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Ohio: Second District Rep. Rob Portman (R) Last Updated July 14, 2003
The most Republican major metro area in the nation over the longest time span has been Cincinnati. Back in the 1850s, when Harriet Beecher Stowe wrote Uncle Tom's Cabin here, Cincinnati was an island of German, pro-Union, Republican sentiment in a Southern, Democratic, pro-slavery sea. Later Cincinnati attracted fewer southern and eastern European immigrants than Great Lakes industrial cities like Cleveland, Detroit and Chicago; its ethnic character (like its physical appearance) and its political preference have remained pretty well fixed. Even many of the Appalachians here are Republicans, from Civil War Republican counties in the hills. Democratic constituencies here never got very large: economically, it was never a strong CIO town; culturally, it is home to a strong anti-pornography movement that, among other things, was the site of obscenity charges filed against Hustler publisher Larry Flynt. The local Republican record remains intact: It was the only million-plus metro area that George Bush and Bob Dole carried by more than 50% in 1992 and 1996, and George W. Bush won it handily in 2000. For 140 years after 1852, Cincinnati and surrounding Hamilton County were divided by a north-south line into two congressional districts. But by 1990 Hamilton County no longer had enough people for two full districts, and today both the Cincinnati-based districts include territory in other counties. Ohio's 2d Congressional District includes much of eastern Hamilton County, up to the edge of downtown Cincinnati and Mount Adams and the eastern edge of the city of Cincinnati. It includes the mostly affluent suburbs of eastern Hamilton County and the fast-growing suburbs of Clermont County and southern Warren County. It also includes counties farther east on the Ohio River, all the way to the old industrial city of Portsmouth and the hills of rural Pike County. These are very different areas. The metropolitan parts of the district, with 77% of its people, are mostly affluent and politically very Republican. The counties farther east are less well off, though there has been some growth here in the 1990s. Portsmouth, however, has a depressed economy and an Appalachian frame of mind. They are close to marginal in most elections, and Pike County has an historical Democratic tradition. Overall, however, this is a very Republican district, 63% for George W. Bush in 2000, his best district in Ohio. The congressman from the 2d District is Rob Portman, a Republican first elected in May 1993, who quickly became one of the most important legislators in the House. Portman has good connections both at home and in Washington. He grew up in Cincinnati, where his father owned a forklift company; his mother's family owned the Golden Lamb in Lebanon, Ohio's oldest inn, and his ancestors were Quaker abolitionists active in the Underground Railroad. He graduated from Dartmouth, then worked for the 1980 Bush presidential campaign as an advance man; he had already worked in the campaigns of his predecessor, Bill Gradison. He graduated from the University of Michigan Law School and worked for a big firm in Washington. In 1989 he worked in the Bush White House, first in the counsel's office and then in legislative affairs; in 1992 he was U.S. representative to the United Nations Human Rights Council. He had moved back to Cincinnati when, in January 1993, Gradison unexpectedly resigned. Portman ran for the seat with Gradison's endorsement and impressive financial backing from the Cincinnati establishment and his Bush connections. In the primary he faced former Congressman Bob McEwen, who had represented the 6th District to the east for 12 years and then lost it after a contentious primary in 1992, and businessman Jay Buchert, president of the National Association of Home Builders, who ran a vitriolic campaign against both Portman and McEwen. With help from a radio ad by Barbara Bush, Portman won with 36% of the vote, to 30% for McEwen, who carried counties he had once represented, and 25% for Buchert. Portman won the general with 70%. He has had no reelection problems since then. In the House, Portman made himself a rising star and got a seat on Ways and Means. As part of the Contract with America, he helped floor-manage in early 1995 the unfunded mandates bill--a large responsibility for one who hadn't even been a member two years. He authored or co-authored nine bills that were signed by Clinton. He shepherded, as co-chairman with Senator Bob Kerrey of the National Commission on Restructuring the Internal Revenue Service, a bipartisan package to define taxpayer rights and make the 100,000-plus employee agency more user friendly. With Bob Matsui, he won broad support to repeal the 3% excise tax on telephone service, which critics derided as the "Spanish-American War tax" because it was instituted as a temporary measure to finance that war, which ended in 1898. Starting in 1997, Portman worked with Democrat Ben Cardin on a bill to increase the amounts workers could set aside in 401(k)s, IRAs and other tax-free accounts and to make it easier for small businesses to offer pension plans. This was an effort not supported by the Clinton or Bush administrations and with little institutional support from the Treasury or the private sector. They worked together to forge consensus on Ways and Means; Portman resisted Republican attempts to raise the limits above $5,000 for IRAs and $15,000 for 401(k)s. Ways and Means Democrat Earl Pomeroy likened their partnership to Ginger Rogers and Fred Astaire. The House passed their bill 401-25 in 2000, but the Senate did not take it up. In April 2001 the House leadership moved it before the Bush tax cut and it was passed 308-70 in June 2001, then attached it to the Bush tax cut. It remained in the tax cut and became law in June 2001--a major bipartisan achievement for two not very senior members. In January 2002 Portman and Cardin put aside broader pension reform and concentrated on issues raised by the Enron bankruptcy. Their bill did not ban companies from putting their own stock in employees' 401(k)s but did allow workers to sell matching stock after three years, require 21 day advance notice of blackout periods and bar companies from requiring employees to invest in their own stock. Some of its provisions became law. Portman has also addressed tax and pension issues on his own. In April 2002 he sponsored a bill to repeal the Alternative Minimum Tax for individuals and corporations and allowing those with less than $500 in dividend and interest income not to itemize. Here he was addressing an issue most serious policymakers know they will have to address some day: the AMT, passed in 1969 to affect only a handful of taxpayers, will by 2010 ensnare within its complex provisions 36 million taxpayers--30% to 40% of all voters. In early 2003 Portman told Bush administration officials that he would not support the provisions for untaxed savings accounts with much higher contributions limits, a project of outgoing Treasury Secretary Paul O'Neill. The proposal was brushed aside by Ways and Means Chairman Bill Thomas. Among House members, Portman probably has the closest ties with the Bush White House--with George W. Bush himself, whom he briefed often during the 2000 campaign and for whom he took part in debate preparation, and with many high level members of the White House staff, with whom he is in constant touch. He is also close to Thomas and to Speaker Dennis Hastert, who arranged for him to chair Republican leadership meetings in January 2001 and in February 2003 named him officially as chairman of the leadership and liaison to the administration. He has been mentioned as a candidate for a leadership position, but has been a de facto part of the leadership for some time. He has been active as a Republican fundraiser, chairing the $25 million House and Senate Dinner in 2000 and starting his own leadership PAC in 2002 though he has declined to take PAC money himself. He has often been mentioned as a nominee for an administration position, open or not, but seems more interested in continuing in the House. But not forever; as he noted in 2002, "I am interested in the possibility of running statewide some day. And I don't know when the time might come, if ever. There are two Republican senators; I support both of them strongly." At home, Portman has worked to keep jobs in the USEC uranium enrichment facility in Pike County and to get funds for the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant; they are in the part of the 2d District added in redistricting, and the only part where the vote was about even in 2002.
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