Columnist Erin Neff: Homeland security issue opening doors for Gibbons

Erin Neff

Friday, June 14, 2002 | 5:27 a.m.

WEEKEND EDITION: June 16, 2002

Erin Neff covers politics for the Sun. She can be reached at (702) 259-4062 or by e-mail at erin@lasvegassun.com

U.S. REP. JIM GIBBONS spent last week hyping the proposed Department of Homeland Security for the president.

Gibbons, R-Nev., has found himself with a new in at the White House, and that has been a drastic change.

As President Bush was deciding earlier this year to recommend Yucca Mountain as the nation's nuclear waste repository, Gibbons couldn't get an audience with Bush. The administration steam-rolled Nevada.

Now, in a strange political twist, Gibbons has something of a hotline to the White House these days.

When the first news stories emerged questioning what the administration knew prior to 9/11, his phone started ringing.

And off to the president's defense, Gibbons sped.

For two weeks in mid May, Gibbons made the rounds, popping up on CNN, Fox News and a host of other cable channels to discuss what he knew, and when.

Critics backed off when Gibbons, who serves on the House Select Intelligence Committee, and others provided cover for Bush & Co.

Fresh off that success, the phone started ringing again -- this time when Bush realized he needed some help selling his plan to create the bureaucracy of all bureaucracies in the name of "protecting the homeland."

Gibbons was ushered into the Oval Office for a meeting and agreed to "shepherd along" the bill to create a Department of Homeland Security.

"I applaud President Bush's leadership on this critical issue and look forward to working with him to meet the diverse needs of our homeland security," Gibbons crowed in one of a dozen press releases about his role.

In an interview, Gibbons said he has been tapped to push the president's plan because "I've had a close working relationship with this president before he was elected."

Last fall Gibbons supported the appointment of former Pennsylvania Gov. Tom Ridge as director of Homeland Security and proposed raising it to Cabinet-level status with budgetary authority.

That's about the same time when Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham was busily mounting his agency's assault on Nevada. One of the administration's post-Sept. 11 arguments for Yucca Mountain is that not only is it safe to store the nation's most toxic waste at the site 90 miles northwest of Las Vegas, it's safer for homeland security to have it all in one space.

Gibbons, now the White House's congressional shepherd for homeland defense, was then just a black sheep without clout. The arguments he and other state leaders made, that Nevada's security was in danger, were drowned out by the nuclear lobby and concerns for "homeland security."

It may seem strange to watch Gibbons justifying the creation of a new, powerful bureaucracy in the name of homeland security when his own arguments against the shipment of nuclear waste for the same reason are ignored.

It may also seem strange that Gibbons is out trumpeting the cause of an administration that plans to dump 77,000 tons of deadly toxic waste in the state.

But the task gives Gibbons a great election year opportunity for free national press and an association with Bush, who still has a 70 percent favorable rating in Nevada even after his Yucca Mountain recommendation.

Gibbons also gets political clout and goodwill he can use down the road should he run for another office. The whispers are that Gibbons runs for governor in four years.

Gibbons won't talk about any personal gain, saying it's more an issue of national security.

Amid the flag waving, he also thinks there could be something in it for Nevada.

"I think anything we can do to elevate the stature of Nevada in the eyes of United States is critical," Gibbons said. "Sen. (Harry) Reid being the second-ranking Democrat in the Senate helps do that for Nevada all the time."

Gibbons said Nevada's past help for the nation -- atomic atmospheric tests at the Nevada Test Site -- has always linked the state to the homeland's security. It's just that not everyone knows about that.

"This is another way to have our voice in the national debate," Gibbons added. "This gives us an enormous leap forward in terms of clout with the administration."

Gibbons newfound clout earned for his support for the administration comes too late for Nevada's fight against Yucca Mountain.

Nevada is about to take one for the country much in the same way Gibbons is for Bush.