Tim Skubick

One of the most popular indoor sports in this town requires no physical training. Any number of folks can play and generally nobody gets injured although at times playing the game has damaged some political careers. We’re talking about the “who is running for what office? or if you prefer it’s the “speculation game.” The capitol press corps is required to play for obvious reasons but everyone else can join in just for the fun of it.

The one story for years that had lots of cache was whether the sitting governor would run for president. And when she composed a book just around election time, the speculation meter was off the charts. (She’s not btw…subject to change.).

Her second in command Lt. Gov. Garlin Gilchrist II has been the object of much speculation. When the governor announced she was not going to endorse anybody running to replace her, the speculators broadly suggested the L.G. run for Secretary of State since everybody knows four other partners with the sitting governor before him ran for governor and failed miserably. He refused to listen to the suggestions and now, of course, he is running for…what else? Secretary of State.

Which brings us to consummate player House GOP Speaker Matt Hall who loves the game, is pretty good at it, and never misses a chance to grab a headline or two with his conduct. To wit the following.

The Detroit News reported that veteran East Lansing lawmaker Sam Singh might not run for reelection. House Speaker Matt Hall gave the story additional legs by postulating that the Democratic senator could be fixing to joint the lucrative ranks of the multi-client lobbyists in this town. He didn’t need any proof to put the story in play. The mere hint of such a move allowed him to use the lawmaker as Exhibit A for putting a legislative stick in the “revolving door” whereby lawmakers are writing the laws one day and then working to either kill or pass them the next as a registered lobbyist. All this gave birth to the “Sam Singh Retention bill”, as Mr. Hall labeled it, underscoring his desire to keep the senator in the legislature. “Everybody likes Sam Singh,” Mr. Hall reported to the breathless press corps in front of him as they couldn’t wait to report this and keep the game going.

The history books are filled with examples of those who went in the door. That includes such notables as former House Speaker Bobby Don Crim, former Senate Majority Leader Bob Vanderlaan and ex-Speaker Gary Owen just to name a few. Actually the list is as long as both your arms and legs.

The good senator was not very forth coming on what he would do. Not taking the bait from the speaker he allowed the story to fester, much to the joy of all the game players. But then he finally revealed late last month that he would not run. End of story? Nope.

His statement did mention some options including returning to the non-profit sector from wince he came or working for a new Democratic governor or president, but there was nary a word about all the lobbyist speculation. Crickets all the way.

That is until he sat down for a TV zoom interview during which he did cough up an answer. But first he filled in some other holes in the story for TV-6 Lansing.

Inquiries such as was this an overnight decision that just dawned on him or was it something else?

And now the rest of the story.

“I’ve been thinking about this transition the last year and a half, my wife and I. I’m turning 55 this year and usually at that point you usually have one or two professional opportunities before you retire,” he warmed to the subject.

Was he burned out?

“That’s not it,” he revealed without a pause to think.

And finally the elephant in the room was addressed head on.

Are you looking at joining some well to do multi client lobbying firm?

Again, no pause.

“I’ve not had any interest in being a multi-client lobbyist ever in my career.”

Well if he didn’t want to serve a whole host of clients, how about finding one client and lace up to lobby for them?

“I don’t even know if I want to lobby specifically for a single issue,” he wonders out loud as the Speaker’s theory went in the tank. You could argue that all of this could have been avoided, had the Speaker called the senator to find out what his plans were. We don’t know if he did but if he had Mr. Singh might have brushed him off in a twinkle or he might have explained the lobby thing was a major no-go.

So with all the intrigue taken out of the story by his decision to not set foot into the revolving door, did he in anyway feel disappointed that he let the speaker down?

“I’m use to disappointing Matt Hall. We’ve usually got the best of him in our negotiations,” he chuckles.

Wonder if there is any chuckling in the Speaker’s office?