[Mb-civic] DeLay Faces Tough Road Back to Top - Washington Post

[William Swiggard]

DeLay Faces Tough Road Back to Top
Indictment, Ethics Questions, Abramoff Case Are Obstacles

By Dan Balz
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, September 30, 2005; Page A06

For the first time in more than a decade, Rep. Tom DeLay (R-Tex.) 
arrived at work yesterday without a leadership title attached to his 
name. Sidelined from his post as majority leader by a criminal 
indictment in Texas, the man who accumulated extraordinary power on his 
way up the ladder faces a difficult and uncertain road back to those 
heights.

The money-laundering indictment back home represents just one of the 
obstacles DeLay must overcome before he can seek restoration as a member 
of the House GOP leadership. The other obstacles include a possible 
House ethics investigation; the scandal involving well-connected GOP 
lobbyist Jack Abramoff, which has touched former DeLay staff members; 
and a 2006 reelection campaign that would have been difficult even 
without the indictment.
Even if he is able to beat the indictment in Texas and avoid other 
potential problems, there is no guarantee that his colleagues will want 
him back. At some point, they may decide that it is in their interest 
politically to move beyond the DeLay era, regardless of the status of 
his legal situation.

With post-DeLay leadership fights already in the offing and with growing 
concern about a deteriorating political climate that has less to do with 
DeLay than with Iraq, gasoline prices and President Bush's problems, 
House Republicans may find themselves torn between personal admiration 
for DeLay and a cold-eyed judgment of what is best for the party. 
"They've already turned the page," a GOP strategist said yesterday.

DeLay has chosen to fight his indictment the way he has waged most of 
his battles, with certitude in his cause and public expressions of 
confidence and resolve. If his lawyers have advised DeLay not to talk 
about the case, he has ignored their counsel, giving interviews on 
television with the frequency of someone who has just won an election 
rather than one who has just received legal papers.

In an interview yesterday on CNN, DeLay again denounced Texas prosecutor 
Ronnie Earle as a vicious partisan and said that his lawyers are 
demanding an early trial under Texas law. Under that scenario, DeLay 
said, the case could be resolved by the end of the year.

Speaking of Earle, he said: "He made sure I was indicted because he knew 
I had to step aside as majority leader. And that is what's going on 
here. It is a political witch hunt, trying to do political damage. . . . 
In my case, he did it in conjunction and working with the Democratic 
leadership here in Washington, D.C."

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) called DeLay's charge 
"completely false."

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2005/09/29/AR2005092902183.html
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