{"id":23460,"date":"2006-04-05T01:01:01","date_gmt":"2011-05-19T06:30:18","guid":{"rendered":""},"modified":"2011-05-19T06:30:18","modified_gmt":"2011-05-19T06:30:18","slug":"tom_delay_i_think_i_m_winning_i_feel_totally_liberated2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.rushlimbaugh.com\/daily\/2006\/04\/05\/tom_delay_i_think_i_m_winning_i_feel_totally_liberated2\/","title":{"rendered":"Tom DeLay: I Think I\u2019m Winning. I Feel Totally Liberated"},"content":{"rendered":"
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RUSH: As always, we\u2019re thrilled to have Tom DeLay with us, who has shuffled the deck considerably with his resignation announcement this week. Congressman, thanks for being part of the program today. As always, it\u2019s great to have you with us.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Well, thank you, Rush. You know, you\u2019re partly responsible for any successes that I\u2019ve had, so you have to take some of the heat, too.<\/line>RUSH: (Laughing.) Well, I\u2019ll join you in it. It\u2019s the way of the world. Look, the first thing I wanted to ask you about, we had some calls yesterday. I don\u2019t know if you heard about this. I know you\u2019ve been busy, but there are some people — and I chastised them, but there are some people — that called the program, and it\u2019s just anecdotal. I don\u2019t know how many this represents, but you may have heard this yourself that, “Well, you gave up. You quit. It was a phony indictment and it\u2019s obviously political but you didn\u2019t hang in there and fight it. The Democrats always hang in there and fight it, and we just keep rolling up and giving it away to them,” and I tried to explain to people that I had a different take on it, but why don\u2019t you address that first off the bat here.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Well, it may appear that way, Rush, but I think I\u2019m winning. First of all, they had me tied down in a reelection campaign where I had to focus completely on getting reelected. I think I could have won the seat, but it struck me that I can fight in another arena and still hold the seat for the Republicans. Now I feel totally liberated. I\u2019m going to be out there talking about the conservative agenda. I\u2019m going to be working very hard to get rid of the federal tax code and replace it with the FairTax<\/a>. I want to continue my effort to hold the judiciary accountable. There\u2019s just a lot of great things I could be speaking out about, and I could not do that. I\u2019m going to work very hard to elect Republicans to carry the conservative cause.<\/line>RUSH: Well, you could have done that had you won and been reelected.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: No, I couldn\u2019t. No. Even if I\u2019d have been reelected, there was no assurance that I could go back into leadership and use my talents where they could be used more. <\/line>RUSH: Oh, okay.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: I wasn\u2019t going to step back into leadership. So now I can — I\u2019m free — to go around the country and organize people and get them motivated and let\u2019s keep beating Democrats, and believe me, I\u2019m going to be talking about the Democrats\u2019 strategy of criminalizing politics. I\u2019m going to be talking about the fact that they have no agenda; all they have is using and abusing our judiciary for their political gain, and I could point to Ronnie Earle<\/a> and the People\u2019s Republic of Travis County, Texas, and I could be an example, and I am an example of the way they play politics, which is dirty, in the gutter.<\/line>RUSH: Well, that\u2019s because they can\u2019t win in the arena of ideas. So they have to destroy their opponents or discredit them, because they can\u2019t beat them in the arena of ideas anymore. I mean, they won\u2019t even be honest about the things they believe. They have no agenda to speak of. Well, they do but they won\u2019t be honest about it, but I want to go back to one thing about your resignation, because I mentioned this yesterday. A lot of people don\u2019t know it. You have spoken since your announcement that your objective is to maintain a Republican majority, and people have… You know, there\u2019s some people that believe that and some don\u2019t. I think people need to know in forming their opinion about this, that during the time of Texas redistricting, you carved up your own district and made it less secure for yourself, less Republican, in order for there to be more Republican seats electable in the state of Texas.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: That\u2019s correct.<\/line>RUSH: And that\u2019s why you\u2019re in this close race because your district isn\u2019t what it used to be.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Yeah. I went from about a 65% district to a 54% district, Republican district, thinking that I could carry and appeal to Democrats and independents like George W. Bush does in my district. He gets 65% of the vote, but obviously when you\u2019re being pummeled every day by the national media and your local paper and things develop like they developed for me, it takes a toll.<\/line>RUSH: Well, I think there was a movement in Hollywood to raise money for your Democratic opponent in this district and it would have cost you a lot of money, and I think you said that it would require a lot of resources be brought into your one district, and it would have harmed others.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: That\u2019s correct.<\/line>RUSH: So this is, as you say, this is really a move designed to take you off the front page, to take the bull\u2019s-eye off your back and give the Democrats nothing to shoot at where it comes to Tom DeLay.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: And put me in a different arena. Look, the Democrats went after me — and I\u2019m not bragging; it\u2019s just true — because I was effective, and how was I effective? I was effective because we built the largest, strongest political coalition in my lifetime right here in Washington, DC and around the country.<\/line><\/p>\n

RUSH: Well, can I interrupt you? You keep inspiring me to make comments here. The Democrats held the House for 40 years. We\u2019ve held the House, you guys, from 1994, \u201995 when you were sworn in. It\u2019s basically been 11 or 12 years that the Republicans have held the majority, and everybody\u2019s dumping on you as The Hammer and your tactics and, “How did you do this?” and nobody wants to go back and look at some of the tactics that the Democrats used to hold onto the House for 40 years, shutting you guys out of meetings and so forth. It\u2019s a clear one-way street.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Well, they hate our tactics because they\u2019re winning and they\u2019re effective. You know, they hate the fact that we had the K Street Strategy because we came into a town as a Republican majority with all the lobbyists in town Democrats, because they were hired, because their buddies were in charge before we came in, and we insisted that they start hiring Republicans. When we first came in, in 1995, most of the campaign contributions, 70% in this town were going to Democrats, 30% to Republicans. You know what it is today? Sixty percent Republican, 40% Democrat. Why? Because we built this huge political coalition, and now you\u2019ve got all these leftist groups, Common Cause, Democracy 21, bemoaning the fact that we actually built a conservative coalition. They hate it! This place doesn\u2019t work because Tom DeLay goes out and introduces a bill and it becomes law. It takes a huge national effort to make these things happen, and it also takes money to make these things happen.<\/line>RUSH: Well, when you did this you shook it up because they didn\u2019t think that something like what you did was possible.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: That\u2019s correct.<\/line>RUSH: They think power is an entitlement of their own. It\u2019s almost a birthright. You\u2019ve come in, you and the whole Class of 1994 that shook everything up.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: The Limbaugh class.<\/line>RUSH: They still haven\u2019t… (laughing) They still haven\u2019t gotten over it, though.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Right.<\/line>RUSH: Their whole movement is fracturing toward the kook, lunatic fringe and making them their base.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: You know, I had a question asked to me this morning. Why is there so much acrimony in Washington? Why can\u2019t you just — the Rodney King, just — get along? Well, we got along when the Republicans had a minority mind-set and were just happy to get a few crumbs off the Democrat majority\u2019s table, and everything was wonderful, and we all got along as long as the Democrats were in power and doing what they do best: raise taxes, bigger government, and all that. When we took over, the day that we took over, all of that stopped, because the Democrats had lost power, which is all that they live for. And they have fought us every step of the way on everything that we\u2019ve done — and they\u2019ve done it, as evidenced in my case, in the gutter type politics. They are still in denial. “These Neanderthals actually gained the majority and are actually doing what they promised the American people they\u2019d do!”<\/line>RUSH: And the headline in the Washington Post, I think, there are many stories on you today in the newspapers, but the one here at the top of my stack, the Washington Post, “DeLay Departing on His Own Terms,”<\/a> and, congressman, I think that is the core of what infuriates them today. Yesterday they were feeling very powerful. The Democrats have gotten themselves in circumstances now where being emotionally satisfied substitutes for victory for them. Paul Hackett loses by four points and they throw parties, thinking they had a moral victory. They lost. Here you\u2019re going out on your own terms. They were hoping to have you around with a bull\u2019s-eye front and back on your shirt to kick you around and make you the face of this “culture of corruption” or whatever other sloganeering they wanted to use. You took it away from them, and it took them a day to realize, “Wait a minute. This is not good for us.”<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Well I hope they think that, because it\u2019s not. I\u2019m going to be out there doing what I do best, and that\u2019s the conservative cause and electing conservative Republicans.<\/line>RUSH: Well, hang on just a second. I gotta break. There\u2019s some other things about you in the news. Cynthia McKinney<\/a>, and you\u2019ve also been — well, that\u2019s important, and you\u2019ve been critical of the fact that there\u2019s no agenda on the House side and Republican side to the House. I want to talk to you about that right after this. Can you hang on for a break?<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Sure I can.<\/line>RUSH: Right back after this, folks. <\/line><\/p>\n

BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/line>RUSH: We are back on the Rush Limbaugh Program, the EIB Network with Congressman Tom DeLay. All right, Washington Times story today. Headline says it all: “House GOP Lacks Agenda, DeLay Says.” They quote you as saying we don\u2019t have an agreed agenda; breaking up our leadership has taken its toll. What\u2019s that portend? <\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Well, I think he misunderstood what I was saying. What I was saying was: the Democrats knew what they were doing. If you take the leader, the majority leader out, that so disrupts the leadership. It takes time, logistic time just to put it all back together. Remember we had —<\/line>RUSH: By the way, you have a great line in this story. “The only reason I was indicted was the stupid rule that allows the Democrats to pick the Republican leadership.”<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Right.<\/line>RUSH: That is a great line, because the Republicans came up with this rule, trying to please everybody. “If any of our leaders ever get indicted, they\u2019ll step out of the leadership position.” Democrats have no such rule, right?<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: That\u2019s correct. They\u2019re not stupid enough to do it. (Laughing)<\/line>RUSH: Yeah. (Laughing). So all they have to do is convince Ronnie Earle to do what he did and you\u2019re out.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Yeah, and Ronnie Earle has done it many times before. He doesn\u2019t care about winning a case or that. He abuses his office to play politics.<\/line>RUSH: Okay, so you\u2019re not saying in this story that there\u2019s nobody in the House that can put together an agenda and lead it?<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: No, no, no, no. What I\u2019m saying is, just take the situation where we had to go spend, what, three or four weeks through a leadership race, that takes time out of putting the actual agenda for the year together. Poor old John Boehner, when he got elected majority leader, he had to put together a staff of 20 people. He had to go out and hire 20 people. Obviously he wants to hire good people. That takes time. Then those people have to get comfortable in what their assignments and responsibilities are. That takes time. So we have been kicked off a track. I\u2019m not criticizing the leadership for it.<\/line>RUSH: Okay.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: It\u2019s just what happens when, in the middle of a Congress, you disrupt the leadership.<\/line>RUSH: I understand all that, but to those of us out here in the red states, outside the Beltway, it seems that there\u2019s been a loss of discipline in both the House and the Senate, mostly in the Senate, but there\u2019s some in the House, too, on the conservative side. I mean, I know you\u2019ve got some moderate Republicans in the House, but it\u2019s largely conservative, and they campaign on conservative issues and a conservative agenda, and somehow they get to Washington and after a number of years they forget that. They start moderating a little bit so as not to offend the media there, not to offend the Democrats, whatever, and it seems like the whole conservative agenda gets watered down, and so when you say that they need to take some time to put together an agenda, put together some people, those of us out here are simply saying, “It\u2019s just conservatism. It works every time it\u2019s tried.” Just go back to that.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Well, that\u2019s just it. We have an agenda. It\u2019s in place all along. It\u2019s limited government, lower taxes, tort reform, protect the people from the judiciary, protect the family from the culture wars. That\u2019s our vision and our philosophy and our world view. Actually putting that in bills and having it work through the committees and bringing it to the floor is very difficult — and I\u2019ve gotta tell you, Rush, I am very proud of what we did last year. I set an agenda the first year as majority leader. We had the most productive legislative year that we\u2019ve had. I mean, we put three tort reform bills on the president\u2019s desk. We\u2019ve been working on that for ten years. Finally got three through the Senate. We did an energy bill that\u2019s a long, far-reaching bill that moves us more to independence on energy, not just go out and find oil and gas, but nuclear energy and all of kinds of other things. I mean, we actually cut spending for the first time since Ronald Reagan. We actually took a look for the first time since 1997 at all entitlement programs and reformed them. Now, granted we only saved $40 billion but it was the first time that we took a look at every entitlement program, which is something I wanted to start and do every year, just like we do all other programs.<\/line>RUSH: Yeah, but you created a new one. I know the president wanted it, and I know you carried his water up there, but —<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: The Medicare bill?<\/line><\/p>\n

RUSH: Yeah, it had to —<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Well, I just disagree with you. I am very proud of that. We took Republican philosophy to the welfare state. We introduced competition, choice, personal responsibility, new health care methods that were not covered by Medicare. I mean, we are going to save money. You know, the old Medicare system would pay $40,000 to amputate your feet because you are diabetic but wouldn\u2019t pay a hundred dollars a month for Glucophage to save your feet and keep you out of the hospital. That is Republican philosophy applied to welfare state program. If we had not done that to welfare reform, we would have never had welfare reform, and believe me, we spent more money getting welfare reform than we were paying.<\/line>RUSH: Well, maybe that\u2019s why the recipients don\u2019t like it, because it is conservatism in a welfare state program.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Exactly right.<\/line>RUSH: All right, time is dwindling. Two things. I need to ask you your opinion of this out-of-control immigration debate that\u2019s going on right now.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Well, that\u2019s another thing we did last year. We passed a strong border security bill and an enforcement bill, and that\u2019s what needs to be done right now. The American people don\u2019t believe the federal government are going to protect our borders and enforce the law before you do anything else in immigration reform, and I believe that, and so we had a — I had a strategy that we would build a virtual wall along the Mexican border. That we would get rid of this catch-and-release philosophy and go to catch-and-remove philosophy, that we would start using real, verifiable IDs so that an employer knows that he\u2019s hiring an illegal or not and then enforce the law against the employers, and we would dry up some of the jobs that attract people, especially from Mexico, to come over here and work. That kind of pressure would allow you to look at and think about a guest worker program later.<\/line>RUSH: But what do you think about the debate? I know that you feel proud of what you did, but what\u2019s going on right now is above and beyond that. What do you think of the general overall debate and its focus? I\u2019ve got about a minute and a half here for this answer. We\u2019ll hold you through the next break because I still want to get to Cynthia McKinney.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Okay. I think what the Senate is doing, came out of the judiciary committee is awful. The McCain-Kennedy bill is just… It undermines the rule of law. It undermines our ability to protect our sovereignty. It will encourage more illegal immigration rather than discourage illegal immigration. That\u2019s the Senate\u2019s debate. The House is standing firm on doing border security and protecting and enforcing the law against what the Senate\u2019s doing.<\/line>RUSH: So you expect those two bills to be reconciled when they go to conference?<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Well, I\u2019m not in leadership anymore, but I\u2019m suggesting to the leadership, “Don\u2019t go to conference with a bill like that coming out of the Senate, until we have debated and passed an immigration reform bill out of the House, forcing the Senate to get rid of all this McCain-Kennedy stuff and focus on border security and enforcement of the law.” That\u2019s what needs to be done first.<\/line>RUSH: And if there is no conference and there\u2019s no bill, then we just have a bunch of pontificating going on in the Senate? It\u2019s an election year and you got a bunch of people —<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: There you go. You take it to the election. Let the American people decide.<\/line>RUSH: Exactly right. Okay, hang on just a moment. We got a little break here. It\u2019s the bottom of the hour and we\u2019ll get into a couple more things with Congressman Tom DeLay. Specifically, he says he\u2019s going to file an ethics complaint against Cynthia McKinney. I\u2019ll ask him about that when we come back after this.<\/line>BREAK TRANSCRIPT<\/line><\/p>\n

RUSH: We welcome back Tom DeLay, Congressman Tom DeLay, who announced his resignation this week. Before I get on to Cynthia McKinney, I meant to ask you this in the previous segment when you were talking about spending, but you have a chance here to tell people how the House works particularly on the Republican side. You\u2019re conservative, and you said that you\u2019re very proud of how spending was held and you made a real dent in it for the first time since 1997. It was only $40 billion and even at that there were other conservatives in the House who were not happy with it. Mike Pence is one. So you\u2019re conservative; he\u2019s a conservative, and yet there are divergent views on how you define success. Is there — I don\u2019t want to say a disunity problem in the House, but how does that play out as you, the Hammer, the leader, go day to day trying to get people aligned and vote together on these issues?<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Well, I\u2019m glad you brought it up, because I hope people can understand that the Republican conference in the House of Representatives have divergent views. Our most liberal member is more conservative than the most conservative Democrat. So the spectrum is not that wide, but they do have divergent views, and when I was whip, I instituted what was called “Grow the Vote,” and I knew that at one time over the 11 years we got down to a five-vote margin. So if six Republicans were against what we were doing, we would lose. <\/line>So we were almost forced to work together, work out our differences, and come up with something that would get us 218 votes. That\u2019s very difficult to do. It takes a lot of time, a lot of effort, a lot of building relationships and trust with each other, but we were able to hold it together and get as much of the conservative agenda that we could get with the votes that we had available. Sure, if I were king, the world would look a lot different today than it would trying to work with 232 of the members of the House of Representatives. But this whole notion that we\u2019re not interested in spending, or somebody said we\u2019re “spending like drunken sailors,” it\u2019s just not true. <\/line>If you look at the trend lines of when we first took over, particularly spending as a percent of gross national product, we have done a lot not only to hold down spending; the opposite is also true. If the Democrats were in control, spending would be three times what it is right now. I mean, we in the House have passed tax cuts every year we\u2019ve been in session. The opposite of that is it\u2019s been 12 years since the federal government has raised taxes. Why? Because of Republican majority. We didn\u2019t come here to raise taxes. We cut taxes every year. <\/line>So my point is that, sure, out of 232 members we\u2019ve probably got 30 or 40 that would be classified as moderate, and there are some conservatives that would like to change the world overnight. But I\u2019m not being pragmatic. I\u2019m just understanding what the votes are available and what you can do with the votes that you have available, and I think we\u2019ve done some pretty amazing things, on very small margins. When I came into Congress in 1985, there were only 185 members of the Republican conference, 185. In other words, the Democrats were running around with almost a hundred-vote margin. The best we\u2019ve been is right now with a 15-vote margin in the House, and we\u2019ve done some pretty amazing things.<\/line>RUSH: So you\u2019re saying you can only get what you can get. Let\u2019s also not leave the president out of this equation. The president, you know, he submits a budget every year, and he hasn\u2019t vetoed any of the spending bills, and you, as the leader in the House on the Republican side, you\u2019re the one who carries the president\u2019s water, correct?<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: But he hasn\u2019t vetoed it because we have the House, the Senate and the presidency, and we agree on what the number. Actually the president has provided the discipline against the Senate. I know my Senate colleagues won\u2019t like this, but they love spending money, and the House and the president have held numbers down. It\u2019s been the president providing the discipline, particularly over the last three years that I was majority leader, where he started cutting the rate of growth three years ago. We actually reduced the rate of growth. Two years ago, we actually froze spending and last year we actually cut spending, and the president provided that discipline, because we\u2019re not going to send him a bill to veto. We\u2019re going to send him a bill he\u2019ll agree to sign. That\u2019s why he hasn\u2019t vetoed any bills.<\/line>RUSH: All right. Cynthia McKinney.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Ah.<\/line>RUSH: You said on Fox today that she\u2019s racist and has pretty much used racism as her leverage the whole time she\u2019s been in the House. You also say that you are going to file an ethics complaint against her. Tell us about these things.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Well, first of all, I have to tell you that I have the utmost respect for the United States Capitol Police<\/a>. These guys are under tremendous pressure to protect precious property and precious lives on Capitol Hill, and they\u2019ve done an outstanding job and are incredibly courageous. On 9\/11 when the planes were headed towards the Capitol and towards the Pentagon, you know what the Capitol Police did? They stayed in the building. The rest of us ran. These people have incredible courage. I lost one. I had a Capitol Policeman, &lt;a target=new href=”http:\/\/www.arlingtoncemetery.net\/gib-ches.htm”>two of them&lt;\/a>, one of them killed in my office and one of them killed outside of my office protecting me and my young staff.<\/line>RUSH: When was this? When was this?<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: This is about eight years ago. A shooter came through, killed an officer at the door, ran into my office and killed John Gibson, who\u2019s very close to me, one of my security officers, in my office.<\/line>RUSH: You were there?<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: I was there, and he did it in such a way… It was unbelievable. He let the shooter run past him. He was in plane clothes and had to yell at him to turn around because he knew if he shot him in the back he could shoot the young people sitting at the desk in front of him, and he took bullets pointblank and it killed him. These are people… In fact, it took courage to confront McKinney. He didn\u2019t know that she wasn\u2019t a suicide bomber. He didn\u2019t know. She didn\u2019t have a congressional pin on. She had changed her hairstyle. He didn\u2019t immediately recognize her, and yet he showed the courage to go confront her and bring her back to the control point, and she punched him. That is just — and then explains afterwards that it was because he was white that he stopped her. That\u2019s incredibly outrageous, and what I said was, if somebody else does not file an ethics charge, I will.<\/line><\/p>\n

RUSH: Well, do you think anybody will? Or will it be up to you?<\/line> CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: I would hope so. What she did brings embarrassment to the House. That in itself is a violation of House rules.<\/line>RUSH: Well, you know, even the Atlanta newspaper &lt;a target=new href=”http:\/\/www.ajc.com\/news\/content\/opinion\/stories\/0404edmckinney.html”>editorializing&lt;\/a> on this yesterday said that she\u2019s just stupid. All she would have had to have done was stop, tell the officer who she was, apologize for not wearing the pin and go back through the metal detector, and she would have had a friend for life.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: That\u2019s right.<\/line>RUSH: She had to make a big scene out of it, and I\u2019ll tell you what, this is the thing: the Democrats are up in arms today at her over this, because they thought they had you on the front page and your resignation. They thought they had killed you off, and now here comes Cynthia McKinney and she\u2019s taking all the oxygen out of your room and she\u2019s become the focal point. They can\u2019t go forward with “culture of corruption” with her out there now, and I think this will be a great move to file an ethics complaint against her, and especially if you\u2019re the one to do it, because that sends a signal that you haven\u2019t been defeated and you\u2019re not going to take any of this lying down and you\u2019re still Tom DeLay and you\u2019re still who you are and you\u2019re pursuing what you believe in.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Well, you know, I am going to defend these Capitol Police, and I am going to let the American people know that they are incredibly professional and courageous, and I\u2019m just not going to allow this to happen.<\/line>RUSH: You said on Fox today that she is racist and, if this quote is accurate, that she has a long history of racism. Everything is racism with her. It\u2019s incredible arrogance.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: That\u2019s entirely true. Her whole career, she bases everything on race. Everything that\u2019s bad that has ever happened to her is because she\u2019s black. She is anti-Semitic. That\u2019s just who she is.<\/line>RUSH: Well, you know, this is… I don\u2019t want to say “courageous,” and I\u2019m not trying to butter you up here, but these are charges that you just don\u2019t hear going in this direction. You normally have the racism charge being made against people like you.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Yeah. Well, she is a racist.<\/line>RUSH: All right, I\u2019ve gotta ask you one more question before we go, and that is the press, some members of the media are having a little argument over who broke the story of your resignation. Chris Matthews &lt;a target=new href=”http:\/\/www.drudgereportarchives.com\/data\/2006\/04\/04\/20060404_135758_flash3dl.htm”>thinks&lt;\/a> he broke it. TIME Magazine\u2019s Mike Allen thinks he broke it. Who did you tell first?<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Mike Allen.<\/line>RUSH: You told Mike Allen first.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Yes, sir.<\/line>RUSH: All right.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: He\u2019s been very fair to me. This is part of me trying to change the culture in Washington, DC, and change the culture of the press: reward your friends and you know the rest of it. Mike Allen has been very good to me — not “good” to me — he\u2019s been very fair <\/emphasize>with me, and I wanted somebody that would be recognized by the mainstream media as being a fair person to get the story and get it out there, and I gave it to him. He came to my house Monday afternoon and interviewed me, and he was writing the story. I made the mistake of calling Chris Matthews before he had filed the story, and Chris immediately ran to the press, but it was all about the same time.<\/line>RUSH: What about the president? When did you inform him?<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Monday afternoon.<\/line>RUSH: What was his reaction?<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: He was a little sad.<\/line>RUSH: Did he try to talk you out of it?<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: No. He was very gracious. He knew that I had been going through a process of trying to decide what I was supposed to do, and so he honored that process and honored my decision, but was very gracious and thanked me for all the work I had done.<\/line>RUSH: So when will your last day be? Have you figured it out?<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: No. I haven\u2019t thought about any of that. We\u2019re going to be on Easter break. I\u2019m going to decide that. There\u2019s a few things I want to clean up for my district before I leave that I had started this year, and it will be dictated by the congressional schedule.<\/line>RUSH: But you are going to retire or resign in enough time for there to be a special election so that —<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: No, there won\u2019t be a special election. Texas has a law that there\u2019s only two dates that you can have a special election, November and May, and this weekend the deadline for the May special election will have passed.<\/line>RUSH: So it\u2019s going to be an open seat election in November?<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Yes.<\/line>RUSH: Oh, okay. Well, look, next time we chat you\u2019ll know more about what you\u2019re going to do post your resignation, and I\u2019ll be interested to hear that, how you\u2019re going to carry the water outside Congress and try to accomplish your objectives. We\u2019ll look forward to that.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: Well, thank you, and I hope you and I can talk privately about that, because I\u2019d love to have your advice.<\/line>RUSH: I\u2019d love to talk anytime. Let\u2019s go play golf!<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: I\u2019ve got time for that!<\/line>RUSH: Let\u2019s go fly to St. Andrews<\/a>.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: (Laughing.) I\u2019ll pay.<\/line>RUSH: We\u2019ll stay in the Old Course Hotel<\/a>.<\/line>CONGRESSMAN DeLAY: I love it.<\/line>RUSH: No, you\u2019re not paying. We\u2019re going to ram it down their throats. (Laughing.) Thanks for your time. That\u2019s Congressman Tom DeLay on the phone with us in Washington. <\/line>END TRANSCRIPT<\/line><\/p>\n

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