Jim Leach is angry. And if you know Jim Leach, you know that takes some doing.
In his 30-year tenure on Capitol Hill ― when, among other things, he headed the House Financial Services Committee and helped shape the banking deregulation bill known as Gramm-Leach-Bliley ― the genteel Iowan was known as one of the most professorial and polite members of Congress.
These days, though, Leach is less the moderate Republican he was until he lost reelection in 2006, and more someone determined to warn others about the current Republican Party. And that mission includes endorsing the Democratic challenger to a man whom he worked alongside for those 30 years: Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa).
“Chuck has been a fine friend of mine. We’ve never had the exact same records. We were different kinds of Republicans,” Leach told HuffPost in an interview recently.
“But the problem to me is a very simple one,” he said. “This state of Iowa and much of the Midwest is really an integrity-related type of people. And what has happened is the breakdown of integrity in public life.”
Leach made waves in late July with his declaration of support for Grassley’s opponent, retired Navy Adm. Mike Franken, and with the news that he’d switched his registration from GOP to Democratic ― despite having been a Republican, by his count, since the early 1960s.
An Emerson College poll conducted in early October showed Grassley with an 11-point lead, after Franken had closed the gap to only eight points in a July Des Moines Register newspaper poll.
David Yepsen, a veteran Iowa reporter who covered the state’s politics for 34 years for the Register, said Leach’s endorsement of Franken could help on the margins.
“Jim Leach will be the first to tell you endorsements don’t mean a lot in Iowa politics. But they are worth some media attention and buzz, and this endorsement helps Franken underscore the argument that Grassley’s been there long enough,” Yepsen said.
“Leach is a respected figure in Iowa and his point may be enough to convince moderate GOP voters to make the switch,” he added. “Franken’s got to peel off some Republican votes, and much of Franken’s media is designed to do that.”
Befitting the idea of “Iowa nice,” Leach said he won’t run down Grassley, only talk up Franken, who he said has needed military knowledge and skills.
“I will be speaking respectfully of Chuck, but I will be advocating [for] Michael Franken. Any other approach is kind of not consistent and doesn’t express adequate sincerity,” he said.
That reluctance to attack was not exactly shared by Grassley when he was asked about Leach’s endorsement before the Senate went into recess at the end of September.
“Well, that shouldn’t surprise you. He changed to the Democrat Party. You would expect him to do that,” Grassley told HuffPost.
But when asked if he still considered Leach a friend, Grassley replied “Oh, sure,” though he said he and Leach have not spoken face to face since 2016.
“It happens that I have great respect for Jim Leach, even though he has changed parties,” Grassley said.
Leach knows his former party colleagues are upset with him, but argues that he had no choice. Donald Trump and the Jan. 6 attempted insurrection were his breaking point, Leach said.
“Leach is a respected figure in Iowa and his point may be enough to convince moderate GOP voters to make the switch.”
- David Yepsen, former politics reporter for The Des Moines Register
“I have disappointed them and they know it, but that doesn’t mean I can change my mind and say I have no right to look at another political party when the political party I have become part of has become dishonest and criminal,” Leach said.
“Those are very strong words,” he said. “But I have no choice but to be appalled with what I have been seeing in Washington, D.C. And you can’t pass it up. And if you do, you give America away to the worst.”
It’s unclear if Leach’s name still carries the weight it once did. (Sen. Joni Enst, the other Iowa Republican senator, had not initially heard about Leach’s endorsement, saying she didn’t follow him.)
But Leach, who turned 80 on Saturday, said he’ll stick to his guns, no matter what.
“I think the point of the issue is that I have to do what fits my convictions, and if I don’t see with my convictions, I have no basis of living,” he said.