March 07, 2010 07:43 PM UTC

Cory Gardner's Quixotic Hits Keep Coming

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• by: Colorado Pols

Democrats putting together their opposition research file on CD-4 frontrunner Cory Gardner haven’t been disappointed by his votes in the Colorado legislature this session. We talked last weekend about Gardner’s politically ill-advised vote to cut the Agriculture Department, despite Minority Leader Mike May’s near-pleading on the House floor not to do so. And then there was his vote against a bill to regulate local governments (as in the city of Aurora) who try to stick the rest of the state with the costs of new school construction though zoning sleight of hand–all too easy to characterize that vote as asking rural Colorado to pay for Aurora’s schools so developers can get a tax break.

But Democrats will be even happier to recount again and again Rep. Gardner’s standout vote against Senate Joint Resolution 004, an innocuous bill that certifies water projects all over the state as eligible for federal funds. The vote in the Senate on this bill was a little closer, with many of the usual-suspect conservatives voting no, but in the House only three representatives voted against–including Cory Gardner.

By way of explanation, SJR10-004 is a bill establishing a list of drinking water projects in the state eligible for federal funding as required by statute. Included in the long list are many projects in CD-4, including the East Larimer Water District, the city of Greeley, Ordway, and (kicker here) a new water treatment plant for Gardner’s hometown of Yuma.

Gardner’s objection? The EPA is requiring that water projects funded by the Drinking Water Revolving Fund comply with the federal Davis-Bacon Act, which since 1931 has required prevailing wages to be paid on federally funded public works projects. This is an updated policy for 2010, but as the EPA explains it it’s really just a loophole being closed–federal funds require federal law be followed as they’re used, and ignoring that requirement just because the money is middled into a state account doesn’t make sense.

But for Cory Gardner, complying with this federal requirement that workers on a federally funded project be paid the prevailing wage was important enough to place himself on the wrong side of a 62-3 vote in the Colorado House. Gardner even attempted an amendment, which failed, asking Colorado’s Congressional delegation to oppose the EPA’s prevailing wage rule (Doug Lamborn and Mike Coffman notwithstanding, as if).

In short, what we have here once again is Gardner making a vote, based on “principle,” that could be used against him to much greater effect than the show of principle helps him. We assume that Gardner hopes to turn these dogmatic losing grandstands into an asset in the CD-4 primary with a passionate ideological defense, but that’s in exchange for turning off an unknown number of general election voters who will hear “Gardner voted against your new water treatment plant because he was worried the jobs it creates might pay too well.” Which you can lay down next to “Gardner voted to make you pay for Aurora’s new school instead of developers,” or “Gardner voted to cut the Ag Department despite pleas from fellow Republicans.”

Bottom line: in a shift we’ll be debating until November, many otherwise astute people have it in their heads this year–a marked difference from the conventional wisdom in the last several election cycles–that the hardcore ideological rhetoric coming from Republicans ahead of their respective primaries, and permanently recorded in their votes for elected officials like Gardner, won’t hurt them in the general election: that “nobody cares,” or that this kind of fringe positioning is actually advantageous now where it hasn’t been in recent elections. This is above and beyond the anticipated backlash effect of a bad economy on the party in power–even considering that, it seems to be agreed that out-demagoguing the competition, and staking out the most conservative red-meat positions imaginable on the issues, is the ticket to victory this year.

As the oppo file on Gardner gets longer and longer, you’d better hope for his sake they’re right.