Independent ethics office issues report

The independent ethics office created in 2008 to help lawmakers police themselves has referred five cases of alleged misconduct to the ethics committee for further review and one for dismissal.

The actions took place between late April and June of this year, the Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) disclosed in its second quarterly report. The new ethics entity is required to issue quarterly reports about how many cases it’s working on, but it cannot make the subject matter of those inquiries public.

{mosads}The ethics committee, however, confirmed Monday that the five cases stemmed from two trips five Congressional Black Caucus members took to the Caribbean in November 2007 and 2008 that may have violated House travel rules barring corporate sponsorship. The members who attended those trips are Democratic Reps. Carolyn Kilpatrick (Mich.), Donald Payne (N.J.), Bennie Thompson (Miss.) and Charles Rangel (N.Y.) and Del. Donna Christensen of the Virgin Islands.

The panel has since launched a formal investigation into the trip.

“While the Committee was previously investigating the Carib News trip, the OCE did refer five related matters to the Committee,” Blake Chisam, staff director for the ethics committee, said in a statement. “The Committee’s statement forming an investigative subcommittee in the Carib News matter makes reference to the five Members that were the subject of the OCE referrals.”

The Hill reported that the OCE interviewed several CBC staffers about the trip. The OCE apparently found enough evidence to forward the matter to the full ethics committee for further review.

The OCE also started 14 other preliminary reviews into charges of ethics violations, terminated four cases and advanced six cases to a “Phase II” review. In addition, the office extended the “Phase II” review in four cases.

The report also notes that 67 people have contacted the office, but doesn’t make clear how many were lodging complaints versus how many were simply seeking information about the relatively new ethics entity.

The OCE activity follows the opening of 10 reviews of lawmaker misconduct during the first quarter of this year, from January to late March.

{mosads}In April, the Chicago Sun-Times reported that the OCE is looking into whether Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. (D-Ill.) was involved in any improper attempts to fill the Senate seat vacated by President Obama, which then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich (D) allegedly tried to sell to the highest bidder. It is unclear if the OCE extended its review of Jackson’s activities or if it forwarded the matter to the ethics panel for further action or dismissal.

The OCE was created last year as part of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s (D-Calif.) pledge to “drain the swamp” after a series of GOP corruption scandals helped Democrats win the majority after 12 years of Republican control. At a meeting between the ethics committee and watchdog groups last week, several government reformers lauded the OCE’s work so far and suggested that the new layer of ethics scrutiny was working better than they had hoped.