Candidate Quits Race Under Fire Controversy Swirled Around War Record, Wife’s Pension

Rep. Wes Cooley of Oregon abruptly dropped his bid for re-election Tuesday, bowing to weeks of pressure from Republican leaders in the House who feared that questions about his war record and his wife’s pension had rendered him unelectable.

Cooley’s withdrawal ended a political drama that began with an uproar, but grew into a soap opera as fellow Republicans plotted again and again to force him from office and he again and again resisted them.

All the while, polls showed Cooley trailing his Democratic opponent in Oregon’s 2nd Congressional District, a rural, conservative and reliably Republican area covering the eastern two-thirds of the state.

In a written statement, Cooley said Tuesday that he was quitting because “the chance that a liberal politician could win the 2nd District race is a risk that I am not willing to take.”

“I know my announcement today will be greeted with a morbid delight by some,” he stated, “but I hope my supporters will understand my decision. I never intended to be in Congress forever.”

Cooley, 64, is one of the scores of conservative freshmen who were swept into the House in the 1994 Republican landslide. For much of his first term, he did not stand out from the crowd.

But in April, The Medford Mail Tribune questioned Cooley’s claim, in a state-financed pamphlet distributed to voters, that he had served with Army Special Forces in the Korean War. Although Army records showed that he had never left the United States and that he completed Special Forces training after the war ended, Cooley insisted he had spent a few days in Korea and was sworn to secrecy about his mission.

The state is investigating whether Cooley knowingly placed false information in the pamphlet, a felony under Oregon law.

Later news accounts questioned whether Cooley and his wife had kept their marriage secret in the mid-1980s so that she could continue to receive veteran survivor’s benefits from a previous marriage. That, too, is under investigation.

Republican leaders have been trying to edge Cooley out of his re-election race all summer. Last month, Cooley’s former campaign manager entered the House race against his old boss as a third-party candidate with the backing of Sens. Mark Hatfield of Oregon and Slade Gorton of Washington, two moderate Republicans.

More recently, House Speaker Newt Gingrich sought to lure Cooley’s predecessor, former Rep. Bob Smith, back to the House by offering him the chairmanship of the Agriculture Committee if he would replace Cooley. Smith has not said whether he will seek the nomination.

A Christian radio broadcaster who finished second to Cooley in Oregon’s Republican primary last spring, Perry A. Atkinson, said Tuesday that he will seek the nomination for Cooley’s seat.

The 2nd District’s Republicans will hold a convention later this month to choose a new nominee.