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McDermott Decides Against Senate Run

A P Kamath in Washington

Jim McDermott, one of India's strongest champions on the Hill, has decided not to run for the US Senate next year because he does not want to spend his energy raising $ 8 million that is needed to put up an adequate fight against Republican Senator, Slade Gorton.

McDermott, a Washington state Democrat and a physician, is a health expert. Having visited India several times and studied the impact of AIDS on truck drivers and the prostitutes in Bombay, he has addressed the Indian medical doctors several times, urging them to impress on New Delhi to have an effective and comprehensive policy on preventing and fighting AIDS. He is always in demand to speak at the annual convention of the AAPI, the Indian medical doctor's group. McDermott is also an active member of the India Caucus in Congress.

He has been a Representative for 10 years.

After an eight-month long internal debate and discussion with his aides, supporters and family he says he felt that entering the Senate race and raising the millions would cut him off from practically everything that he holds close to his heart.

He would be doing nothing but "sitting on the phone and raising money, and I simply wasn't willing to do that with my life," McDermott told reporters. "In the end, you have to have it in your soul that you are willing to sit down and raise the $ 8 million."

His soul told him to turn down the temptation, he said. "Other people can do what they choose," he added.

Gorton is expected to spend $ 8 million in television, radio and newspaper advertising and travelling across the state. Since he is the incumbent, the proverbial wisdom has it that a challenger has to spend much more than Gorton. Insiders in Seattle believe that McDermott would not be able to offer a stiff challenge if he could not spend between $ 10 million and $ 12 million.

Instead of raising those millions, McDermott decided what he really wanted to do: Work on health-care issues in the House.

While in the state legislature, he developed the Washington Basic Health Plan, the first state program in the country to provide low-cost health insurance to the unemployed and working poor. In Congress, he is active in health care reform issues, and he was appointed to the Ways and Means Committee's Health Subcommittee in 1992. He also founded and chairs the Congressional Task Force on International HIV/AIDS and introduced the AIDS Housing Opportunities Act, a new program enacted into law in 1990 authorizing $ 156 million in 1992 for special housing assistance people with AIDS.

McDermott, the co-author of the Single Payer healthcare legislation, is leading the fight in the House of Representatives to guarantee all Americans comprehensive health care coverage.

Political observers here believe he is sure to win another term in the Congress, where he would spend less than $ 1 million on his re-election bid.

McDermott told newspapers in his home state that he expects Democrats to win control of the House next year. He could then find himself with a position in the Ways and Means Committee and use that position to push his health-care agenda.

Next: Adding Desi Zest To American Fare

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