WIll Mark Foley Run For Congress Again?

Maybe Fox was just prescient-- instead of stupid or partisan

When Mark Foley was forced to resign, in the midst of a shocking sex scandal just before the 2006 election, no one would have imagined he would ever run for office again-- no, one that is, except for people who know Mark Foley. He needed some time off. There were even rumors that he was begging the Republican House leadership to let him retire before well-placed leaks from Rahm Emanuel tanked his career and-- many say-- Republican chances in the 2006 midterms.

Today, Foley is a political consultant and... a lobbyist-- something he once told me he doesn't even want to be considered-- and there are always rumors that he plans to run for office again. He sure has a fat war chest if he wants to.

Foley says he has “no immediate plans” to run for Congress again but has learned to “never slam a door on the future.”

He’s made some charitable contributions in recent years from unused campaign funds-- $10,000 last year to the Compass Gay & Lesbian Community Center in Florida, for one-- and has more than $1.26 million remaining as of March 31.

“After the resignation, I would have given it slim odds that I’d ever run again,” he said. “But I’ve had people tell me since, ‘Your public service was sterling aside from a bump in the road.’ There’s no easy answer, although I’m going to be 60 this year, so any decision I make would be in a reasonable, short period of time."

A couple years ago, I got together with Foley and talked about the chances of him running against my congressman, Blue Dog/New Dem Adam Schiff. When some of the country's "gayest" and gay-friendliest neighborhoods-- West Hollywood, Silverlake, Atwater, Los Feliz, Hollywood-- were redrawn into Schiff's congressional district last year, you would have thought the long-time homophobe suddenly discovered he had 5 gay sons and a long-lost lesbian sister. From someone routinely and gratuitously voting against LGBT community interests, Schiff was suddenly treating gay people as though they were Armenians-- i.e., with respect, reverence and deference-- when he was the congressman with the district with the most Armenians outside of Yerevan. Now he has more gays in his district than San Francisco does! Foley didn't seem likely to ever leave Florida, but he was opening to exploring all possibilities-- even running as a Democrat.

Foley says his record on social issues is progressive-- although if you look at his voting record in Congress, you would have to redefine "progressive" as anything to the left of the Tea Party. A couple of years ago, he told me he has no serious problems with the Democrats' social agenda, but he couldn't hack the economic and fiscal one. He's never exactly been a working family kind of guy. Maybe a classic Republican Party royalist. So, no Adam Schiff's D+20 district is not going to be a hospitable political base for Mark. But what about his old district, or what's left of it after it was gerrymandered? There are two choices-- FL-18, along the coast from just both of his beloved West Palm Beach through North Palm Beach, Juno Beach, Jupiter, Stuart, Port St Lucie and Fort Pierce, west as far as Lake Okeechobee, or FL 17, which stretches west from Okeechobee all the way to Port Charlotte on the west coast. Thomas Rooney, who represents FL-17 (PVI R+10), is a right wing Republican with a ton of family money situated in a low-info district taylor-made for him. FL-18 (PVI- R+3) makes a lot more sense for Foley. Sleazy New Dem Patrick Murphy is the current congressman and if there is any district in the country Foley could win, that's it. Foley's old 16th CD combined much of the two districts and was slightly less red than with is now (R+2). People in FL-18 know him and like him, despite the bump, and Murphy has alienated progressives and failed to win over conservatives. It would be a fun race to watch.