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In Alabama, Rep. Bobby Bright avoids perils of anti-government mood
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The reaction from the right is positive. "Bobby, I'm a Barry Goldwater right-wing conservative," Kiwanis old-timer and retired Air Force officer Doug Speight said at the breakfast.
"I'm sorry to hear that," Bright said.
"Well, I also support Bobby Bright," Speight replied.
"Good man," Bright said.
Speight, who queried the lawmaker on Arizona's immigration law, said he likes Bright because he is a "Republican masquerading as a Democrat."
Yet that doesn't completely capture the congressman's profile. Bright said Arizona's new immigration law "attacks our Constitution" because, he says, it could encourage racial profiling. Yet his solution is not to fight the law in court, but to devote billions more in federal money to secure the border. "Arizona is right there on the front line," he said. "They are experiencing horrible crime every day. Not just periodically, but every day. The people elected their local leaders to do something."
Similarly, Bright won't push to repeal the health-care law because measures he likes, such as protections for people with preexisting conditions, would be lost.
He is also deeply critical of the Republican Party, saying the no-earmark promise that all five of Alabama's GOP congressmen signed onto this year is little more than an election-year gimmick that amounts to a pledge against the state. "That's what really makes me mad about my colleagues," he said. "They put their own partisan needs ahead of their constituents."
Impoverished region
If the 2nd District is ripe for Bright's mixture of conservatism and fiscal advocacy, it is largely because of the region's poverty. The district includes not only many of Montgomery's impoverished blacks but also the rural, struggling stretch of southeastern Alabama known as the Wiregrass Region, where Bright was born. The district is also home to Maxwell Air Force Base and the Army's Fort Rucker, making military spending a priority.
Bright's brand of populism helps him with both ends of the district's political spectrum. The 13th of 14 children born to a sharecropper, Bright climbed his way out of poverty by working through college and law school. He likes to tell the story of how his father once used wire to hold his shoes together.
"I remember kicking my sister in the shin, and it got infected, and she had to go to the hospital," he told an audience at a social services center in Montgomery. "My daddy didn't like that too much."
Still, Bright faces challenges on the left. As mayor, he earned deep loyalty in Montgomery's black community with a commitment to bringing the racially divided city together and with heavy attention to redeveloping the downtrodden downtown. But today, his votes against the stimulus package and the budget and his opposition to new taxes and spending make the questions tougher at the city social services center than at the suburban breakfast.
"How can you cut Trio?" asked Charles Jackson, a junior at Robert E. Lee High School, referring to a federal program that helps disadvantaged students finish high school and enter college.
"I'm not cutting anything," Bright responded quickly. But he added: "We can't continue the expenditures that we've become accustomed to. We can't raise taxes. We can't continue to borrow. We've got to look at cutting wasteful spending."
