvantage McCollum in a contest with the former mayor of St. Paul. And after the wins by U.S. Sen.-elect Amy Klobuchar and other Minnesota women in this year's election, McCollum's gender could be seen as an asset in 2008.


If California and Maine can send two women to the Senate, why not Minnesota?


But McCollum has plenty of reasons to stick with the good thing she has going in the House. Her safe seat, likely hers for the rest of her career if she wants it, is only for starters.


Her committee work has already made her a specialist in education and foreign relations, and her seat on the Democratic Steering Committee has given her political connections around the country.


She's a strong Democrat who maintains a close working relationship with Republicans Jim Ramstad and John Kline, and is likely to hit it off with Republican Rep.-elect Michele Bachmann.


She's the one Democratic Reps.-elect Keith Ellison and Tim Walz will look to for advice, that Gov. Tim Pawlenty will call to rally the delegation for the state's benefit, that Minnesotans will contact when seeking an avenue to Speaker Pelosi.


You don't have to be a senator to be a political star. But if you're already a political star, your chances of becoming a senator vastly improve.