Sidelined Cagle on the mend, at peace

GAINESVILLE —- Nearly two months after neck and spinal surgery derailed his plans to become the next governor of Georgia, Lt. Gov. Casey Cagle says his heart is at peace although his body is still recovering.

In his first interview since the April 27 surgery to remove bone spurs between two of his vertebrae and repair a degenerative disc along another delicate portion of the spine, Cagle appeared fit, although his rail-thin physique has added a few pounds.

With his wife, Nita, by his side and their white poodle, Tucker, nearby, Cagle settled into a large arm chair in the den of his home. The 43-year-old Republican was dressed in a stiff-collared dress shirt, dark slacks and black dress shoes. An orthopedic collar, the kind whiplash victims wear in courtroom dramas, sat on a nearby table. Cagle eyed it with disdain.

“This was a very significant surgery,” he said. “One that, quite candidly, the recovery time was a little more severe than I had prepared myself for.”

A few weeks before an Emory University surgeon slit open his throat, lifted aside his esophagus and voice box to remove the bone spurs and fuse his vertebrae together, Cagle stood before reporters and announced he was abandoning his bid to become the 2010 Republican nominee for governor.

That morning, a poll showed him with a double-digit lead over his nearest Republican opponent, Insurance Commissioner John Oxendine.

The damage to his spine, near where it meets the neck, was too severe, he said. The pain and the risk to his future health, too great. Instead of running to replace Gov. Sonny Perdue, Cagle said, he would go under the knife and ask voters to return him to the lieutenant governor’s office.

When he announced his decision to the world, there were whispers that the medical condition was a front to hide more nefarious problems. Other Republicans even hinted there were problems in his marriage or that Cagle overstated the severity of his condition.

Cagle was operated upon on April 27 at Emory’s Orthopaedics and Spine Hospital in Tucker. The next day, his security detail drove him the 40 miles to his home here on a cul-de-sac in a middle-class subdivision.

It would be three weeks before he could take a few steps. Six weeks before he left the house (for another car ride back to see his surgeon). Last week, he began thrice-weekly trips to a physical therapist. It’ll be six months more before the athletic 43-year-old can swing a golf club or ride his bike or go for a jog.

Nita Cagle, also 43, said her husband knew, intellectually, that the recovery would be difficult, but the reality was much worse.

“The first time you take that bandage off, I think, was kind of a wake-up call,” she said. “You look in the mirror at that. When you actually look, and your throat was cut and they moved your voice box and esophagus over …”

“It’s far more invasive than you can really prepare yourself for,” Casey Cagle said. “When someone says you’re going to have difficulty swallowing … well, until you go through it, you don’t understand what that truly means. And when they say the pain is going to be pretty severe, you don’t know the magnitude of what that pain is until you go through it.”

But, both agree, things are improving. Before the surgery, the damage to his nervous system had caused great pain down his left arm, of which he had limited use. Now, he said, that arm is back to full strength. He’s beginning to get some stamina back and the physical therapist is working to strengthen his neck muscles and allows him limited, careful, exercise for his upper body.

His body is healing, and so is his psyche. That was the hardest part of the decision to abandon the governor’s race, Nita Cagle said.

“It’s hard to see his heart break like that,” she said. “Watching him make that decision was the hardest thing because he was giving up a dream he had, and putting our future first. But, still, he was peaceful about the decision because he felt like it was where we needed to be.”

Cagle said that when he ran for lieutenant governor in 2006 it was not with an eye toward West Paces Ferry and the governor’s mansion. But, midway through his first term as the state’s No. 2, he was already working toward that new address. He’d raised about $1.5 million, had hired staff and was the acknowledged front runner.

But his physical condition led him to believe he would be putting his future, and his family’s, at risk if he continued down that path. Total loss of the use of one arm was a distinct possibility. Paralysis was a threat.

Running for governor in a wide-open field, with a half-dozen other Republicans seeking the nomination, and at least four Democrats on the other side, would be too difficult, he decided. He shut down the campaign for governor and announced a bid for re-election.

“With the governor’s race, you’ve got to give 110 percent,” Cagle said. “You can’t be sidelined in that process as long as we potentially could have been.”

Running for re-election, while difficult and challenging, is different.

“Running for re-election doesn’t start until the end of this year,” he said, “whereas the governor’s race started last year. And there’s a huge difference there and being an incumbent seeking re-election is very different.”

Indeed, the two sitting state senators who had already announced a bid for his office, Republicans Eric Johnson of Savannah and David Shafer of Duluth, withdrew to clear the path for Cagle. Johnson is now running for governor and Shafer, who has only suspended his campaign for lieutenant governor, is focused on re-election to the Senate. “Eric and David were obviously very gracious and understanding,” Cagle said.

“Because this was not something I chose. Just something I had really no choice on the matter from a physical point of view.”

Cagle hopes to return to his office in Atlanta next month, although he’s been working, some, from home. He’s spoken with Perdue several times, he said, and with House Speaker Glenn Richardson (R-Hiram). His staff has made things easier, he said.

He’s kept up with the news of the day, he said, including the overhaul this week of leadership of the state Department of Transportation.

The state’s financial situation, too, weighs on him. Should the governor call lawmakers back for a special session this summer —- it would be August at the earliest —- to make more budget cuts, he said he’d be there, standing behind his familiar lectern in the Senate, read to lead.

If lawmakers don’t return until their normal time in January, he’ll be ready for that, too, he said.

“I’m going to have the opportunity to do some things from a public policy perspective that I’m very excited about,” he said.

“I’m at peace with it,” he said. “I’m very much at peace with where we are.”

Casey Cagle

Age: 43

Hometown: Gainesville

Family: Wife, Nita, sons, Jared, 19, Grant, 17, Carter, 13

Education: Graduate of Johnson High School; attended Gainesville College and Georgia Southern University

Career: Elected to state Senate as a Republican in 1994; elected lieutenant governor, 2006.

A standout football player, he graduated from Johnson High School and attended Gainesville College and Georgia Southern University.