TIM SWARENS

Swarens: Why Andre Carson shouldn’t boycott Israeli leader’s speech

Tim Swarens
tim.swarens@indystar.com

Seven years ago, when first tossed into the deep end of elected office, shortly after his grandmother Julia’s death, Andre Carson was not especially well qualified to serve in the U.S. House.

A political and policy neophyte, Carson had been selected by his party’s leaders to join the people’s House solely because of family connections. Everyone knew it.

To his credit, Carson also knew it.

In those first months on Capitol Hill, Carson had an “I know I have a lot to learn” quality about him that was winsome. And he has learned, including from some ugly remarks he made in a political speech in 2011.

Carson also has grown, not only in his grasp of the complex issues facing our nation but also in how he handles himself with political friends and ideological opponents.

So by January, when Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi appointed Carson to the high-profile, highly important House Intelligence Committee, only the deepest of red-dyed partisans on the Republican side raised any significant objections. Carson was ready to help lead in critical times.

Which is why it’s so disappointing that Carson has now set himself up to take a symbolic but significant step backward.

Next week, the vast majority of the 535 members of the House and Senate will gather in the Capitol to hear Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu talk about the deep perils his nation would face from a nuclear-armed Iran.

Harry Reid plans to be there. Nancy Pelosi has said she will attend. Indiana’s Democratic senator, Joe Donnelly, also will fill a seat.

But Andre Carson won’t.

He’s one of about 30 representatives and senators, as of Friday, who’ve announced that they plan to boycott the speech.

On Thursday, I asked Carson’s spokeswoman, Jessica Gail, why a rookie member of House Intelligence would purposely skip the opportunity to hear firsthand from the elected leader of a key ally, especially given the life-or-death subject of Netanyahu’s speech.

Gail at first said that Carson has a scheduling conflict, but then raised two more plausible reasons. The first is that House Speaker John Boehner broke protocol by failing to coordinate the prime minister’s speech with the White House. The second: Israel will stage national elections two weeks after the speech, and Carson is concerned that Congress not be used as a campaign prop.

She hastened to add that Carson’s absence isn’t a reflection of his attitudes toward Israel or Netanyahu. The congressman, in fact, met with the prime minister a year ago.

Carson also isn’t alone in raising such objections. Most of the other members joining the boycott have voiced similar concerns. And neither the president, nor the vice president, nor even Secretary of State John Kerry will attend, based, publicly at least, on the same points Carson raised.

Yet, many other Democrats acknowledge those complications but still plan to listen and to show respect to the prime minister.

Here, for example, is how California Rep. Eric Swalwell explained it to The San Francisco Chronicle: “I’m not going to be disrespectful toward a head of state from a country that is so important to us, but I think we could have accomplished getting updated by the prime minister in a way that worked with the White House.”

Closer to home, Donnelly, not exactly a common foil for Republican hijinks, weighed the arguments for and against attendance and landed on hearing from the best friend the United States has in a tough neighborhood in hard times.

A spokeswoman for Donnelly sent me the following statement on the senator’s behalf on Thursday: “In these challenging times with many national and international security threats, he believes it is important that we work with our allies, including Israel, to constructively solve problems. He values our country’s relationship with Israel in addressing the ongoing violence in the Middle East as well as working toward a nuclear weapon-free Iran.”

Work with allies. Value our relationship. Solve problems. In challenging times.

Joe Donnelly gets it. And he’s ready to set politics aside and show up Tuesday.

Unfortunately, Andre Carson doesn’t. And won’t.

Contact Swarens at tim.swarens@indystar.com. Follow him on Twitter @tswarens.