Jon Kyl

A hardline conservative, Kyl has been one of the key promoters on Capitol Hill, along with Sen. Joe Lieberman (I-CT), of a tough line on "enemies" in the Middle East. He has repeatedly joined neoconservative-led causes aimed at widening U.S. Mideast intervention and has been a loud voice for regime change in Iran. After Israel's summer 2006 offensive against Hezbollah, Kyl and other senators introduced a resolution "condemning the actions of Hezbollah and fully supporting Israel's self-defense efforts." In September 2007, Kyl co-sponsored with Lieberman an amendment that urged the State Department to label Iran's Revolutionary Guards officially as a "foreign terrorist organization." According to the Agence France Presse (September 27, 2007), the non-binding amendment, which passed 76-22, "says that senators agree it is in the critical national interest of the United States to prevent Iran turning Shia extremists in Iraq into a 'Hezbollah type force.'"

During the 2006 midterm elections, Kyl won 53% of the vote in Arizona, bucking a trend that saw several hardline congressman (including Pennsylvania Republicans Sen. Rick Santorum and Rep. Curt Weldon) lose their seats, in part because of a backlash against the foreign policies promoted by the George W. Bush administration. Kyl is the honorary co-chairman, along with Lieberman and George Shultz, of the recently reincarnated Committee on the Present Danger (CPD), the Cold War-era anti-communist group that was revived in 2004 with the declared intention of "protecting and expanding democracy by supporting policies aimed at winning the global war against terrorism and the movements and ideologies that drive it." CPD members include a number of well-known rightist and neoconservative figures such as Frank Gaffney, Newt Gingrich, Jack Kemp, and Jeane Kirkpatrick.

In a July 20, 2004 op-ed for the Washington Post addressing the nature of the "present danger," Kyl and Lieberman warned that one of the biggest challenges facing America was the internal threat of disunity over the administration's efforts to fight a global war on terrorism: "The leaders of the Democratic and Republican parties have so far stood firm in their commitment to finish the job in Iraq and to fight to victory the war on terrorism. But that bipartisan consensus is coming under growing public pressure and could fray in the months ahead. Although the tide is turning in the war on terrorism, a political undertow in this country could wash out our recent gains. We must not let this happen."

Like the latest version, the first two iterations of the CPD, formed in the early 1950s and then again in the mid-1970s, were made up of elite citizens committed to raising bipartisan congressional and public support for increased military budgets and a more aggressive global military posture. Both committees proved extremely successful—the first winning broad support for militant Cold War policies, and the second in undermining the politics of détente and arms control. All three incarnations have defined the "present danger" as being both threats from outside the United States and internal passivity in the face of external threats to U.S. national security. (See Right Web's GroupWatch Archive: Committee on the Present Danger.)

Kyl is also the honorary co-chair, along with former CIA chief James Woolsey, of the National Security Advisory Council of the Center for Security Policy (CSP), a hawkish policy institute that cited the CPD as a model when it was founded in 1988. Led by former Reagan administration official Frank Gaffney, CSP claims to be "a non-profit, non-partisan organization committed to the time-tested philosophy of promoting international peace through American strength." CSP's advisory council is chock-a-block with neoconservatives and hardliners, including Morris Amitay, former director of the American Israeli Public Affairs Committee; Kathleen Bailey of the anti-arms control group the National Institute for Public Policy; William Bennett; Midge Decter, former head (along with Donald Rumsfeld) of the Committee for the Free World; and Jeane Kirkpatrick.

Kyl has represented Arizona as a member of Congress since 1987, first in the House of Representatives and in the Senate since 1994. During his tenure, Kyl has been an unfailing proponent of right-wing agendas in both domestic and foreign policies. In 2003 and 2004, his votes "supported the interests" of the National Right to Life Committee 100% of the time (and therefore NARAL Pro-Choice America 0% of the time), according to vote-smart.org. When it came to issues involving budget, spending, and taxes, in 2005 Kyl supported the interests of the Americans for Tax Reform 90% of the time. He supported the American Conservative Union 100% of the time in 2005. (For more on Kyl's or other legislators' voting records, see www.vote-smart.org.)

In contrast, liberal organizations that support civil rights, environmental causes, health, education, labor rights, and world peace rarely see votes in their favor from Senator Kyl. He never once supported the interests of the National Education Association, the Children's Defense Fund, the National Organization for Women, the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights, the American Wilderness Coalition, and others in 2005, voting for their interests 0% of the time.

On foreign policy issues, Kyl has been a hardliner since his first days in Congress, supporting U.S. military aid to the Nicaragua contras in the 1980s. In 1998, he co-chaired with Lieberman (along with two other members of Congress and several Israeli Knesset members) the U.S.-Israeli Parliamentary Commission, which argued that both countries faced imminent threats from nuclear-armed ballistic missiles. According to a September 1998 CSP "Decision Brief," the members of this commission were invited to share their concerns with the so-called Rumsfeld Missile Commission, a congressionally mandated commission led by Donald Rumsfeld that was heavily criticized for exaggerating the threat of ballistic missiles to U.S. security.

Kyl joined fellow Republican Senators Jesse Helms, James Inhofe, and Robert Smith in orchestrating the defeat of the 1996 Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT); the Republican-controlled Senate allowed only three days to debate an issue that was on the Senate calendar for over two years. The main point of contention between congressional opponents and supporters of the CTBT was the importance of underground nuclear weapons testing, which the treaty prohibited. Opponents contended that the United States would not be able to deter "rogue" nations from developing nuclear weapons unless it could test its own stockpiles. Treaty supporters argued that testing was unnecessary, and physicists and the directors of the three nuclear labs agreed that the Stockpile Stewardship and Management Program, which is accounted for in the treaty, adequately tests the safety and reliability of stockpiles without underground testing. Kyl and Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) introduced an amendment to the 1997 Defense Authorization bill that gave the president the option of testing, but the bill was defeated.

More recently, Kyl has backed congressional initiatives supporting regime change in Iran. He was a key advocate of Senate resolutions in 2003 and 2004 aimed at tightening sanctions and isolating the regime in Tehran (see Right Web Profile: Coalition for Democracy in Iran). Kyl is also a cosponsor of the Iran Freedom and Support Act, which is subtitled, "A bill to hold the current regime in Iran accountable for its threatening behavior and to support a transition to democracy in Iran." Commenting on the bill, Rep. Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) said: "While this bill makes a point of so-called not using force against Iran, be assured this is a stepping stone to the use of force, the same way that the Iraq Liberation Act was used as a stepping stone." (See Tom Barry, "Iran Freedom and Regime Change Politics," Right Web, May 19, 2006.)

Kyl's hawkish positions have earned him the support of defense contractors. Since 1993, several major defense contractors such as Lockheed Corporation, Raytheon, General Dynamics, Honeywell International, Veridian Corporation (now a part of General Dynamics), TRW, Northrop Grumman, and United Technologies have contributed to his campaigns.

During 1997 to 2002, Kyl received $3.8 million in campaign contributions—65% of from individuals, and 26% from PACs. Of the PAC contributions, 88.1% came from business, 0.5% from labor, and 11.4% from ideological or single-issue groups. When he was a member of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee, Kyl received contributions from such energy corporations as Bechtel, Enron, Halliburton, Occidental Petroleum, and PG&E. Kyl had more than $7 million on hand for his 2006 Senate reelection campaign. (For more on Kyl's campaign fundraising and contributors, see his profile from the Center for Responsive Politics, www.opensecrets.org.)

Kyl is now a member of the Senate Finance Committee (for which he chairs the Subcommittee on Taxation and IRS Oversight), the Judiciary Committee (for which he chairs the Subcommittee on Technology, Terrorism, and Homeland Security), and is the chair of the Republican Policy Committee.

Despite his record of support for the administration's war on terror, it is Kyl's stance on immigration that was proving to be the lightning rod issue in his reelection campaign. An opponent of Bush-supported legislation that passed the Senate in early 2006 aimed at easing the path to citizenship for immigrants, Kyl has been busy hyping the threat posed by immigrants with criminal records. He has proposed that undocumented immigrants must return to their countries before applying for a temporary work program, an idea that his fellow Republican from Arizona, Sen. John McCain, has harshly criticized. According to the New York Times, Kyl's Democratic challenger, Jim Pedersen, a shopping mall developer, has taken to quoting McCain in his campaign advertisements: "To the chagrin of Mr. McCain, Mr. Pederson has used a quotation of his calling Mr. Kyl's suggestion that immigrants return to their countries before applying for any temporary worker program 'bordering on fantasy'" (June 4, 2006).

Government Service

Education

"Face the Nation," CBS Transcript, September 16, 2007.

"America Votes 2006," CNN.com, http://www.cnn.com/ELECTION/2006/.

Center for Security Policy, Decision Brief, No. 98-D 163, September 16, 1998, www.security-policy.org/papers/1998/98-D163.html.

Jon Kyl's Senate Voting Record, www.vote-smart.org.

Jon Kyl's Campaign Fundraising Data, Center for Responsive Politics, www.opensecrets.org.

Office of Sen. Jon Kyl, "Kyl: Israel Has Full Support of United States," press release, July 17, 2006.

Randal Archibold, "Democrats See Opportunity in Arizona," New York Times, June 4, 2006.

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