News Coverage
Lincoln in Line to Lead Agriculture Committee
Published September 14, 2008
WASHINGTON - A Senate shakeup could place Sen. Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas as the leader of the Senate Agriculture Committee, a post giving her more clout on Capitol Hill and likely more political security at home.
Although uncomfortable to discuss publicly, Senate insiders already are projecting the lineup of committee chairmen if Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., were to leave because of health reasons.
Kennedy is undergoing treatment for a malignant brain tumor. He has said he plans to return to the Senate in January.
But his departure would set off a round of musical chairs in the upper ranks of the Senate, where he has served for more than four decades.
Kennedy's departure would leave open the chairmanship of the Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) committee. Current Agriculture Committee Chairman Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, is next in seniority to take over Kennedy's committee.
Since senators by rule may only be chairman of one committee, that would leave agriculture open. The three other Democrats ahead of Lincoln in seniority on the agriculture panel are all chairmen elsewhere.
Lincoln confirmed she'd be in line to be agriculture committee chairwoman if Kennedy left, but wouldn't discuss it further.
"Everybody always knows what your seniority is, but you don't talk about those things," she said. "I want Ted Kennedy to be there as chairman of that HELP committee as long as possible because he's a wonderful guy. He provides tremendous wisdom and leadership at that committee and that's critical for us."
Lincoln's ascension to the top of the committee would improve her re-election prospects in a state where agriculture is vital to the economy.
That's assuming that Lincoln will have viable opposition in 2010, which doesn't look likely, said Jennifer Duffy, senior editor of the Washington-based Cook Political Report.
"There are no obvious vulnerabilities and Republicans don't have much of a bench (in Arkansas)," Duffy said. "She's not on my list of potentially vulnerable incumbents in 2010."
The GOP did not field a challenger to Sen. Mark Pryor, D-Ark., this year.
Former Gov. Mike Huckabee might be the only Republican that could pose a strong challenge to Lincoln, said Jay Barth, a political science professor at Hendrix College in Conway.
If Republican opposition materializes, a Lincoln chairmanship could negate some of her disadvantages.
Barth said Lincoln's approval ratings generally lag behind other Arkansas Democrats. If Democrats take the White House in November, the party should expect difficult mid-term elections, historical trends indicate.
As agriculture committee chairwoman, though, the position would be "undeniably beneficial" to her in Arkansas, he said.
"We know where elections are decided in the state," Barth said. "They're decided in those rural areas where those white, rural voters are either themselves tied to the agricultural economy or their communities are tied to it."
The state's agriculture lobby would be ecstatic over the news, having long been critical of Harkin's committee leadership.
"Sen. Harkin has had much of a parochial Midwest viewpoint to the exclusion of southern agriculture," said Stanley Reed of Marianna, president of the Arkansas Farm Bureau.
Reed said Lincoln would be open-minded about the issues faced by farmers across the country, not just in one region.
The senator this year won the American Farm Bureau's "Golden Plow" award as the Senate's No. 1 advocate for agriculture.
"She understands agriculture policy more than anybody up there," Reed said.
She's also made a few enemies in her diehard support for federal subsidies to farmers.
Among her foes is the Environmental Working Group, whose president last December blasted Lincoln in a San Francisco newspaper for her defense of what he called "unlimited, multimillion-dollar subsidies in perpetuity to plantation-scale operations in the South."
An Environmental Working Group spokesman on Friday said it wouldn't be proper to speculate how committee chairmanships might shake out. But that the group would work with anyone who has the agriculture helm.
Duffy said she wasn't so sure that Lincoln would become chairman.
First, Harkin would "think long and hard" about departing, given agriculture's importance to Iowa's economy, she said.
Sen. Kent Conrad, D-N.D., could also usurp Lincoln, Duffy said. Conrad is now chairman of the Budget Committee but could give that up for agriculture. He has more seniority than Lincoln.
