Barack Obama

Senate Considers Independent Ethics Office

Thursday, March 2, 2006

By JIM ABRAMS
Associated Press Writer

WASHINGTON -- An independent ethics office is included in a lobbying reform package a Senate committee is taking up, putting on the table the sensitive issue of whether lawmakers are capable of policing themselves.

The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee votes Thursday on legislation, an outgrowth of recent lobbying and ethics scandals, that would require greater disclosure of lobbyist activities and take steps to end the sometimes too-cozy relations between lawmakers and those representing special interests.

There's little controversy over many aspects of the bill -- based on a measure sponsored by Sens. John McCain, R-Ariz., and Joe Lieberman, D-Conn. -- such as banning gifts and travel provided by lobbyists.

But there will be a fight over a provision, to be introduced by the committee chairman, Sen. Susan Collins, R-Maine and Lieberman, the top Democrat, that would establish an office of public integrity to back up the work of the House and Senate ethics committees.

The office, Collins said, "would help to promote public confidence in the enforcement process by increasing the transparency and independence of the process."

It "would provide an independent, nonpartisan and professional office to work with the congressional ethics committees in a strengthened oversight and enforcement process," clean government groups, including Common Cause and the League of Women Voters, wrote senators Wednesday in urging support of the office.

The committee's action on ethics reform would be the second this week, leading up to debate on the Senate floor as early as next week on a comprehensive bill to limit privately funded travel, make retiring lawmakers wait longer before taking jobs as lobbyists and require greater disclosure of lobbyist contacts with lawmakers.

On Tuesday the Senate Rules Committee approved a lobbying bill that also sets up a procedure to eliminate pet projects, or earmarks, that lawmakers insert into larger bills, often at the urging of special interests.

The idea of an independent ethics office is being pushed by lawmakers, led by Democrats, who say the current system isn't capable of handling ethics issues in a fair and timely fashion. The House ethics committee has been inactive for more than a year, crippled by partisan differences over investigations and staffing.

House and Senate Democrats have a bill that would create an office with auditing and investigative authority. Sen. Barack Obama, D-Ill., has proposed an ethics enforcement commission to receive complaints from the public on alleged ethics violations by lawmakers. Reps. Christopher Shays, R-Conn., and Marty Meehan, D-Mass., partners on campaign finance reform, have a similar proposal.

These proposals all would leave final decisions on whether ethics rules or lobbying laws have been violated to the ethics committees or the Justice Department.

But there's also resistance from lawmakers who say an outside group to monitor ethics in Congress is both unneeded and unwise. Sen. George Voinovich, R-Ohio, who chairs the Senate ethics committee, plans to offer an amendment to remove the new office from the Collins proposal.

The House also is working on legislation in response to the fallout from the scandal over Jack Abramoff, the former lobbyist who pleaded guilty as part of a federal corruption investigation case involving the spending of millions of dollars to buy political influence.

House Republicans, however, are still divided over some key issues, such as whether to ban all privately funded travel. Abramoff hosted several prominent lawmakers on trips to Scotland and elsewhere marked more by rounds of golf than by fact-finding events.

Democrats on the House Rules Committee, meanwhile, on Wednesday introduced a package they said would help end unethical abuses in Congress by making the legislative process more open and assuring that the minority party was not shut out of decisions on the final contents of legislation.

"At the same time that we are piously talking about expanding democracy to the rest of the world, we better take care of it here," said Rep. Louise M. Slaughter of New York, top Democrat on the committee.