'A cold day in Gila Bend': Sorry Democrats, McCain won't quit the GOP
Dan Nowicki
Sen. John McCain says he has no intention of abandoning the Republican Party, despite once again angering conservatives with his vote on health care and helping generate a new round of inside-the-Beltway speculation that he might quit the GOP.
In a July 30 article, Politico Magazine floated the idea with the headline: "McCain Once Almost Left the GOP. What About Now?"
"It will be a cold day in Gila Bend," McCain, R-Ariz., told The Arizona Republic when asked Thursday about such speculation.
In the Politico piece, author Philip Shenon quotes former Sen. Tom Daschle, D-S.D., as saying McCain nearly turned independent in 2001, following his loss to then-Texas Gov. George W. Bush in the 2000 Republican presidential primaries. At that time, one Republican defection would have shifted control of the Senate to the Democrats.
“I think it’s unlikely he’d do it now, but John is an independent thinker,” Daschle told Politico Magazine.
McCain, who is back in Arizona undergoing treatment for brain cancer, suggested to The Republic that Daschle's account of their 2001 discussions overstated the situation.
"I was very friendly with Daschle. I was friendly with (subsequent Senate Democratic leader) Harry Reid (of Nevada)," McCain recalled. "He and I came to the House together in 1983. But I never considered leaving the Republican Party."
In those days, rumors about McCain possibly going independent or switching parties were rampant, especially after McCain hosted Daschle at his cabin near Sedona.
There even was a Washington Post story that McCain might make an independent presidential bid against the then-President Bush in the 2004 election. McCain emphatically denied that he was contemplating such a move.
And in the 2004 cycle, the Democratic presidential nominee, then-Sen. John Kerry of Massachusetts, apparently approached McCain about joining his party's ticket as his running mate, but McCain later said he had no interest in doing so.
McCain ran for and won the 2008 Republican presidential nomination, but lost the general election to Democrat Barack Obama. In today's GOP-run Senate, he is the chairman of the influential Senate Armed Services Committee, a position he loves. It's another reason the chatter about him fleeing the Republican Party is far-fetched.
Still, McCain's decision to buck his party on health care has people talking again.
In the early hours of July 28, McCain snuffed the current Republican effort to repeal the Affordable Care Act, or "Obamacare," by voting to kill the "skinny repeal" legislation.
Republicans control the Senate with a 52-seat majority, meaning no more than two GOP senators can vote against a Republican priority if there is no support from across the aisle. Vice President Mike Pence is set to break any 50-50 ties.
On the health-care vote, Republican Sens. Susan Collins of Maine and Lisa Murkowski of Alaska had already staked out their ground as Republican opponents, and McCain's thumb's down delivered the death blow.
McCain confirmed to The Republic that he heard from President Donald Trump, Pence and other GOP luminaries who unsuccessfully tried to persuade him to vote yes.
The Politico Magazine story quotes an unnamed Democratic senator who surmised Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., already is considering "reaching out to McCain and Collins and Murkowski and others and asking if they really want to stand with the GOP."
McCain does appear to have risen in stature among Democrats as a result of the vote.
A national Quinnipiac University poll released Wednesday found McCain's overall favorable rating at 57 percent. But 74 percent of Democrats viewed him favorably, compared to 60 percent of independents and only 39 percent of his fellow Republicans. The July 27 to Aug. 1 poll of 1,125 voters had a margin of error of plus or minus 3.4 percentage points.
"Where were you when I needed you?" McCain quipped to his newfound Democratic supporters, referring to his 2008 loss to Obama.
Nowicki is The Republic's national political reporter. Follow him on Twitter, @dannowicki.
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