Koch aides voice growing optimism for Trump moves

Fredreka Schouten | USA TODAY

Show Caption Hide Caption Trump signs 'historic' bill to transform VA President Donald Trump signed a bill into law Friday designed to make it easier to fire Department of Veterans Affairs employees. Trump cast the signing as a fulfillment of a campaign promise to dismiss VA workers who let our veterans down. (June 23)

COLORADO SPRINGS, Colo. — Top officials in the political empire affiliated with conservative billionaire Charles Koch on Saturday praised President Trump’s move to roll back environmental regulations and appoint conservatives to the federal bench — in the latest sign that leaders of the influential network are finding common cause with the new president and his team.

“Overall, we’ve made tremendous progress on the federal level that we haven’t been able to make in the last 10 years,” James Davis, a spokesman for the Koch network, told reporters Saturday.

Other officials praised Trump’s efforts to dismantle rules regulating emissions from fossil fuel-powered plants and his signing of a law Friday making it easier to fire problem employees at the Department of Veterans Affairs. The network also announced a new grassroots effort in 36 states to build voter support for Trump’s tax cut plan.

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Their growing optimism came as Koch and the hundreds of donors in his network kicked off a three-day retreat at a luxury Rocky Mountain resort to strategize about policy fights in the months ahead and plot their moves to expand the Republican majorities in the House and the Senate in the 2018 midterm elections.

Eighteen Republican officials, including Texas Sen. John Cornyn, the No. 2 Republican in the Senate, and governors of Texas, Kentucky, Arizona and Missouri — also were slated to speak.

Koch's view extends far beyond government and politics — with major network operations focused on education and programs to spread his free-market, up-from-bootstraps principles into broader parts of public life. The network, for instance, announced a new three-year, $21 million initiative with NFL Hall of Famer Deion Sanders to fund anti-poverty programs in Dallas.

Sanders mingled with wealthy donors Saturday night on the lawn of the luxury Broadmoor resort here and posed for a picture with Koch's younger brother and political partner, David Koch, at the summit's opening reception.

"When I look at where we are and the size and effectiveness of this network, I am blown away," Koch told the group.

In opening sessions, network leaders talked repeatedly of building a "movement of millions."

Koch, who oversees a Kansas-based industrial conglomerate, criticized Trump’s policies and rhetoric during the 2016 campaign, but he has increasingly supported key policies of the new administration. On Friday night, he met with Vice President Pence and two Pence aides and talked about tax cuts, health care and other issues but did not make any specific requests on policies, officials said,

Tim Phillips, who leads the network's grassroots arm and sat in on the Koch-Pence meeting, said “there weren’t any asks on either side.”

Koch’s network is one of the biggest players in American politics, with a staff and annual budget that has rivaled that of the national Republican Party.

Earlier this year, network officials announced plans to raise and spend between $300 million and $400 million in the 2018 cycle to advance their policy and political agenda, a boost from the $250 million they spent during the 2016 cycle.

On Saturday, Phillips said the spending would be on the “high end of that range” as the network encourages lawmakers to “be bold” and “go big” on issues such as repealing the Affordable Care Act or enacting across-the-board tax cuts.

Network officials still object to several actions by Republicans in Washington, saying they oppose the Senate’s newly unveiled health care bill because it still retains provisions of the original law that allowed states to expand Medicaid to more low-income residents.

The Senate bill phases out the additional money that the federal government gave to states to expand the program. Phillips said the network wants true repeal not a “slight nip and tuck.”

Mark Holden, a top Koch Industries executive who helps run the network, voiced disagreement with one Trump administration move: Attorney General Jeff Sessions’ push to reinstate harsher sentencing. Last month, Sessions directed federal prosecutors to seek the “most serious” criminal charges against suspects.

Holden has led the network’s efforts to reform the criminal justice system and reduce penalties for nonviolent offenders.

“We respectfully disagree with that failed, big government top-down approach,” Holden said of Session’s move.