Date: 2006-04-26
Speaker: WASSERMAN SCHULTZ (democrat)
Chamber: H

Well. you know. it is getting ready to happen again tdmorrow. We are going to watch them deliberately squander yet another opportunity. Do you remember several months ago when the Jack Abramoff scandal broke. and he was exposed. and indicted and arrested. and decided to plead guilty and began implicating people who he worked with and who he collaborated with? There were calls from the Republican leadership that they were going to do something about this. make the process more transparent. restore ethics to undergird the American publics confidence in this system. And that was all supposed to culminate in tomorrows legislation that we will hear in this body. what the Republican version of lobbying and ethics reform is. Mr. DELAHUNT. We are all about thirdparty validators in the 30something Working Group. I have thirdparty validators just initially to compare Republican proposals on lobbying reform with the proposals that are coming out of the United States Senate. from the Republican leadership there versus the proposals coming out of the Republican House. And this was on the front page of USA Today just a couple of days ago. on April 24. just on Monday. the two proposals coming out of the two Republicanled Chambers. Look at the differences. Mr. DELAHUNT. that we have here. This is the difference between the lobbying legislation the Senate and the House of Representatives. the gift limits that are proposed in the legislation coming from the Senate. And. again. this is right off the front page of USA Today. The Senate version of the bill would say that Members could receive no gifts from lobbyists to Members or their aides. None. A ban. The House version of the bill tomorrow. we would have no change from the $50 limit that is current law. That is transparency? That is a restoration of Americas confidence that Members are up here doing the job that they were elected to do? Status quo. That is the reform that we are going to consider tomorrow. The lobbying ban. Right now. former Members have a 1year ban before they can come and represent clients in front of Congress and contact their former colleagues and advocate on behalf of those clients. The Senate would double that time. to 2 years. At least. so that there would be some distance between the time of service that a -Member was here and the people that they served with. And so the idea behind a .2year ban. Mr. DELAHUNT. is that at least some of the issues that that Member was vpting on. that the Members that they were working with. that there is some distance between that time. and that way hopefully you are not going to have undue influence occur. The Senate doubled that to 2 years. In the House. again this is off the front page of USA Today. there would be no change. The current 1year time limit would still remain in place. Let us look at congressional travel. Travel sponsored by lobbyists. again off the front page. in that same graph on the front page of USA Today. The Senate legislation that deals with travel by Members sponsored by lobbyists would say that they have to have preapproval in order for a Senator to travel with lobbyists. on a lobbyistsponsored trip. The S.nate legislation said that that would have to be preapproved by their Ethics. Committee. You know. interesting proposal. There are several ways you can do it. We will go one step further in our proposal. which we will go through in a second. But the House version. this is funny. it is so sad that it is funny. The House proposal tomorrow that we are considering on travel says suspend travel until December 15. What are they hoping. that we get past the election and people will forget? Or maybe we get past the election and it will not matter anymore and they can just go back to taking trips to Scotland and playing golf when they are supposed to be doing the peoples business? I am not sure who they are trying to kid. It is just truly unbelievable. Mr. DELAHUNT. Their nerve is amazing. So I just wanted to outline that is the difference between the Republican proposals. Now. I want to just take a minute and go through what the Democrats would do. You know we hear so much that. you know. all the Democrats do is criticize and. you know. we do not have a plan for this. that. or the other thing. which of course we spend each night here trying to outline the plans tiat we do have. and debunk that oftrepeated myth. which is truly mythological. because we have numerous plans which we will continue to outline. But let us look at the House Democrats lobbying and ethics reform proposal. where we would truly crack down and get tough on the culture of corruption and cronyism that exists here. It is called the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act. If that is what we are considering tomorrow. which I truly wish we were. then the gift limits that Democrats proposed would be a ban on gifts including meals. tickets. entertainment. travel from lobbyists and nongovernmental organizations that retain or employ lobbyists. Because. you know. what we could debate. we could have a legitimate debate. I think. Mr. DELAHUNT. on whether or not particularly nongovernmental organizations should be able to sponsor Member travel. those educational trips that I have taken in the time I have been here. once or twice. that are truly helpfl. But.. you know. unfortunately. you know that old expression where they talk about the one bad apple spoils it for the whole bunch. In order to restore Americans confidence in their government. a change like we are proposing. just a total ban would do that. You got to go that far. But that is not what we are considering tomorrow. We are considering just holding off on travel until December 15. squeezing our eyes shut and hoping the problem goes away. A lobbying ban. We House Democrats would propose. do propose. a 2year ban for former lawmakers. executive branch officials and senior staff. that they. could not represent clients and contact former colleagues for 2 years. It would eliminate floor and gym privileges for former Members who are now lobbyists. It would require Members and senior staff to disclose outside job negotiations. because the K Street Project. the infamous K Street Project where you have the revolving door of negotiations going on. while staff. while Republican staff are still here working for the public. negotiating lucrative private deals to leave here and then. you know. within a year. representing clients and lobbying their former colleagues. And the pressure that the K Street Project applies for those private firms to hire those Republican staffers. we would end that practice in the Honest Leadership and Open Government Act. And finally. these are just highlights. Actually this proposal is far more comprehensive than what is outlined here. Travel sponsored by lobbyists. We would prohibit lobbyists from planning or participating in congressional travel. It would require Members to pay the full charter cost when using corporate jets for official travel and to disclose relevant costs in the CONGRESSIONAL RECORD. Literally. the piece of the legislation we are going to consider tomorrow. the only change. is corporate travel. in other Words. when a Member is using the private plane provided by a lobbyist. Sometimes. you know. a Member needs to get somewhere quicker than commercial travel allows them to. The proposal tomorrow only prohibits the lobbyists from traveling with the Member on the plane. They can still do it exactly as they do it now. but they cannot go with the Member. That is the accountability that is provided for in this bill. It is a joke. You know the American people are not going to buy it. You know. the finger in the dike for the next 6 months and hoping that that gets them through. I mean. I am hopeful that. that does not work. It appears that the American people finally get it and that they will be behind us in moving this country in a new direction. Sorry I took so long. That has been growing inside me.