Senator finds some bitterness

07/28/2007

WASHINGTON (AP) -– David Vitter's involvement with a Washington escort service started a media storm, but it was his antics on the Senate floor Thursday that set colleagues buzzing.
And not in a good way.

In a complicated tale involving Senate courtesy, procedures and a poisonous rivalry with a home state colleague, the Louisiana Republican's efforts to win adoption of amendments to a pending bill created a contretemps of the sort rarely seen in the stately chamber.

By the end of a long day, Vitter was called dishonest by Harry Reid, the Senate's top Democrat, then made peace with him, only to have Reid, D-Nev., later explode at the Louisiana freshman in a fit of anger.

The episode started when Vitter offered a plan easing the importation of low-cost prescription drugs from Canada, trying to attach it to an unrelated homeland security funding bill. It wasn't germane and was immediately trapped in a procedural vise.

Democrats managing the floor made an agreement with Vitter in which his amendment as well as a competing one would both be killed.

Instead, Vitter made a change to his amendment to fix its procedural problems. That move was permitted by the rules, but broke the agreement.

"Somebody did not keep their word," said Reid.

Ultimately, Reid and Patty Murray, D-Wash., the acting floor manager, allowed Vitter's amendment to win. They wanted to pass the homeland security bill by midnight, and so Reid made peace with the Republican senator.

"It was simply a misunderstanding," Reid said diplomatically, accepting Vitter's explanation.

That was not the end of it, not by a long shot.

After Mississippi senators and Vitter's rival, home state colleague Mary Landrieu, a Democrat, won approval of amendments on Gulf Coast recovery, Vitter insisted he get another shot at an amendment — killed on procedural grounds Tuesday — to shift hazard mitigation funds to Louisiana housing efforts.

Vitter insisted the defeated plan be revived as part of a consensus batch of amendments put together by the bill's floor managers — who included a still-seething Murray.

She said no way.

It was around 10 p.m. Everybody wanted to go home, and Vitter seemed to hope the threat of delay might cause Democrats to bend.

Wrong.

"You've done enough," hissed a furious Reid in an exchange audible in the Senate Press Gallery. Reid poked angrily at Vitter, making it plain that despite his earlier niceties, Reid thought the junior Republican had way overstepped the boundaries.

After yet more parliamentary moves, this time by Democrats, Vitter was forced to back off.

But even then, Reid calmed down and tried to bury the hatchet. It doesn't pay for the Senate's leader to nurse a grudge in the chamber, where any single member can tie the place in knots.

"They did try to make amends and talk about trying to be more agreeable in the future," said a Vitter spokesman.