WASHINGTON — What chance does Charles Gene “Chuck” Lokey, Jr., give himself of winning a Republican primary challenge to Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich?
“Improbable, yes; impossible, no.”
While he has not officially announced yet, Lokey is “leaning very heavily towards running.” The race for Georgia’s 6th congressional district would be his first for public office.
A life-long Republican, and former Gingrich supporter, one might question why Lokey is compelled to challenge the perceived leader of the conservative movement. However, his feelings are strong about the credentials of the speaker. “He calls himself a conservative. He’s anything but.”
Expressing his disdain for “RINOs” (Republicans in Name Only), Lokey believes that the GOP is becoming too much like the Democrats. He thinks that Gingrich has led a movement to moderate the Republican Party. Hence, he is motivated to help lead the party back to its conservative principles.
“I don’t see the Republican Party standing for anything anymore,” says Lokey. “We have a lot of rhetoric of being a party of lower taxes, and smaller government, and yet we have a greater amount of spending from this Republican Congress, and we have more programs. I didn’t see any programs cut from the budget. I find that extremely disconcerting.”
Lokey, 43, need not prove his conservative credentials. He worked his first campaign for Barry Goldwater in 1964, when he was in the 5th grade. He’s voted Republican ever since he became eligible.
He’s also been married as long as he’s voted. Lokey wedded his wife, Linda, at age 18. They have a son in the Air Force, stationed in Okinawa, Japan, and a daughter in college.
A computer consultant, Lokey came to Woodstock, GA, from Florida in 1990 to accept a job offer. He is now a senior manager for KPMG Peat Marwick, and travels about four days a week servicing clients.
Since settling in Cherokee County, Lokey has become prominent in the local Republican Party. He has managed several campaigns, including Sen. Paul Coverdell’s current re-election effort. It was last month, however, that Lokey decided he needed to assert himself, causing him to resign as Cherokee County Republican chairman.
“I stepped down so I could speak out,” he says. “I felt very constrained, and I was getting very frustrated because I didn’t have the freedom to criticize our party leadership.”
Lokey’s original plan in resigning was to write a book about Gingrich, to prove that he’s not a conservative. In gathering his research for the project, he met several others who shared his point of view about the speaker. Ultimately the plan steamrolled into an informal coalition of grass roots conservatives, who now plan to run a candidate against Gingrich.
Lokey feels he knows the pulse of the grass roots. “There is a hard core of Republican party folks who will vote for (Gingrich) no matter what, just simply because he is Speaker of the House. But there are quite a lot of folks who are not necessarily enamored by Newt, and are very, very upset with his politics, and very upset with how he represents us, or maybe I should say, not represents us.”
Lokey points to several examples of where Gingrich has not upheld conservative principles, including:
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o The congressional pay raise. “When the average congressman is making $137,000 a year, and their average constituent is making a third or less than that, I find it very appalling.” He disagrees that high salaries are necessary to draw good people to Congress. “I’m a strong adherent of a public servant. I believe they are there to work for us. I think Newt has the view that everyone works for him.”
o Elevating moderates to leadership. “I’m extremely upset that he appointed liberals to positions of House leadership, i.e. Congressman (James) Greenwood of Pennsylvania, who is pro-abortion and pro-gay rights, and Congresswoman (Jennifer) Dunn of Washington. He didn’t have to do that.”
o Supporting moderate candidates. “In the congressional race out in California, he strongly supported Brooks Firestone (who lost a California congressional special election), who is a Republican in name only. It’s those kinds of examples that I look and I just say, ‘You know, this guy is just not representing the conservative values of the 6th district. He says he is, but he’s not.”
Perhaps Lokey’s biggest gripe about Gingrich resulted from last year’s budget deal with President Clinton. “The difficult part about Newt is he speaks conservative rhetoric. The difference is in what he does.”
“If you look at the budget deal…we got the largest budget in American history, and the shame of it was we got it with a Republican Congress. Regardless of the fact that the majority is small, nonetheless, that’s why we have leadership. I believe Newt basically capitulated to Clinton, so I would say that (the budget deal) was a sham.”
“We heard how wonderful it was. We got more spending than we’ve had in history. We got some tax cuts, but I believe they were basically crumbs. I felt it was an awful lot of rhetoric over very little. We got crumbs thrown to us peasants.”
While not quite at the level of peasantry status, running against Gingrich would still be a sacrifice for Lokey. “I’m not able to finance myself. I would take a leave of absence from my job, and it would be costly. I would live on a shoestring budget to run.”
He’s not afraid to ask for money, although he’s realistic about his ability to do so. “Will I raise millions of dollars? No.”
He says he has already had offers for PAC money, as well as by individuals. He also feels he has enough people from his informal coalition to run a credible campaign.
Lokey believes that a lot of free press will be available, “by virtue of the fact that the race would be against the Speaker of the House. I think it would be the most watched race in the country. I don’t think I would need a tremendous amount of money.”
As for opposition, Lokey says it’s been very soft. “No one has said, ‘don’t run.’ There have been folks who have said, ‘You can’t win.”
Has he spoken to Gingrich about a potential challenge?
“I spoke to him about a number of issues in the past, of which I was basically ignored, and got little or no response. Newt is very self-centered, and he has his nose in the air, and he thinks an awful lot of himself. I confronted him with a number of issues in the past, publicly, and he ignored what I said. So I don’t feel like I have to make public, or tell him, ‘I’m running against you.”
In the spirit of David vs. Goliath, Chuck Lokey is willing to pose his principles against the establishment’s. And while realistic, he knows that the underdog sometimes is the victor.
“A lot of races have been won by folks who weren’t given any chance at all to win. For me, personally, I don’t think I could run a race just to be a sacrificial lamb. And if I choose to run, it’ll be because I think I have the possibility of winning.”
Lokey expects to finalize his decision this weekend. It is one that is not easy for him.
“I’m not sure I actually feel happy about it. If Newt were practicing what he’s been preaching, no one, including myself, would be contemplating a run against him. All I want is for him to keep his promises. Since he has not and I don’t believe he will, based upon his track record, he gets what he deserves, if someone runs against him.”
