He says he has a 'very good' shot at leading the Energy and Commerce Committee. | John Shinkle/POLITICO Barton makes play for energy gavel

Republicans don’t even have the House majority yet, but Rep. Joe Barton is already making a play for a chairmanship his leadership is highly unlikely to give him.

In his quest to lead the Energy and Commerce Committee, the Texas Republican is petitioning the Steering Committee that awards chairmanships to “clarify” whether the party’s six-year term limits for the position apply to time served in the minority. He’s already talking about investigations he’d like to launch and asserts that he’s got a “very good” shot at the chairmanship.


But Energy and Commerce may not be one the Lone Star State wins. Michigan Rep. Fred Upton is talked about by Hill insiders and K Street sources as having the upper hand in the chairmanship battle. Florida Rep. Cliff Stearns and Illinois Rep. John Shimkus are also in the mix. Why so much maneuvering for a chairmanship before the election?

The energy panel, under a Republican majority, could become the launching pad for ideological battles that would define a GOP House digging in on global warming, cap and trade, energy bills, health care repeals and a wide range of business regulations.

Barton pegs his chances for retaking the gavel at “very, very good,” adding that being a chairman is “not an entitlement program. ... It is discretionary.” He said he may ask for a special waiver for term limits.

But top House Republican aides indicated that the Steering Committee will reaffirm that the rule does include time in the minority and majority — and that the panel is unlikely to extend Barton a waiver. Barton already has a tense relationship with Minority Leader John Boehner of Ohio, which won’t help him in lobbying for the chairmanship. Barton and Boehner’s icy relationship goes back to when the Texan challenged Boehner for minority leader in 2006.

“Henry Ford once said, ‘There is no such thing as no chance,’ but ol’ Henry never met Joe Barton,” said one aide familiar with the Texas delegation.

Michael Steel, a spokesman for Boehner, declined to comment directly on Barton’s quest but made it clear that the Republican Conference has certain term-limit rules.

“The House Republican Conference has a three-term limit for ranking members and chairmen,” Steel said in an e-mail to POLITICO. “Requests for waivers have been granted in the past in rare circumstances, and that decision would be made by the Steering Committee at the appropriate time.”

Barton is still in the doghouse with some Republicans for his now-infamous apology to BP during this summer’s oil spill disaster — a rhetorical flap that nearly cost him his top seat on the Energy and Commerce Committee. What’s more, Barton seems to be signaling that there won’t be any long-lasting fallout from the incident, although several members called for his resignation.

“There’s more talk about the BP thing in the general media than there is in the Republican Conference, either in the member level or in the leadership level,” Barton told POLITICO in an interview. “I don’t sense any negative consequences from that at all.”

The precedent Barton is seeking to use dates back 16 years to 1994, when, he said, several longtime ranking Republicans finally became chairmen of committees after a long slog in the minority.

But that example may not work in 2010. The class of 1994 was the first Republican majority in four decades, so those ranking Republicans had been waiting for years to gain chairmanships. Given that the GOP held House control until 2006, Republicans who currently meet the six-year term limit would have spent some time as chairmen. Barton became chairman in early 2004, after then-Rep. Billy Tauzin of Louisiana stepped down.

The current Steering Committee — which is packed with leadership loyalists — is expected to renew the current term-limits rule, which was also reaffirmed in February.

Barton agrees with Boehner on term limits, according to a House aide, but also thinks there’s a “qualitative difference” between serving in the majority and serving in the minority. “Don’t ask me to do a good job in the minority and make a rule that says you can’t continue to do a good job as chairman,” Barton told POLITICO earlier this year, adding that the rule is counterproductive.

One House aide said Barton “has done everything he’s been asked to do as a ranking member.”

But doubts abound.

“I don’t think it’s very likely that Barton’s going to get a waiver. I think most of downtown thinks that it’s going to be Fred,” an industry attorney close to the committee said, referring to Upton.

But Republicans are still sensitive about the BP incident, when Barton handed Democrats on Capitol Hill and in the White House a way to frame Republicans as being cozy with Big Oil during the calamitous oil spill in the Gulf.

Facing then-BP CEO Tony Hayward in June, Barton said he was “ashamed” that the White House would “shake down” the company to shell out $20 billion for an escrow fund. Barton later apologized.

The incident caused a rare public, and private, rebuke from House GOP leadership. Boehner, Minority Whip Eric Cantor of Virginia and Conference Chairman Mike Pence of Indiana dragged Barton into a Capitol office, forcing him to issue an apology for his comments or resign his post.

Several Republican lawmakers, including Jo Bonner of Alabama and Jeff Miller of Florida, called on him to resign his post immediately. Republican leadership made it clear that he was to keep quiet or lose the job. Several Republican lawmakers and aides at that point indicated that Barton was “a hair away” from being removed.

Regardless of his chances at the gavel, Barton is anxious to launch investigations into the Environmental Protection Agency’s policies, specifically the rules targeting climate change and ozone.

“We’re going to look at all these new regulations,” Barton told POLITICO. “There are some serious, serious concerns about the endangerment finding that [the EPA’s] carbon dioxide regulations are based on,” he said. He accused the agency of a “huge regulatory overreach” on air pollution standards and of ignoring the “extremely negative” economic consequences.

And that’s just the beginning. Barton accused Democrats of lagging in their oversight role and said he expects investigations to increase across the board. It’s harder for lawmakers to oversee an administration of their own party, he said, but under a divided government, “the oversight role is more natural.”

The 61-year-old former oil consultant said his first priority is to get into the majority. But despite his hyperpartisan reputation, he vowed that his previous experience as a chairman under a Republican president shows that he could have “civil, courteous, respectful relationships with all the Cabinet secretaries.” And despite his missteps, some Republicans are still doing his bidding.

“He had an outstanding chairmanship,” the House aide said. “And as ranking member, he’s done a great job opposing the signature agenda items of a Democratic administration.”