‘Desperate’ Gramm Rips Dole Majority Leader’s Aide Calls Texan ‘A Wounded Rattlesnake’

A fund-raising letter by Sen. Phil Gramm, R-Texas, skewering Bob Dole for failing to push the GOP “Contract With America” was dismissed by the Senate majority leader’s spokesman as a “desperate” move.

“It looks like Phil Gramm is a wounded rattlesnake striking out in all directions,” said Nelson Warfield. “But in this case, he may be biting his own tail. Bob Dole is one of the most popular and respected Republicans in America. Attacking him is a pretty desperate move.”

Gramm is running a distant second to Dole in the race for the 1996 Republican presidential nomination.

Sen. Kit Bond, R-Mo., who is neutral in the presidential race, also criticized Gramm’s letter for calling the Senate a potential “black hole” for initiatives in the House-passed “Contract With America.”

The written jabs at Dole are more pointed than the ones Gramm generally delivers in person.

The Kansas Republican “didn’t get the message” of the 1994 elections, Gramm’s letter said.

“Only one person has the clout to get the ‘Contract With America’ through the Senate - the Majority Leader. Why hasn’t Bob Dole done it?”

The Texas senator accused Dole of “cynicism” and doing “absolutely nothing” to cut taxes for American families when he supported, but did not work to pass, Gramm’s failed tax cut package.

In the letter, dated July 21, Gramm asked recipients for $500, $750 or $1,000 donations to help him in “putting Bob Dole’s feet to the fire.”

Warfield said Gramm misrepresented the majority leader’s record.

Gary Koops, Gramm’s spokesman, stood by the four-page letter.

“Bob Dole says leadership is the issue in the presidential campaign,” he said. “His lack of leadership in the Senate on the contract isn’t a sideshow, it’s a campaign issue.”

Bond, who through a spokesman declined to comment, confronted Gramm about the letter Wednesday at a Senate Republican Caucus meeting, according to a GOP aide familiar with the session.