King takes on Washington gridlock, climate change, arts funding in virtual forum
Screenshot / Portland Regional Chamber of Commerce
U.S. Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, addresses Tuesday's Eggs & Issues virtual event organized by the Portland Regional Chamber of Commerce. Around 650 people had registered.
Speaking from his home away from home in the nation's capital, U.S. Sen. Angus King, I-Maine, on Tuesday addressed a virtual Maine audience with a long list of things that are broken — and need fixing — in Congress.
Painting a grim behind-the-scenes picture of current affairs, King sharply criticized what he sees as "unbelievable power" exerted by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., as well as a lack of deep and serious relationships among lawmakers.
"The majority leader has dictatorial control that would make Julius Caesar blush," King said at the Portland Regional Chamber of Commerce virtual Eggs & Issues breakfast forum, its first after the summer break. Around 650 people had registered.
Without going into details about specific bills, King noted that the McConnell has literally hundreds of bills on his desk going nowhere while at the same time using a procedural technique to bring bills to the floor of his choosing without debate.
King said that while that was not a direct criticism of McConnell and also pointed some blame at his Democratic predecessor (Harry Reid of Nevada), "each time it seems to get worse, and Mitch has taken it to a new level of total control." Reid was a U.S. Senator from Nevada who was the Senate Majority Leader from 2015 to 2017.
Another negative in Congress, King said, is the lack of personal bonds among lawmakers, owing in part to the schedule with everyone leaving Washington after the last vote on Thursday afternoons.
"That seriously diminishes the ability to develop relationships," he said, which in turn makes it hard to develop trust and negotiate deals. In pre-COVID times, King aimed to do that to some extent with regular takeout rib dinners at his home in Washington that he said were "about it for bipartisan social events."
That comes on top of institutional gridlock with only one saving grace cited by King: "We don't hate each other," King said. "There is tension and there is partisanship, but it doesn't go to the personal."
In the brief question-and-answer session that followed, King pointed to climate change as a threat not just to the Portland waterfront or Maine's coast, but also to national security as wildfires rage in California and sea levels rise everywhere.
"Climate change is going to disrupt populations," he said, "and we're going to see migrations because of famine and drought, and that's going to be destabilizing" around the world.
King, who will be talking about an energy storage bill later today on the Senate floor, also noted that there is no single solution to the climate change problem, saying, "We've just got to do everything we can think of."
The senator also addressed a question about funding for the arts affected by the pandemic, noting their importance to Maine's culture, history and economy, and that a lot of them are "export businesses" bringing people into the state.
On that front, he referenced the federal Save our Stages Act in Congress that would provide grant support for community cultural institutions and said that arts are "part of what makes our communities worth living in."
He added: "It's so important to who we are, and that should also be part of the COVID bill that we're trying to negotiate," he said. "Whether that will make it in, I don't know."
King was responding to a question from Gretchen Johnson, director of strategic partnerships at Portland-based law firm Preti Flaherty, who told Mainebiz afterwards she was reassured the senator "hasn't lost sight of the bigger picture."
"The arts community has suffered tremendously during the pandemic," Johnson said. "Museums, theaters, concert venues, all shuttered early and remain closed. Yet, the arts are essential not only for our local culture, they are a major draw for our overall tourism economy. Sen. King referred to the arts in Maine as an 'export'; it’s important to see how everything fits together, from health care, to broadband, to hospitality, and the arts, and I’m grateful for the senator’s perspective."
Johnson also noted that a vibrant arts community is an important factor in retaining a strong workforce to the state.
Quincy Hentzel, CEO of the Portland Regional Chamber of Commerce, told Mainebiz she was pleased with Tuesday's turnout and presentation, saying, "This morning the senator provided a welcome respite from partisan politics and brought a focus to the importance of collaboration and connecting with one another in an effort to get the difficult work done."
Last month, King addressed the virtual Mainebiz Small Business Forum, speaking of Maine's opportunity to capitalize on the new attraction of remote working.
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