How Rep. Austin Scott betrayed his Tea Party roots

Rep. Austin Scott of Georgia, a Tea Party favorite and president of the House Republicans’ freshman class, got off to a slow start as a legislator but finally introduced his first bill last week.

His draftsmanship should please the people who chant “read the bill” at political rallies, because H.R. 2774 is only one sentence long. In its entirety: “Be it enacted by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the Legal Services Corporation Act is repealed.”

This one sentence says a great deal about Scott, because it is a transparent attempt by the young lawmaker to defend a company in his district that discriminates against U.S. citizens in favor of Mexican migrant workers. Scott introduced the bill abolishing Legal Services exactly three days after it became public that Legal Services had won a U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission determination that Georgia’s Hamilton Growers “engages in a pattern or practice of regularly denying work hours and assigning less favorable assignments to U.S. workers, in favor of H2-A guestworkers.” Hamilton also “engages in a pattern or practice of discharging U.S. workers and replacing them with H-2A guestworkers,” the EEOC determined.

“We are at a point where Congress must look at programs and ask, ‘Is this absolutely necessary?’ ” Austin said in a statement when I asked for elaboration. Noting that state and local governments, bar associations and pro bono lawyers help to subsidize legal aid, he argued that “eliminating federal funding for the LSC will not eliminate free legal aid for the poor. This bill simply takes this duplicative and unnecessary program off the federal taxpayers’ dole.”

Still, even a number of Republicans see value in Legal Services. Though House Republicans have proposed a 26 percent cut in Legal Services’ current budget of $379 million, 68 of them joined Democrats in defeating an attempt this year to defund Legal Services.

Phyllis Holmen, executive director of Georgia Legal Services, said she has never spoken with Scott and “hadn’t been aware of his views on Legal Services” before he introduced his bill. She said it’s common for growers to call their members of Congress for help when a Legal Services client sues them.

If Scott were true to his Tea Party roots, he would have told the growers to get lost. He would have trumpeted the case as evidence that Americans are willing to do the dirty jobs that businesses claim only foreigners will do. As one of the American plaintiffs put it: “We worked hard at our jobs and really wanted the work, but Hamilton didn’t want Americans to work in their fields.” Americans, after all, would be more likely to know the laws and to complain if they’re being exploited.

Instead, Scott chose to side with a large employer of foreign migrants in his district — against his out-of-work constituents.

danamilbank@washpost.com