Wampum

I apologize for my lack of tact in suggesting, even before Senator Craig Thomas was interred in his local cemetery, that Tom Sansonetti might be picked to replace him. However, now that open season for the seat has apparently been called in Wyoming, with some 30 candidates tossing their hats in the ring, I feel somewhat less constrained in discussing the race, particularly the candidacy one of my favorite Abramoff dark-horse subjects, Tom Sansonetti.

While local Wyoming papers tend to describe Sansonetti as the "former state Republican Party Chairman", he's far more well-known nationally as the former DoJ Assistant Attorney General for Environment and Natural Resources from 2001 until 2005, and former Solicitor of the U.S. Department of the Interior from 1990 until 1993. Prior to 1990, Sansonetti was Chief of Staff to the man whose seat he hopes to fill. In the years between Bush Administration jobs Sansonetti was a BigEnergy lobbyist for Holland and Hart, a position to which he returned, along with Bush II Interior Solicitor and failed federal judge nominee, William Myers. In late 2000, Sansonetti was chosen by Bush to head up the Interior Department Transition Team for Interior; much of the responsibility for the subsequent mess can be laid directly at his feet.

Yesterday, released along with the Griles' sentencing docs were 91 letters of support for Griles from family, friends and former colleagues. Although I have yet to see it myself, Tom Sansonetti's was three pages long. This isn't at all a surprise, as Griles and Sansonetti worked very closely, far more closely than might seem proper in a situation where one department (DoJ) was purportedly providing oversight for the other (DoI). Through emails between Abramoff and Italia Federici, Griles' romantic partner at the time, we learned that Sansonetti dined with Griles and Federici at Abramoff's Signatures restaurant, and was a late addition to the now-infamous Interior/lobbyists dinner for Gale Norton at Julie Finley's Georgetown home in September, 2001.

However, Sansonetti is sure to play his Wyoming GOP and Thomas CoS roots as he campaigns to be one of the three names sent by the 71 members of the Wyoming Republican Committee to the Democratic governor for the final decision on who replaces Thomas. Since this in not a traditional "election", but inside baseball, I give him, with his GOP and BigEnergy lobbyist credentials, extremely good odds at winning one of those slots and even the seat. Of course, should the Abramoff scandal continue to hit pay dirt, we might then see that seat vacant again in the near future.

Update: Here is Sansonetti's application. Not only was he Thomas' first Chief of Staff, but Thomas barely beat out Sansonetti for the Congressional seat vacated by Dick Cheney (when he left to become Secretary of Defense.) Thomas immediately asked Sansonetti to be his campaign manager, re-unifying the party after a contention debate process.