Happy New Year everyone.
I am sure lot of you are enjoying the last weekend of the holiday season. Wanted to let everyone know that we are expecting House leaders to make changes to House rules. We believe that these changes are nothing short of chilling attempts to discourage Members from filing ethics complaints like the one Rep. Chris Bell (D-TX) filed against Rep. DeLay.
Here is the
Washington Post's report on the proposed changes:
House Republican leaders are urging members to alter one of the chamber's fundamental ethics rules, which would make it harder for lawmakers to discipline a colleague.
The proposed change would essentially negate a general rule of conduct that the ethics committee has often cited in admonishing lawmakers -- including Majority Leader Tom DeLay -- for bringing discredit on the House even if their behavior was not covered by a specific regulation. Backers of the rule, adopted three decades ago, say it is important because the House's conduct code cannot anticipate every instance of questionable behavior that might reflect poorly on the chamber.
Republicans, returning to the Capitol on Tuesday after increasing their House majority by three seats in the Nov. 2 election, also want to relax a restriction on relatives of lawmakers accepting foreign and domestic trips from groups interested in legislation before the House.
A third proposed rule change would allow either party to stop the House ethics committee from investigating a complaint against a member.
Basically the House Rules Committee Chairman David Dreier (R-CA) wants to force ethics complaints to be vetted by the Rules Committee he chairs before they are sent to the bipartisan Ethics Committee. He is also encouraging the adoption of a provision that would subject members to disciplinary action if they raise a complaint the committee finds to be frivolous.
The effect of this rule would be to eliminate the barely functioning ethics review process that currently exists in the House Committee. The intent and purpose of Rep. Drier's changes are to promote a majority party's political agenda instead of protecting the integrity of the institution and promoting public confidence in Congress and its Members.
We cannot let these rule changes go unnoticed because we believe these changes threaten core democratic values. So we need your help today.
We are holding a press conference on Monday, January 3rd with the
Congressional Ethics Coalition to protest these rules changes. We want to make our protest a poweful one and we are going to need your help. We will be posting more information on our press conferece on Monday.
So please stay tuned.
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