NPR's Steve Inskeep profiles Vermont Sen. Jim Jeffords, a moderate Republican who cast a crucial vote against President Bush's $1.6 trillion tax cut proposal. Sen. Jeffords' tie-breaking ability on close votes in the evenly divided Senate gives him considerable influence. He used it to help reduce the size of the tax cut by about a fourth and divert more than $200 billion of it to pay for special education. Jeffords was just re-elected and has received less criticism in his home-state than from conservative Republicans in Washington, D.C.
Copyright 2001 NPR