[Congressional Record Volume 141, Number 13 (Monday, January 23, 1995)]
[House]
[Page H480]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




        CALL FOR AN INDEPENDENT COUNSEL IN SPEAKER'S ETHICS CASE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 4, 1995, the gentleman from Michigan [Mr. Bonior] is recognized 
during morning business for 5 minutes.
  Mr. BONIOR. Mr. Speaker, we Democrats are anxious to get on with the 
business before this House. I was pleased on Friday that the Speaker 
appointed his Members of the Ethics Committee and Minority Leader 
Gephardt appointed Members from the other side of the aisle as well. To 
avoid a conflict to interest, they each chose Members from the 
preexisting ethics panel. This was a wise move because the only 
complaint before the Ethics Committee right now is a complaint 
involving Speaker Gingrich. Clearly the Speaker would have had a 
conflict of interest appointing new Members who would sit in judgment 
on his own case. Unfortunately, even with Friday's announcement, the 
Speaker still has a conflict of interest problem. The subject of the 
ethics complaint and the essence deals with the relationship of GOPAC, 
which is a political action committee controlled by Mr. Gingrich, to 
Mr. Gingrich's other enterprises.
  GOPAC is an organization which has raised over the last 9 years 
anywhere between $10 and $20 million in contributions. Its contributors 
included people who have direct interest in what we do in the People's 
House here. Direct interest. They have contributed to over 100 
Republican candidates and campaigns. Yet we do not know who contributed 
the money or how the money was spent, because GOPAC still refuses to 
disclose the names of its past donors, and, I might add, its past 
expenses as well.
  The ethics complaint involves questions about the relationship of 
this multimillion-dollar political slush fund to Mr. Gingrich's alleged 
nonpartisan college course. Clearly any person who has had dealings 
with GOPAC has a serious conflict of interest in this case. Yet in this 
morning's Wall Street Journal, we learned that 2 of the 5 Members 
appointed to the Ethics Committee by Mr. Gingrich on Friday have had 
past dealings with GOPAC.
  Mr. Speaker, this will not do. The only way we are going to get on 
with the business of this House and to get past this ethical cloud 
swirling around the Speaker's head, from his book deal to GOPAC, to his 
supposedly nonpartisan college course, is to have a professional, 
nonpartisan, independent outside counsel appointed to this case.
  I would urge in the strongest way possible that that is the course 
that this body and that the Ethics Committee take.


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