Ways and Means Chief Thomas to Leave Congress

BAKERSFIELD —  Rep. Bill Thomas (R-Bakersfield), who played a key role in congressional passage of President Bush’s tax cuts and Medicare’s prescription-drug benefit, announced Monday he would not seek reelection in November.

Thomas’ district, which includes a slice of northern Los Angeles County and most of Kern and San Luis Obispo counties, is expected to remain in Republican hands. But his departure, after 28 years on Capitol Hill, will leave Bush without a valuable political strategist in his efforts to make tax cuts permanent and enact further changes to Medicare.

It also will leave Congress without one of its most controversial members, a lawmaker widely respected for his expertise on complex issues but also considered gruff and hot tempered. In 2003, he called police to break up a meeting of Democrats, setting off a partisan furor that culminated in Thomas’ apology on the House floor.

Since 2001, Thomas has headed the House’s influential Ways and Means Committee, which oversees tax legislation and bills affecting Social Security, Medicare and trade policy. But under GOP rules, Thomas must give up the panel’s helm at the end of the year -- a major factor in his decision to retire.

Speaking at his district office in Bakersfield, he said that he wanted to bow out while he was still at the top of his game, like Los Angeles Dodgers great Sandy Koufax.

“He was one of my favorites on the Dodgers, and I admired him when he said, ‘I could pitch another game, but why?’ ” Thomas said.

Standing with his wife, Sharon, Thomas also said he was tiring of his cross-country commute.

“The burden begins to bear on you,” he said.

Republican strategist Grover Norquist, a leader in the party’s push to lower taxes, said few of Thomas’ friends and allies were surprised that he would leave office at the same time he gives up his chairmanship.

“Having been duke, you don’t go be peasant again,” Norquist said.

Bush lauded Thomas, 64, as “a very effective leader” who was pivotal to the approval of measures that the president said “brought about strong job creation and economic growth, improved healthcare for people of all ages and ensured that America continues to benefit from free and fair trade.”

Praise from House colleagues and others included wry references to his often-imperious style.

Rep. Jack Kingston of Georgia, a House Republican leader, said, “You’re losing one of the big personalities on the Hill, a guy who knows his stuff and wants to make sure everybody else knows he knows it.”

Ralph Hellman, a lobbyist for the Information Technology Industry Council, said that without Thomas, life on Capitol Hill “certainly will be more boring.... He could mix it up and create havoc with the best of them, but always with a game plan in mind when he created the havoc.”

Hellman added: “The average I.Q. of the city will probably go down by about 10 points. He was always the smartest guy in the room.”

Some GOP activists -- unhappy about the growth of the federal budget deficit during Bush’s administration and opposed to the Medicare drug benefit that took effect this year -- said Thomas had not done enough to restrain federal spending.

As speculation grew in recent weeks that Thomas would end his House career, members of the conservative California Republican Assembly passed a resolution last weekend declaring: “We are glad to see him retire.”

Mike Spence, the group’s president, said, “We welcome the opportunity to get a new congressman who will be a fiscal conservative.”

Likely Republican contenders for Thomas’ seat include Kevin McCarthy, the state Assembly minority leader, and state Sen. Roy Ashburn.

To illustrate the GOP’s strength in the district, Bush carried it with 68% of the vote in the 2004 election and Thomas ran unopposed for the seat he first won in 1978.

Rep. Jim McCrery (R-La.) is considered a front-runner to succeed Thomas as Ways and Means chairman if Republicans retain control of the House in the 2006 elections. Reps. E. Clay Shaw Jr. (R-Fla.) and Nancy L. Johnson (R-Conn.) also have expressed interest in the post.

Thomas, a one-time political science professor at Bakersfield Community College, said he looked forward to spending more time with his grandchildren after leaving Congress, but otherwise offered no hints about his plans.

He said he would “take a look at what’s available.” There has been speculation he will be offered a job in the Bush administration.

He said he was “not walking away into the sunset yet.”

“I haven’t finished my work and I have nine months to go,” he said. “So rather than read my headstone now, let’s see if I can’t carve a few more things in it.”

His major remaining legislative goals include reconciling differences with the Senate on a bill that would extend tax cuts on investment income scheduled to expire at the end of 2008.

These tax cuts have been central to Bush’s economic policy and their extension is one of his top domestic priorities.

A statement issued by Thomas’ office highlighted his accomplishments as chairman, saying the panel paved the way for approval of “over $2 trillion in tax relief for hardworking American families” and “a long overdue voluntary prescription drug benefit in Medicare for the first time in the program’s history.”

Liberal critics, however, have lambasted the tax cuts, saying they unduly favor the affluent. And the Medicare benefit -- along with sparking criticism from conservatives over its cost -- has been assailed by many senior citizens as too complex.

A major political disappointment for Thomas was the failure of his committee to craft a bill to overhaul Social Security.

On the heels of his 2004 reelection, Bush pushed hard for restructuring the program to allow younger workers to divert some of their payroll taxes into investment accounts. But the proposal stalled in the face of adamant Democratic opposition and lukewarm support from many Republicans.

The incident that led to Thomas’ highly publicized public apology stemmed from a committee vote he scheduled on a complicated pension reform bill. Most of the panel’s Democrats, saying that they had not seen the bill until the night before, walked out of the meeting before the vote and met in a back room to plot strategy.

Thomas asked his staff to summon the Capitol police to remove them from the back room. But the Democrats refused to budge, and they called reporters to protest Thomas’ action. No arrests were made, and the Democrats eventually left the room.

Thomas, in his mea culpa a few days later, said, “As my mother would have put it, ‘When they were passing out moderation, you were hiding behind the door.’ ”

Simon reported from Washington; Malcolm from Bakersfield.