Otter was frustrated in U.S. House

BOISE – U.S. Rep. C.L. “Butch” Otter, R-Idaho, the millionaire businessman who went to Washington, D.C., in 2001 to keep government out of Americans’ lives, decided to run for governor of Idaho two years ago after he became disenchanted with politics in the nation’s capital and feared he was wasting his time.

“I don’t know if it’s my party or it’s just that whole process in Washington, D.C.,” Otter said. “That’s why I decided I was coming home. I just felt like I wasn’t getting anywhere back there. I was kind of wasting my time.”

In six years in the House, Otter, 63, was the primary sponsor of four new laws, including two that renamed buildings in Boise, according to an AP review of federal legislation.

Jerry Brady, Otter’s Democratic opponent in the November governor’s race, said so few bills are a sign Otter hasn’t worked effectively with congressional leaders to pass legislation important to Idaho.

Otter, meanwhile, said he helped set the agenda on national issues important to people in his home state, including opposition to the USA Patriot Act passed after Sept. 11, 2001, as well helping secure $3.5 million in 2002 to study an aquifer beneath North Idaho and eastern Washington.

Still, Otter said posturing in the House and the Senate left him “frustrated.”

“So much stuff gets gobbled up in positioning yourself,” the four-time Idaho lieutenant governor said.

In December 2001, Otter led the charge to rename the U.S. Courthouse in Boise after longtime Republican Rep. James A. McClure. Three years later, he helped rename the U.S. Geological Survey building in Idaho’s capital after Fredrick Haynes Newell, who led irrigation teams that mapped Idaho dam sites before 1900.

Otter, who today will marry 39-year-old Lori Easley, a school principal, was also primary sponsor on two other laws. One modified a 122-year-old survey in northern Idaho, the other allows the U.S. Treasury to buy silver on the open market.

Congressional experts say Otter, who has been primary sponsor of 56 total bills or amendments, faced difficulties any junior lawmaker would encounter in the 435-member House.

“Junior members, as a rule, do not get to pass important legislation,” said Steven Smith, professor of political science and director of the Weidenbaum Center at Washington University in St. Louis. “That’s reserved for more senior committee leaders. And he’s just not there yet.”

Still, Brady, who lost to Dirk Kempthorne in the 2002 governor’s race, said Otter’s record highlights an inability to work with colleagues to get things done. Brady has been among Democrats who have criticized Otter’s opposition to a bill that would create 315,000 acres of new wilderness in Idaho’s Boulder and White Cloud Mountains. That bill is sponsored by U.S. Rep. Mike Simpson, R-Idaho, who was elected in 1998.

Otter fears it doesn’t do enough to protect land users such as ranchers.

The bill passed the House, and is now in the Senate.

“Mike Simpson is a junior congressman,” said Brady, a wilderness backer. “He’s been there just two years longer than Butch, and look what he’s done. Butch made some votes, but he’s not identified with any major improvement in the welfare of the people of Idaho that required the hard work of compromise and putting together coalitions.”

Otter said his 2003 call to junk provisions of the Patriot Act allowing so-called “sneak-and-peek” warrants, wiretaps, surveillance at libraries and multijurisdiction warrants was a triumph because he helped persuade 309 House members to stand up for privacy. His amendment was eventually eliminated. Still, Otter said he helped frame the debate – in Congress and among regular people – over balancing national security and freedom.

“That wasn’t just a huge victory for me, that was a huge victory for the whole concept of big, intrusive government versus individual liberty,” he said.

Otter, who left an assistant leadership position under former House Majority Leader Tom Delay amid differences over the Patriot Act, said the allure of staying in Washington, D.C., wore off amid frustration over lawmakers debating bills “for hours and hours that we know are not going to go anywhere.”

“I’ve learned a lot more about the bureaucracy,” Otter said. “And who’s really running this country. It’s not the 535 people (in Congress) that think they are. It’s the bureaucracy that runs this country.”