(The following article by Dan Daly was posted on the Rapid City Journal website on March 1.)
RAPID CITY, S.D. — Dakota, Minnesota & Eastern Railroad’s big rail project — and the role that Sen. John Thune, R-S.D., played in getting it funded — has touched off a not-so-civil war between the states.
Sen. Mark Dayton, D-Minn., told the New York Times that Thune’s railroad maneuver was “the most despicable special- interest deal I’ve ever seen in all my 30 years in government.”
Dayton’s Minnesota constituents, including the city of Rochester and its Mayo Clinic, oppose the DM&E coal line because it could bring as many as 34 trains a day through the middle of town.
“The Mayo Clinic is worth a hell of a lot more than the whole state of South Dakota,” Dayton told Fortune magazine.
Dayton apologized Tuesday for the Mayo Clinic comment, but not before Thune’s staff sent out an angry response. “Senator Dayton’s comments are unconscionable, offensive and unbecoming of a United States senator,” Thune was quoted in the news release.
“Our neighboring senator needs to do a reality check,” Thune continued. “Unlike Sen. Dayton, we may not all be millionaires in South Dakota, but we understand the value of hard work and appreciate real-world experience.”
Dayton is the son of former Dayton Hudson Corp. chairman Bruce Dayton and the great-grandson of George Dayton, who founded the retail giant now known as Target Corp.
Almost lost in the dust-up was the issue of Thune’s dual roles as railroad lobbyist and lawmaker.
In the two years between leaving the U.S. House of Representatives and winning Sen. Tom Daschle’s Senate seat, Thune collected about $220,000 as a paid lobbyist for DM&E. He also worked for the ethanol industry, milk producers and Sioux Valley Hospital.
Then, as South Dakota’s junior senator, Thune engineered changes in last year’s transportation bill that paved the way for DM&E to get $2.5 billion in low-interest federal loans to build a coal line into Wyoming’s Powder River Basin.
Thune insisted — and he still insists — that his legislative changes and the yet-to-be- approved DM&E loan are good for South Dakota and good for the country.
But Dayton complains that Thune is using a “reverse revolving door” to benefit his former client. Dayton said he will introduce an amendment Thursday to close that door.
Under existing law, a former member of Congress cannot lobby Congress for one year after leaving office. The law was an attempt to close Washington’s so-called revolving door, where former policy makers step down and start marketing their influence to interest groups.
However, there isn’t anything that bars a lobbyist who becomes a lawmaker from pushing legislation favorable to former clients.
The Dayton amendment would establish a two-year cooling-off period. During that time, members of Congress or senior staff could not get “personally involved” in matters that benefit their former clients, according to an outline of the amendment issued by Dayton’s staff.
Thune spokesman Kyle Downey said Dayton’s amendment would bar any elected official with real-world, private-sector experience from using that experience during their first two years in office.
Downey said that would leave a Congress populated only with rich millionaires who never had to work for a living — a not-so-subtle slam at Dayton’s wealthy family background.
In his statement, Thune defended his Senate work on behalf of DM&E. “I have worked on rail issues my entire professional career, both in the public and the private sector, and I make no apologies for my efforts to work with South Dakota companies to create high-paying jobs in South Dakota and to improve our economy,” Thune said.
In the mid-1980s, Thune worked on railroad issues for the state Department of Transportation. In the early 1990s, he served as head of the state Division of Railroads under Gov. George S. Mickelson.
He maintained his ties with DM&E and has publicly supported the railroad’s expansion. Last summer, when the transportation reauthorization bill was up for a vote, Thune stepped in again.
Specifically, he helped increase the Federal Railroad Administration’s Railroad Rehabilitation & Improvement Financing program to $35 billion from $3.5 billion. The new law also set aside a certain amount for small railroads, and it changes the way the FRA figures collateral for the loans.
Those changes, incidentally, were not popular at the White House. The Bush administration’s Office of Management & Budget has proposed in its 2007 budget to kill the entire loan program.
Downey noted that Dayton voted twice in favor Thune’s provisions in last year’s transportation reauthorization bill. “It’s either bad staff work or he doesn’t read the bills he votes on,” Downey said.
As recently as Monday, Downey said, Dayton was a co-sponsor of the Railroad Competition Act of 2005, which has language nearly identical to Thune’s rail provision. Dayton had his name removed Monday.
Chani Wiggins, Dayton’s communications director, said the legislation — both last year’s transportation bill and the pending railroad competition act — contained last-minute changes that altered their intent.
She said the Senate version of the highway bill, for instance, increased the loan fund to $6 billion from $3.5 billion. Somewhere in the conference committee, it became a $35 billion fund.
Asked to comment about the Thune camp’s description of Dayton as a self-financed millionaire, Wiggins said, “I can’t even give you a reaction to that.”
She said Dayton is sorry about his Fortune comment insulting South Dakota. In his letter to Thune, Dayton wrote:
“I apologize to you and the people of South Dakota for my inappropriate remark, as reported in FORTUNE Magazine. The reason I have spoken so forcefully against this project is because of the damage it will do to Rochester, Minn., and its premier institution, The Mayo Clinic. Your former client has been beyond irresponsible in his unwillingness to find an acceptable solution.”
“The Mayo Clinic is of inestimable value to my State of Minnesota. However, I had no cause to make a comparison with the also-inestimable value of the great state of South Dakota,” Dayton said.
DM&E president Kevin Schieffer issued a statement claiming that 30 of 32 Minnesota communities along the route are on record as being in support of the project.
He said Rochester and the Mayo Clinic oppose the project “because the Mayo Clinic located its hospital next to the train track many years ago when it needed the railroad to transport patients. Now, Mayo thinks additional train traffic will hurt Mayo’s business, despite the fact that the federal courts and the (U.S. Surface Transportation Board) have rejected those claims.”