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Senators Say Ethics Bill Too Weak
By Jonathan Allen and Martin Kady II
Congressional Quarterly
January 9, 2007
Conservative senators are readying amendments to a bipartisan lobbying, ethics and earmark overhaul package they contend is too weak to clean up the scandal-plagued Congress.
Though many floor amendments are expected to fail, Senate leaders already are preparing their own substitute to make the bill tougher.
Under pressure from both sides of the aisle to make the bill more stringent, Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said Monday that language would be offered to ban senators and staff from receiving gifts or meals from organizations that employ lobbyists, to prohibit senators from traveling at the expense of such organizations and to require earmark disclosures. The Senate bill (S 1) “is just a start,” Reid said at a news conference stocked with freshman Senate Democrats, many of whom pledged during their campaigns to back tough ethics changes.
Reid and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., are working together on the legislation, which carries the number S 1 to signify that the bill is a high priority in the 110th Congress, after congressional approval ratings sank below 30 percent last year. But Reid’s last-minute revisions, which were still under wraps Monday night, are unlikely to sate fiscal hawks’ appetite for tougher rules governing earmarks. Nor are they likely to appease moderates from both parties who want an independent office to investigate alleged ethics violations.
Lengthy Debate
The legislation likely will dominate the Senate floor for several days, and perhaps weeks.
Conservatives including Sens. Tom Coburn, R-Okla., Jim DeMint, R-S.C., and John Ensign, R-Nev., are working on amendments designed to crack down on the earmarking process and rein in spending. The amendments, which Republican aides said were still a work in progress, could include a demand that lawmakers certify that the earmarks they sponsor would not benefit themselves or their immediate families.
Another amendment that might be offered would seek to give the president line-item veto authority, which conservatives contend would provide a counterweight to ill-conceived earmarks. Others would try to mandate a sort of competitive bidding process for earmarks and seek to broaden the Senate’s definition of earmarks to include spending targeted to federal agencies.
More Scrutiny
Earmarks have come under great scrutiny in recent years. Lawmakers accustomed to local praise for using clout to direct dollars back home have found themselves on the defensive because of real or perceived benefit to themselves, their relatives and campaign donors.
Former Rep. Randy “Duke” Cunningham (1991-2005), R-Calif., is now serving a prison sentence after taking $2.4 million in cash and gifts in exchange for directing federal contracts to certain defense companies.
Senate conservatives say earmark-related provisions adopted by the House last week (H Res 6) would come far closer to achieving their goals than did the bill that passed the Senate, 90-8, in the 109th Congress. This year’s Senate bill started out with text extremely similar to last year’s bill.
“The House version is much stronger than the Senate,” said Coburn spokesman John Hart. “We’re concerned that the Senate is going to pass a watered-down, meaningless version of earmark reform.”
It is not just conservatives who hope to alter the bill on the floor. Democrats Barack Obama of Illinois and Russ Feingold of Wisconsin are leading a charge for an independent Office of Public Integrity to investigate ethical lapses on Capitol Hill. Obama and Feingold likely will team up with John McCain of Arizona and some other Republicans who favor outside scrutiny.
A similar effort garnered just 30 votes last year, making the support of freshmen important but by no means assured. Sen. Bob Casey, D-Pa., who beat Republican Rick Santorum on Nov. 7, said in a brief interview that he believes the Office of Public Integrity should be studied further by the Rules Committee in hearings. Sen. Jon Tester, D-Mont., who beat Republican Conrad Burns in the general election, said he thinks the Senate should police itself.
“I would rather see the enforcement done by an existing body,” Tester said. “But there needs to be teeth in enforcement.”
Obama also is behind an effort to require senators to pay the full market rate, rather than a first-class fare, when they travel on corporate jets. That proposal won’t fly with California Democrat Dianne Feinstein, whose home state is a continent away from Washington and is large enough to make intrastate flights necessary.
“To prohibit their use or make the cost prohibitive would make it very difficult for many members to get to and around their states on a timely basis,” Feinstein said. “Frequently, a member needs to travel to several sites at long distances in a very short period of time.”
Sen. John E. Sununu, R-N.H., said “it just stands to reason” that the Senate will not stray far from the consensus of the last Congress. “It will probably end up looking a lot like the bill we passed before,” Sununu said.
The bill would ban lobbyist-financed travel; prohibit lawmakers from accepting meals and gifts from lobbyists; lengthen from one year to two years the moratorium on former senators lobbying their colleagues; and require senators to disclose their sponsorship of certain earmarks and their travel on non-commercial flights.
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