In the acknowledgements page for Rick Perry’s Fed Up!, one name stands about among the thank yous: Charles “Chip” Roy, an attorney and veteran Senate aide who left his job as a special assistant US attorney to work on the book full time. He followed up his literary stint with a new job as director of the Office of State-Federal Relations, appointed by Perry himself. And according to the The Houston Chronicle’s account of his confirmation hearings back in April, he really took his work on Perry’s anti-government manifesto to heart:
The Senate delayed a decision on Perry’s appointment of Chip Roy as director of the Office of State-Federal Relations after he made remarks at his confirmation hearing that could have come straight from Perry’s Washington-bashing Fed Up!
A former staffer to U.S. Sen. John Cornyn, Roy spoke of an “intrusive federal government that spends our money recklessly.” Roy said he wants to “empower state leaders … to push back on Washington where necessary.”
Roy added that he backed lawmakers decision to slash his office’s funding to shore up other parts of the state budget, and said he “might have voted to cut it as well,” because the office either shouldn’t exist or “stand for something,” like “liberty, state sovereignty and an end to the crippling pile of debt and regulation coming from Washington that is destroying our nation and endangering the state.”
Seeing as the office’s mission is to to “promote communication and build relationships between the state and federal governments, to advance the interests of the people of the State of Texas,” the anti-DC tone rubbed some Democratic state lawmakers the wrong way. But Roy was confirmed on a 27-4 vote in the Texas Senate before the end of the month.
Benjy Sarlin
Benjy Sarlin is a reporter for Talking Points Memo and co-writes the campaign blog, TPM2012. He previously reported for The Daily Beast/Newsweek as their Washington Correspondent and covered local politics for the New York Sun.
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