WASHINGTON (AP) _ President Bush had no advance warning that Sen. James Jeffords of Vermont was about to quit the Republican Party and hand control of the Senate to Democrats, a top White House aide said Friday.
"The president told me he felt when Senator Jeffords came to the White House on Tuesday his mind was pretty much made up _ that he had decided he was going to leave the Republican Party," Bush counselor Karen Hughes said on ABC's "Good Morning America."
"We first heard from one of Senator Jeffords' closest friends on Tuesday morning, and when that senator, Sen. (Olympia) Snowe (R-Maine), called our chief of staff, she urged him not to tell anyone because she said no one knew about this," Hughes said.
While there had been rumblings that Jeffords was unhappy with Bush's agenda and was considering defecting, "no one took them seriously," Hughes said. "In fact, members of Senator Jeffords' staff disputed them until Tuesday."
Jeffords announced Thursday that he would become an independent and vote with Democrats in organizing the Senate. That will give the Democrats control of the Senate agenda and committees.
Asked whether Bush's inability to keep Jeffords in the party showed a weakness on the president's part, Hughes pointed to Senate passage this week of a big tax cut and House approval of major parts of Bush's education plan. "The proof is in the results," she said.
On CBS' "The Early Show," Hughes was asked about Jeffords' statement to Bush that he would be a one-term president if he did not listen to moderates.
"It's kind of ironic that Senator Jeffords would say that ... the same week we are working closely with a Senate liberal, Sen. Ted Kennedy, on the president's education bill. So I think we just couldn't disagree more," Hughes said.
(Copyright 2001 by The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.)
APTV 05-25-01 0824MDT
