I’m not out there trying to demagogue the issues

But then along came Rep. Cliff Stearns and his twin probes into Solyndra and Planned Parenthood. Almost out of nowhere, the chairman of an burberry women coats Energy and Commerce subcommittee has found a voice and key role in the House GOP machine, making waves by supplying tasty morsels for Republicans as they battle the White House. “Every time I come off, I think people realize I’m credible and not trying to use this for political gain,” the 12-term Florida Republican said in an interview. “I’m not out there trying to grab headlines, and I’m not out there trying to demagogue the issues,” he added. But the press attention could be useful for Stearns as he shifts into a newly redrawn district for 2012. Stearns on Tuesday announced he would leave his current district that includes his hometown of Ocala rather than be forced into an August primary challenge against freshman GOP Rep. Richard Nugent. Instead, he’ll shift into the new 3rd District, which includes about 70 percent of his current constituents and all or parts of eight counties he’s represented before. Stearns’s own rise to chairman of the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee was something of an afterthought after Republicans swept into power in the 2010 midterms. He’d just been trounced by Michigan Rep. Fred Upton in a four-man race to be chairman of the full Energy and Commerce Committee. GOP officials privately said Stearns never had a chance, a fate sealed, thanks to his history of holding onto a large campaign war chest and not spreading the money around among his colleagues. But now more than a year into the job, Stearns seems fortuitous to have a gavel with expansive jurisdiction over everything from energy to Internet privacy and health care. “He has good insights and good staff around him, but I really think he’s in the right place at the right time and has a determined commitment to these issues,” said Matt Mackowiak, a Republican strategist and founder of the Potomac Strategy Group. Some aren’t buying Stearns’s newfound stardom. Democrats say the Solyndra and Planned Parenthood investigations have yet to produce evidence that matches up with the accusations the chairman has leveled during hearings and media interviews. And Stearns’s sometimes awkward and overly aggressive public statements only underscore his flimsy cases. Last October, Energy and Commerce ranking member Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) dubbed Stearns’s Solyndra inquiry a “kangaroo court.” Obama also has gotten in on the act. Last fall, after Stearns told NPR, “We can’t compete with China to make solar panels and wind turbines,” the White House pounced, with the president citing the congressman’s comments during a press conference to argue that he wouldn’t cede the entire industry to foreign competition. Other moments from Stearns’s highlight reel include a press release stating that Bill Daley left his job as White House chief of staff because of the Solyndra investigation and fumbling on the definition of a loan guarantee during a town hall event in his district. Stearns’s year-old probe into the now-bankrupt California solar company Solyndra provided the grist for two of the first campaign attack ads against President Barack Obama. And it was Stearns’s investigation into Planned Parenthood that gave Susan G. Komen for the Cure the basis to stop sending grant money to the woman’s health organization. The nonprofit quickly reversed itself amid public backlash, but it still led to the resignation on Tuesday of a top executive. Stearns, an aerospace engineer and restaurant owner, seems to be getting a good share of the media time compared with Issa. He’s doing more TV interviews than he’s ever done in his Capitol Hill career, including two appearances on Fox News and another on CNN during the same day earlier this month. The Gainesville Sun’s editorial page took issue with Stearns in an op-ed — headline: “Eating his words” — that questioned why he’d bash Obama for energy subsidies while also welcoming a $95.5 million Energy Department grant to help Saft America Inc. open a lithium-ion burberry coats for women battery plant in Jacksonville. “While playing to the tea party might help Rep. Stearns climb the ranks in the House, it’s been a waste of resources and tax dollars,” said Josh Freed, the vice president for clean energy at Third Way, a think tank that now employs Jonathan Silver, the former DOE loan guarantee office director whom Stearns called on to be fired. Even fellow Republicans have had to walk Stearns back. Upton and former Energy and Commerce Committee Chairman Joe Barton (R-Texas) refused to go down the same path as Stearns in calling for Energy Secretary Steven Chu and other Obama officials to be fired over Solyndra. Stearns also caught Republican colleagues by surprise last month when he told Fox Business Network about upcoming discussions for holding the White House in contempt of Congress for failing to comply with his subpoenas. “He’s way ahead of the rest of us,” Rep. Lee Terry (R-Neb.) told POLITICO. “I’m not sure we’re at the last resort and that would be the last resort. It’s an extraordinary step.” Last week, Upton, Stearns and the rest of the Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee Republicans threatened the White House with a contempt vote if they don’t get all the materials they want by Feb. 21 or a formal claim of executive privilege. Planned Parenthood is collecting signatures for a petition to Stearns that accuses him of “grasping for something, anything, he can use to discredit, damage or destroy Planned Parenthood. This isn’t about fiscal responsibility. This is about harassment and intimidation of America’s leading provider and advocate of women’s health.” Continue Reading Stearns told POLITICO that his investigations are asking tough questions that hadn’t been asked before. “It’s nothing ideological,” he said of the Planned Parenthood probe. “I’m trying to keep it on the financial oversight.” After a year of work on Solyndra, Stearns also acknowledged he’s still looking for the smoking gun to show there’s been political pressure on the Energy Department. But he blames the White House for resisting so many of his document requests, including two subpoenas. “It’s been a lot of smoke, and when there’s smoke, there’s fire,” he said. Some Democrats have come to Stearns’s defense, saying his work follows a familiar path for the Energy and Commerce Committee. “I don’t think either side can go back and say we never used it for investigations that were political in nature. Both sides have,” said former Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.), Stearns’s most immediate predecessor as chairman of the oversight panel. “I don’t think what he’s doing is outside the ordinary.” “Cliff isn’t a wild card,” Stupak added. “He’s got a good team. There’s a real wealth of expertise.” Back home, Stearns’s work on Solyndra and Planned Parenthood seem destined to play a role in his August primary challenge. He’s already got $2.4 million in the bank, which dwarfs the other potential Republican candidates, including veterinarian Ted Yoho, burberry new women windbreakers for sale black who’s written a $50,000 personal check to his campaign. Yoho said in a telephone interview that Stearns is partly responsible for the Solyndra debacle because he didn’t do more to stop the underlying program from being created. “We want it on the front side so the investments don’t even happen,” he said.