PHILADELPHIA (KYW Newsradio) — For the first time in 12 years, Pennsylvania U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey will stop commuting to Washington from the Lehigh Valley.
He chose in 2020 not to seek re-election, and voters in November picked Democrat John Fetterman as his successor.
In an exit interview with KYW Newsradio special contributor Larry Kane, Toomey shares the high and low points of his career, his take on the state of the Republican Party, and what he has planned for the future.
Listen to the full interview in the player below:
Kane: Sen. Toomey, you waited so long for this post, being in the most important legislative body in the world. You were elected to the U.S. Senate. You spent 12 years there. What was the high point of your time in the Senate?
Toomey: The high point was probably the biggest legislative accomplishment that I had, which was the role that I was able to play on our tax reform. In 2017, we undertook a big project to really redo our tax code. It was quite a project, as you can imagine, something as big and complex as the tax code. But we set out to create an environment where the economy would be more conducive to economic growth, and we made changes on the business side as well as on the individual side. It was a challenge to do the design. It was a challenge to usher it through the Senate, but we got it done. After that, frankly, it turned out to be a remarkable success.
2019, which was the first full year of the tax reform being in effect, and before COVID hit, we had the best economy of my lifetime. Record-low unemployment, strong growth, very low inflation. The economy was strong, jobs were great, people’s wages were rising. Unfortunately, then COVID came along and disrupted things, but I think we’re on a much, much better path than we would have been had we kept the old tax code.
Kane: It took a lot of courage because you introduced bipartisan legislation to expand background checks. Was that a disappointment for you that it didn’t get through?
Toomey: Yeah, it was a disappointment. And we took a few runs at it. I’m a big believer in the Second Amendment. I’m a gun owner. I take my sons shooting. This is an important right to me. But it’s also true that having a mechanism to keep guns out of the hands of people who shouldn’t have them — namely, violent criminals, the dangerously mentally ill and children — having a mechanism is something that says [a] very, very broad agreement. I’ve never had someone come up to me and say, “We really should abolish the background check system for gun purchases.”
What Joe Manchin and I wanted to do was extend the background check to all commercial sales. And right now, we have commercial sales that occur without background checks at gun shows and over the internet, and that just doesn’t make sense. You can do a background check in a couple of minutes. It’s very low-cost. We should make it more difficult for dangerous criminals and violently mentally ill people to get firearms.
So it made a lot of sense, but it’s disappointing that we couldn’t get it across the goal line.
Kane: That was five years ago. Think of this: How many lives may have been saved if that legislation were actually passed?
Toomey: We’ll never know. I’ve always been really clear, Larry, that there's no panacea here, right? A sufficiently determined person could typically find a way to get a gun, but I do think over time it would save some lives if we made it more difficult for people who shouldn’t have guns to get them.
Kane: There was a great headline in … one of the many interviews you’ve done across the country that you didn’t change but the party did in the middle of your run. You went in as a conservative, right-of-center Republican, and you came out as a rebel with a cause, voting to convict the president of the United States during the impeachment trial and standing up for what you believed. Was that more important than getting on the good side of someone?
Toomey: Well, there were a few of us. But no, it was not a close call for me. I was very certain that the right thing to do is vote to convict. President [Donald Trump] had knowingly and willfully tried to prevent the outcome of the election from resulting in the peaceful transfer of power. That is just about as egregious affront to the Constitution that I can think of. If that doesn’t constitute an impeachable offense, it’s hard for me to think of one that is. So I didn’t have any doubts about what the right thing to do was there, and I have no regrets about the vote that I cast. The most important thing is to do the right thing.
Kane: During the Pennsylvania Society dinner, your speech was applauded around the country for this clarity: You said that no party should be to have to answer to any one politician. Does that go for future presidential candidates as well?
Toomey: Yeah, it always does. The further point that I made was that the Republican Party is much bigger than any one person — always has been and always will be. We are the political representation of the center-right coalition in America. I think on a good day, that's more than half of all Americans. We deserve to represent that coalition if we represent the principles and ideas that unite people. Obviously, there are individual disagreements here and there, but there's a consensus, roughly, among this huge segment of our great country.
The core principles of limited government and personal freedom and traditional values, a strong leadership role in the world — those ideas are, in various forms, at the heart of this coalition. That's what has to motivate and guide people who choose public service, in my view. Individuals will come and go, but the principles are enduring.
Kane: Back in 1964 was the first election I could legally vote in, being 21 then. I was looking at Barry Goldwater, who said these words: “Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice.” As you look back at what he said, and what happened on Jan. 6, I think he might have been a little bit off on that. What do you think?
Toomey: Well, what he said was extremism in the defense of liberty, the defense of freedom. What happened on Jan. 6 wasn't about advancing freedom. It was about people who had been lied to and they'd been misled. They had been deceived into thinking that an election had been stolen when it hadn't been stolen. And they reacted, unfortunately, violently. And that's totally inappropriate. But I don't think it was at all what Barry Goldwater had in mind.
Kane: You've done a lot in your life for the Club for Growth, all the particular activities you've done on Capitol Hill. What's next for you? Do you plan on staying involved in politics?
Toomey: I'll be mostly in the private sector. … I made a conscious decision not to pursue any future employment opportunities. I wanted to wait and run through the tape here and not create any conflicts of interest. In January, I'll start looking at opportunities. I do hope I’ll find some way to be at least somewhat involved in politics. I've put a lot of my time and energy over a lot of years into this cause, so I don't think I'll walk away completely, but I'm going to walk away from serving in public office myself. And maybe I'll find an opportunity to help some others.
Kane: I have to tell you a story I’ve never told anybody. About this time 10 or 12 years ago, I was on an Acela train to Washington, and Arlen Specter was sitting there. It was his last trip to the Senate after 40 years. Everybody’s shaking his hand. I said to him, “What are you going to do?” He said, “I don't know.” Is this kind of a bittersweet feeling you have right now as you leave the United States Senate?
Toomey: There are definitely some folks that I will miss — colleagues, staff members, folks that I've worked with over the years. But I will tell you, I don't have any regrets about my decision. It was the right decision for me and my family. I have no regrets about having served this wonderful, wonderful opportunity. I'll always cherish this privilege that the people of Pennsylvania gave me twice. But now, it's time for me to move on.
Kane: If you could do one thing over again that you didn't do, what would it be?
Toomey: I don't have a good answer for that, Larry. I'd love to have seen different outcomes. We talked about the background checks. I put a lot of effort, these last two years, into having a sensible regulatory regime for cryptocurrencies and crypto projects. I can point to things that I wish we had been able to get done, but there are a lot of reasons that it's difficult to get things done.
I don't look back with a lot of regret. I feel like I gave it my best. I worked as hard as I could for Pennsylvania every day for 12 years. And like I said, no regrets.