Pete Stark will let Sander Levin take the Ways and Means chairmanship. Stark hands off gavel

Rep. Sander Levin will take over as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee after Rep. Pete Stark, who held the gavel for a day, stepped aside.

The dominoes fell after Rep. Charles Rangel (D-N.Y.) resigned the chairmanship of the powerful tax-writing panel Wednesday as Republicans and many Democrats were moving to oust him following an ethics committee ruling that found he violated House gift rules.


Levin, who had been chairman of the trade subcommittee, will helm the panel through the end of this Congress — barring the unlikely return of Rangel.

Officially, Stark stepped aside to keep the gavel of the panel's health subcommittee. But lawmakers and aides said Stark faced a rebellion within the committee and the caucus over his sometimes bizarre behavior and penchant for making offensive comments.

Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Chris Van Hollen told Stark at a Ways and Means Committee meeting Wednesday that his stepping aside would be in the best interests of the party, according to a Democratic aide familiar with the meeting.

Panel members voted unanimously in favor of recommending Levin for the post once Stark stepped aside, according to Rep. Lloyd Doggett (D-Texas).

“Under the circumstances, I could not think of anyone who could serve the country, the Congress and our committee better than Sandy Levin,” Rangel said.

Republicans on the Ways and Means Committee would have preferred Rep. Richard Neal (D-Mass.) to ascend to the chairmanship because Levin is seen as fiercely partisan, a House GOP aide said. Levin is also said to be less willing to negotiate with Republicans on free trade — one potential area of agreement between Republicans on Ways and Means and the Obama administration. Neal was seen by Republicans as bipartisan and more open to negotiations.

Stark, 78, was in trouble from the beginning with his potential chairmanship. He was ensnared in an ethics investigation into claims he tried to obtain a tax exemption for Maryland residents though his main residence is in California. In an interview with the Office of Congressional Ethics, Stark alternatively denied and admitted that he had applied for the tax exemption. He was eventually absolved by the ethics committee.

He has also long been known to grab the spotlight with bizarre and often offensive comments. He called former Connecticut Republican Rep. Nancy Johnson a “whore for the insurance industry” and said she got her information from “pillow talk.” He said Jewish members of Congress were a cause of the Gulf War.

More recently, he accused Republicans of sending soldiers to Iraq “to get their heads blown off for the president’s amusement."

Stark, in a Thursday morning statement, said he wanted to oversee the implementation of health care reform from his subcommittee chair.

“Once we pass health reform, it will take careful oversight to make sure that it is being implemented correctly,” Stark said. “I have chosen to remain Chair of the Health Subcommittee and look forward to working with my colleagues on these vital priorities.”