REPORT OUTLINES SIGNIFICANT DISCREPANCIES IN WHITE HOUSE LOGS

Washington, May 2  -

“One of the Subcommittee’s major responsibilities is to look at the Administration’s transparency and how major decisions are made,” said Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL), Chairman of the House Energy and Commerce Committee’s Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations.  “In a judicial settlement, the White House agreed to post online records of visitors from the previous 90-120 days.  In this hearing we will examine how visitor records are collected, the White House policy for releasing this information, and if meetings with lobbyists and other interested groups occurred outside of the White House to avoid generating records of these visits.”

A report by the Center for Public Integrity found that thousands of known visitors to the White House are missing from the logs and the event description for more than 20 percent of the visits is left blank.  The Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee is holding a hearing entitled “White House Transparency, Visitor Logs, and Lobbyists.”  The hearing is on Tuesday, May 3, 2011, at 10:30 a.m. in Room 2123 of RHOB.

Witnesses

First Panel:

 Brad Kiley, Director, White House Office of Management and Administration

Second Panel:

Tom Fitton, President, Judicial Watch
John Wonderlich, Policy Director, Sunlight Foundation
Anne Weismann, Chief Counsel, Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington