DeLay And Company

(2 of 3)

DeLay has been neither apologetic nor subtle about his coziness with the corporate and ideological groups that have business before Congress. "It's in their interest to keep a Republican majority, and it's a way to keep a Republican majority and get our job done," he told the Washington Post in 1999. "It's sort of, 'Scratch my back, and I'll scratch yours.'" DeLay was so effective at getting his way that he became known as "the Hammer," and as he rose a notch in ranks to majority leader, the question everyone asked was not whether but when he would achieve his dream of becoming Speaker of the House.

Buckham, originally from Nashville, Tenn., had come a long way from his first job on Capitol Hill, as an intern in the early 1980s, clipping newspapers and fetching coffee for the staff of the Senate Republican policy committee. He got to know DeLay during a seven-year hitch as executive director of the House Republican study committee, which was something of an idea factory for the G.O.P. during its wilderness days of what then seemed like perpetual minority status in the House. Together DeLay and Buckham worked to push their party to the right on issues like taxes, welfare and federal regulatory policy. When the Republicans took control of the House, Buckham moved over to DeLay's whip's office, staying three years before he announced he needed to spend more time with his wife and four children.

But even at an official distance, while Buckham built his own operation, he became more deeply involved than ever with DeLay.

"[Buckham] was always there, ever present," recalls a former aide to then Speaker Newt Gingrich, whose office never completely trusted DeLay's. Buckham put DeLay's wife Christine on the payroll of his thriving Alexander Strategy Group from 1998 to 2002, according to DeLay's financial-disclosure forms. Buckham also hired Tony Rudywho had been DeLay's press secretary, policy director, deputy chief of staff and general counselas well as Karl Gallant, who had served as executive director of DeLay's political-action committee. Buckham's firm has a long and lucrative client list, which, according to its website, includes the American Bankers Association, BellSouth, Eli Lilly, Fannie Mae, R.J. Reynolds and Time Warner (parent of this magazine).

For most Republicans, the occasional controversy used to seem a small price to pay for the prodigious amounts that DeLay was raising and contributing to their campaigns. Had it not been for the six additional seats that Texas picked up in the House last year, thanks to a redistricting plan engineered by DeLay, George W. Bush would not have been the first re-elected President since F.D.R. to gain seats in Congress. And DeLay has always been solicitous of G.O.P.

Representatives as individualsadjusting the House schedule to accommodate a daughter's recital, knowing who needs a place to smoke and who is having a family crisis, making sure there is pizza in his office to tide members over during late-night votes. Given the majority leader's high profile in the intensely partisan atmosphere of the House, many Republicans agree with DeLay spokesman Dan Allen that attacks to some extent "come with the territory."

But much of the goodwill toward DeLay has begun to evaporate over the past year, as controversies have piled up like bricks in a wall around him. A Texas grand jury is examining allegations that one of his committees sent illegal corporate contributions to Republican candidates in 2002 legislative races there. In September it handed up indictments for three people, including the head of DeLay's political-action committee, and Travis County district attorney Ronnie Earle has not ruled out the possibility of charges against DeLay.

Then there is the spreading scandal around high-flying lobbyist Jack Abramoff, a former producer of low-budget movies whose most marketable asset was access to DeLay. Here, too, Buckham appears to have played a key role. "How did Jack Abramoff get into Tom DeLay's office?" asks a source close to the majority leader. "Ed Buckham."

Abramoff and former DeLay spokesman Michael Scanlon are being investigated by the Senate and Justice Department for allegedly defrauding Indian tribes that had hired them as lobbyists. Abramoff and Scanlon refused to comment at Senate hearings last year and have denied wrongdoing. The two are suspected of convincing the tribes to spend vast amounts on such extravagances as basketball-arena skyboxes for parties for members of Congress and their staffs. The pair may have violated tax or criminal laws in their lobbying efforts and have also involved members of Congress, including California Representative John Doolittle and Arizona Representative J.D. Hayworth, who used the skyboxes but did not report their use as campaign donations, as required by law. DeLay and a number of other lawmakers are in hot water as well for accepting Abramoff-arranged foreign golfing junkets, including one to Scotland's fabled St. Andrews course.