Arizona will lose 'a real workhorse'

Jon Kyl's 26-year career on Capitol Hill officially ends this week, and Arizona will lose an influential and hardworking senator whose legacy, particularly on water policy, could help shape the state for decades.

Jon Kyl: Retiring after 26 years in D.C.

Age: 70.

Party: Republican.

Family: Wife, Caryll; two grown children, Kristine Kyl Gavin, who lives in the Washington, D.C., area, and John Kyl, who lives in Phoenix.

Public office:U.S. senator since 1995. Elected GOP whip in December 2007. Served in U.S. House of Representatives from 1987 to 1995.

Legislative accomplishments: Sat on the influential Senate Judiciary and Finance committees. Was a former chairman of the Senate's anti-terrorism subcommittee and was recognized as a U.S. counterterrorism expert. Co-authored the Crime Victims' Rights Act. Negotiated and shepherded through Congress several landmark water settlements.

Professional background: Lawyer at Jennings, Strouss & Salmon in Phoenix. Former chairman of the Phoenix Chamber of Commerce.

Education: Bachelor's degree in political science and law degree from the University of Arizona.

Notable: Recognized by Time magazine in 2010 as one of the 100 "people who most affect our world." He appeared in the "Leaders" section of the annual "Time 100" list, with President Barack Obama and other well-known political figures. In 2006, Time named him one of the 10 best senators.

Kyl, 70, spent 18 years in the U.S. Senate and eight years before that in the U.S. House, rising from a low-profile, rank-and-file Republican to become Arizona's highest-ranking lawmaker in Washington in decades. He decided not to seek a fourth Senate term, and at 10 a.m. Arizona time on Thursday, Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz., will become the state's 11th senator.

Kyl served with five presidents, and his tenure spanned the impeachment and Senate trial of President Bill Clinton, the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, and the Iraq and Afghanistan wars. In December 2007, his GOP colleagues elected him to the job of minority whip, making him the No. 2 Senate Republican leader and boosting Arizona's political clout.

But Kyl also quietly earned a reputation as the go-to guy in Washington for Arizona issues. As Sen. John McCain, the state's senior senator, dominated the national limelight as a two-time Republican presidential candidate, Kyl tackled the less glamorous but often vitally important issues and projects around Arizona.

A one-time practicing attorney specializing in water law, Kyl negotiated and ushered multiple landmark Arizona water-rights settlements through Congress. The water deals resolved legal entanglements between the federal government and Indian communities in Arizona that stretched back decades.

"I can't tell you how many people would say, 'When I really need something done, I go to Jon Kyl,'" said Bruce Merrill, a veteran Arizona political scientist who has followed Kyl's political career from his first House race in 1986. "I put Jon Kyl in the same status that I put Barry Goldwater in terms of what he's done for the state. This guy was a real workhorse for Arizona."

Kyl mastered the Senate process.

He was credited in 1999 with using under-the-radar tactics to orchestrate the Senate defeat of the Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty sought by Clinton. In naming Kyl one of "America's 10 Best Senators," Time in 2006 dubbed him "The Operator" and hailed his expertise at legislative "subterfuge."

And although his partisan credentials were never in doubt -- Democratic critics slammed him as obstructionist during President Barack Obama's first term -- Kyl at times also could reach across the aisle. He co-sponsored a 2007 bipartisan comprehensive immigration-reform bill with the late Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass., that spurred a backlash against Kyl from the right. He collaborated with Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., on crime-victim legislation and other issues. While in the House in the early 1990s, Kyl helped bring attention to the House banking scandal that hurt several of his fellow lawmakers, including then-Rep. Jay Rhodes, R-Ariz.

"Senator Jon Kyl served the people of Arizona with distinction," former President George W. Bush said in a written statement to The Arizona Republic. "He is a highly intelligent man who was well-briefed on the key issues of our time. He earned respect not only in the Senate, but in the White House during my Presidency."

Kyl wasn't prone to grandstanding, and he figured out early on that much can be accomplished quietly, outside the media spotlight and especially if taking credit isn't a priority. Kyl is the son of a former Iowa congressman and never had any interest in running for anything but federal office. He immersed himself in issues, big and small, and prided himself on preparation, becoming known as one of the most knowledgeable lawmakers in the chamber.

Once described by The Republic as having "the sober-minded earnestness of a Presbyterian minister," he comes across as serious and professorial. Kyl is a stickler for details and facts and can be prickly if he believes his integrity has been impugned. While he became a man of the Senate, he never became a creature of Washington, returning most weekends to Arizona, where his family has a cabin in Greer.

There was never a sense that Kyl would say something in Washington that he wouldn't say in Tucson or Kingman.

Kyl also never begrudged the better-known McCain for his spot on the national and international stage, saying they each served their state in different ways. He hinted at how he viewed the relationship when on election night in November, he referred to Flake as "another wingman" for McCain.

A national leader

In his Dec. 19 farewell remarks on the Senate floor, Kyl characterized his political career as an effort to maximize personal freedom through pro-growth economics, social values and national security that reflected a "strong and sovereign America."

"I am deeply honored to have served for 18 years as Arizona's 10th senator, and for four terms in the House of Representatives before that," Kyl said. "Now, it's time to move on."

Kyl is tight-lipped on his intentions, but it's widely believed he will stay involved with the shaping of public policy in some way. He has donated his official papers to the University of Arizona, his alma mater. He doubts he will write a memoir and emphatically says he is through with running for public office.

"I want to continue to serve in ways that, in the private sector, I can make a contribution to public policy," Kyl said in an interview with The Republic. "Probably some politics. If I can serve in an advisory and counselor role, I certainly want to do that. And I very much want to have a lot to do here in Arizona even though I will probably also be doing some things in Washington."

Kyl's exit will result in a loss of stature for Arizona. Only three other Arizonans have ascended to the top echelon of Senate or House leadership: Sen. Ernest McFarland, a Democrat who was Senate majority leader from 1951 to 1953; Sen. Carl Hayden, a seven-term Democrat who was Senate president pro tempore, and third in line to the presidency, from 1957 to 1969; and Rep. John Rhodes, a Republican who was House minority leader from 1973 to 1981. Others took different paths to national notoriety. Former Rep. Stewart Udall, D-Ariz., was secretary of the Interior in President John F. Kennedy's and President Lyndon Johnson's administrations, while Goldwater and McCain, respectively, won the Republican Party's nomination for president in 1964 and 2008. Rep. Morris Udall, D-Ariz., also made an unsuccessful 1976 bid for the White House.

"He ranks right up there with the very, very best that we have ever had," McCain said of Kyl.

Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., called Kyl "an absolutely invaluable partner" whose "good judgment" and cooperation will be missed by the Senate GOP caucus.

"There are two things I think you need to know about Jon Kyl before you begin any discussion," McConnell told The Republic. "Number 1, he's absolutely brilliant, and, Number 2, he knows how to play team ball. Being in a legislative body is a team sport, but there's not much of a payoff for it because (the media is) always looking for someone who is not playing team ball."

When Kyl spoke, people actually listened, something not true of every senator, McConnell said.

"To be effective in a group with a bunch of class-president types requires a particular skill, and he has that in great abundance," McConnell said. "And whatever he chooses to do next, I'm sure he will be conspicuously successful with that as well."

The respect for Kyl extends to the other side of the aisle.

Feinstein, the California Democrat, said she enjoyed working with Kyl, whom she characterized as "a dedicated public servant," particularly on crime victims' rights. They also collaborated over the years on border-security and anti-terrorism issues.

"Because of our work together on the Crime Victims' Rights Act, victims of violent crimes are now afforded many critical protections, such as the right to restitution and the right to make statements in court," Feinstein told The Republic. "Senator Kyl's tireless work on victims' rights provides a great insight into his character."

Even before he began climbing the rungs of Senate leadership, Kyl was making a name for himself among the Washington elite.

In 2000, Kyl was interviewed as a possible vice-presidential running mate for Bush, who was a Texas governor. Kyl said his VP vetting got "pretty far" before Dick Cheney, who led the search, decided to take the job himself.

"I would have loved to have been selected, but I'm glad Dick selected himself," Kyl said.

In a telephone interview with The Republic, Cheney said he could not confirm the details of the 2000 running-mate search because the process was confidential, but he did stress the high regard in which he holds Kyl, whom he got to know when both served in the House, and said he considers him a personal friend.

"I'd have been very happy with Jon Kyl as the president of the United States," Cheney said. "I think he was that good."

Arizona legacy: Water

Kyl will be remembered nationally as a GOP leader known for his conservative posture on national security, including his strong support for missile defense and his sharp criticism of those who leak classified information, as well as judicial issues. But his work forging complicated Indian water-rights settlements could cement his long-term reputation in his home state.

Kyl, a water-law expert who as an attorney argued before the U.S. Supreme Court, helped negotiate multiple agreements to resolve decades of legal entanglements and disputes between the federal government and Arizona's Indian communities, including the 15-years-in-the-making 2004 Arizona Water Settlements Act.

He retires from the Senate leaving a major water settlement involving the Navajo and Hopi tribes unfinished.

"We still had one big one that we didn't get done, but we did a lot of the work on it and the parties had agreed to it, it's just that they didn't want to go forward with the legislation to effect it," Kyl said. "So that's a disappointment, and yet all of the preceding ones were important to our state."

Generally speaking, Kyl said, he believes his legacy won't come into focus for some time, and he declined to speculate how history might remember him. But he acknowledged that his work on the water settlements, as well as public-land use and national forests, will resonate most with his constituents.

Jack August Jr., an Arizona political historian and authority on the state's political fights over water, said Kyl's emphasis on the state's water future was in the tradition of Hayden, the long-serving senator known as the father of the Central Arizona Project, the 336-mile network of canals and pumping stations that delivers Colorado River water to Phoenix and Tucson.

"Kyl was a warrior for the conservative movement, but at the same time he's one of our great water senators, like Carl Hayden," said August, author of the 1998 book "Vision in the Desert: Carl Hayden and Hydropolitics in the American Southwest." "I would put him right there. He's a brilliant guy. I admire him as a historian."

McCain said Kyl's contributions to the Indian water settlements shouldn't be underestimated.

"His achievements on these water-rights agreements with our Native Americans are landmark and have historic implications," McCain said. "He has been indispensable, and obviously unique because he had all this background as a water-rights lawyer. They are the most complex issues that you could ever address. Out of 100 senators in the United States Senate, he is the only one who has that kind of capability and credibility."

Kyl does not dispute that of the two senators, he did much of the heavy-lifting when it came to Arizona issues, saying his relationship with McCain "worked out fine." He noted that McCain ran for president in 2000 prior to securing the nomination on his second try in 2008, so naturally some of the Arizona-specific duties would fall to him. And despite being the state's senior senator, McCain never once pulled rank, Kyl said.

"I think Arizona got its money's worth," Kyl said. "You had two different kinds of senators, and we complemented each other to a large extent."

Critics, controversies

Arizona Democrats have long argued that Kyl's conservatism is out of step with the changing demographics of the state, which they argue is getting more moderate.

While he never became as well-known as a foe of earmarks as McCain or Flake, Kyl's rejection of pork-barrel politics drew criticism from those who believe that senators and representatives should try to secure as much federal funding for home-state projects as they can. Kyl's vote to convict Clinton in his 1999 Senate impeachment trial and opposition to Obama's 2010 health-care overhaul also won him no fans among Democrats.

But some also give Kyl his due.

Paul Eckerstrom, a former Pima County Democratic Party chairman, disagrees with Kyl on many issues and is especially bothered by Kyl's opposition to allowing the government to negotiate drug prices as part of the Medicare Part D program. But he said he was impressed by Kyl on water issues. "I always thought he was very smart, and a formidable political opponent because of that," Eckerstrom said.

Former Sen. Dennis DeConcini, the Democrat whom Kyl succeeded, said that despite philosophical differences on policy, he has always considered Kyl a gentleman. "I've seen him work very well with people and not be a showoff or anything like that," said DeConcini, who served from 1977 to 1995. "He's a smart, smart guy."

For all of his recognition as one of the more cerebral senators, a 2011 gaffe about Planned Parenthood helped define Kyl negatively on social-media platforms such as Twitter and Facebook.

After Kyl misspoke on the Senate floor by saying abortions made up 90 percent of Planned Parenthood's services -- the correct figure is 3 percent -- Ryan Patmintra, his then-Washington-based press secretary, made things worse by telling CNN that Kyl's comment "was not intended to be a factual statement." That nonsensical response, which Patmintra said Kyl neither saw nor approved, entered the national lexicon after going viral. Television comedians and Democrats roundly mocked the phrase.

In addition to the unfinished business of the Navajo-Hopi water settlement and a land swap that could have resulted in a massive new copper mine near Superior, Kyl acknowledges some regrets, such as how the Iraq war, which he supported, turned out.

"I don't regret the positions that I have taken, but I do wish things had worked out differently than they did," he said.

But, overall, he is proud of the way he represented Arizonans for more than two decades.

"What an honor," Kyl said in summing up. "It all comes to an end now, but in politics nothing is ever over. It's a continuing battle of ideas, so you can't put yourself in the position of the indispensable person. It goes on after you, and I'm just happy to have had the opportunity to serve."

Copyright 2012 The Arizona Republic|azcentral.com. All rights reserved.For more information about reprints & permissions, visit our FAQ's. To report corrections and clarifications, contact Standards Editor Brent Jones. For publication consideration in the newspaper, send comments to letters@usatoday.com. Include name, phone number, city and state for verification. To view our corrections, go to corrections.usatoday.com.

Posted

View the original article here