Why Is Judd Gregg Withdrawing His Nomination To Be Commerce Secretary?

Judd Gregg is the latest Obama Cabinet nominee to withdraw, and perhaps the most confusing withdrawal yet. Gregg's stated reasons for withdrawing don't fully explain the picture. First, he says he disagrees with the policy direction the administration has gone with the stimulus. But if that were the full explanation, Gregg never would have agreed to be nominated in the first place. We've known for months that the stimulus would be a massive, big-spending bill that would go against Gregg's strong fiscal-conservative ideology. But Gregg still eagerly accepted the nomination just a little over a week ago. What's more, since then, the stimulus package has been trimmed down. Why was bipartisanship possible last week, but not this week?

His second reason is his disagreement with the alleged politicization of the Census Bureau. The census is part of the Department of Commerce, but Obama is giving Rahm Emanuel partial control. This makes a little more sense--the census is very politically important as it helps determine congressional districts--but I'm skeptical that this single issue is big enough to get Gregg to walk away. Leaving does nothing to decrease this "politicization"--it actually increases it, because now Gregg will have no say in how the census is conducted.

Matthew Cooper at Talking Points Memo has a more likely reason--Gregg underestimated just how withering the criticism from his GOP colleagues and Granite State residents would be. From the latter, the criticism is over betraying his party; from the former, it's about being "cute" and abstaining from voting on a stimulus package that everyone knew he was against.