Sens. Angus King (I-Maine) and John Hoeven (R-N.D.) represented an ultra-exclusive group of lawmakers when they recently appeared on the same C-SPAN show — together they make up the entire (and entirely unofficial) Senate mustache caucus.
The political pair — who each sport rather impressive lip sweaters — were interviewed in separate segments on “Washington Journal” last week.
King told anchor Steve Scully, “You know that this lineup that you’ve had this morning is 100 percent of the Senate’s mustache caucus. John Hoeven and I are the two guys.”
The former Maine governor, who was sworn in earlier this month, recalled with a laugh a chat he had with Hoeven, saying, “When he greeted me when I was first here a couple of weeks ago he said, ‘Well, you’ve doubled the percentage of mustaches in the Senate.’ ”
The "mustache caucus" had the potential to triple if former Rep. Denny Rehberg (R-Mont.) had been successful in his Senate bid. Rehberg, who has a salt-and-pepper 'stache, lost the 2012 race to the facial-hairless Sen. Jon Tester (D-Mont.).
Aaron Perlut, chairman of the American Mustache Institute, tells ITK, “The Congressional Mustache Caucus (CMC) ... welcomes the addition of Senator King to the numerically paltry yet powerful Mustached American contingent in the 113th United States Congress.”
Perlut added in an email, “[King’s] addition buoys the disheartening loss of [former Rep. Roscoe Bartlett (R-Md.)] amongst our people serving on Capitol Hill and sends a stark reminder to the bare-faced mortal community that people of Mustached American descent remain a formidable piece of today's political spectrum.”
