3 hours 38 minutes ago by Sanjay Talwani - MTN News
HELENA - Governor Steve Bullock said Friday that Senate Majority Harry Reid (D-NV) called him to weigh in on filling the Senate seat later vacated by Max Baucus (D-MT), but he told Reid to keep out of Montana politics.
"I said, 'it's none of your damn business,'" Bullock said.
Bullock declined to say what the majority leader told him about the appointment, but the two were apparently in agreement on the final result: Bullock last week appointed Lt. Gov. John Walsh, whom he as well as much of the national Democratic Party establishment, including the Democratic Senatorial Campaign Committee, had endorsed in the race to succeed Baucus.
Bullock said Reid's call came before the White House plan to nominate Baucus as ambassador to China was made public.
"And I said, 'You know what? Stay out of my decision-making. This is a decision that I make and no one else,'" Bullock said.
Reid's office did not respond to a call from Montana Television Network seeking comment.
Asked if he could put to rest a "conspiracy theory" floated primarily by Republicans that the entire nomination of Baucus to the ambassadorship was a ploy to give Walsh a head-start in the November election, Bullock laughed.
"If there was a backroom deal, I was certainly never invited into that back room," he said.
He said he spoke to no Democratic Party or White House officials on the matter.
In his strongest push back yet at criticism over the appointment and what some called a lack of transparency in the process, Bullock also said he didn't want "a three-ring circus" that might have resulted if he has revealed his decision before Baucus actually left the Senate. He said governors in other states handled similar decisions the same way, while others, who did not, were criticized for creating a process that resembled an arm-wrestling match or "American Idol."
Asked what regrets he had about the process, he said he could have better educated members of the media. Had reporters and editorial boards that criticized the decision dug a bit deeper intot he experience of other states, the narrative might have been different, he said.
He said he wasn't surprised that Republicans were unhappy with the decision to appoint a Democrat to the seat that had been occupied by a Democrats for a century.
"I wanted to choose who was most effective, while at the same time, continue governing because we've been working of very important issues," he said.
He noted that Montanans entrusted Walsh with greater responsibility than that of a U.S. Senator: Then adjutant general of the Montana National Guard, Walsh led 750 Montanans into combat in Iraq, the largest wartime deployment of Montana troops since World War II. Bullock said Montanans could be proud of the first Iraq War veteran in the Senate.
The Montana Republican Party meanwhile continued to attack Bullock on the decision and the process.
"Governor Bullock is missing the point and trying to save face," state GOP Executive Director Bowen Greenwood said in an email. "It's not about him appointing a Democrat, it was about him shutting out the public on this process. It wasn't just the GOP calling for (an) open and transparent process, editorial boards across the state were as well," and former Lt. Gov. John Bohlinger, a primary rival of Walsh, and former U.S. Rep. Pat Williams, both Democrats, also weighed in.
"Bullock repeatedly refused to talk to you about this process and the appointment," Greenwood wrote. "Now he comes out and says Reid contacted him about it - after the fact. After the deal was done. Don't you find that a little odd?"
(file photo)
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