Republicans formally take control of the House of Representatives tomorrow, and while they campaigned on combating inflation and reducing the price of gasoline, it seems their first move will be to neuter the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE), especially since so many of their members are facing investigation by that panel.
Politico congressional correspondent Nicholas Wu found a major rule change that would impose term limits for serving on the Ethics Committee, which would allow them to give Democrats on the committee the boot.
Be sure and note the additional provision which would make it much harder for committee members to hire staff.
Not bad enough? NPR congressional reporter Deidre Walsh also happened upon this tidbit: The moves would “effectively gut” the Office of Congressional Ethics.
And Lisa Gilbert, the executive vice president of Public Citizen, which advocates for transparency in government, noted:
“OCE is a bipartisan ethics office that helps monitor and report on ethics issues involving members of Congress. It has a proven track record of enhancing transparency and enforcement of ethics rules and has gained widespread support among the American public. It has been reauthorized every Congress since its inception in 2008. We ask each and every Member commit to encouraging the smooth reauthorization of OCE once again in the next Congress.”
As usual, Republicans pretend to care about the issues which impact voters the most, but when given power they prove that their only real agenda is to protect themselves from the consequences of their own disgusting behavior.
