[Congressional Record Volume 142, Number 133 (Tuesday, September 24, 1996)]
[House]
[Pages H10978-H10979]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




             A WITCH HUNT AGAINST THE SPEAKER OF THE HOUSE

  The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Roth). Under a previous order of the 
House, the gentleman from California [Mr. Riggs] is recognized for 5 
minutes.
  Mr. RIGGS. Mr. Speaker, I know the hour is getting late, and I just 
came back from California tonight to attend the debate and votes and 
have a nasty head cold to boot, but I had to come down and speak during 
special orders tonight after watching the partisan discord on the floor 
earlier tonight and listening to the comments coming from the other 
side of the political aisle, and that is what it is, from the very 
partisan Democrats in this House of Representatives, the people's 
House, who are now engaged, have been engaged for months, in a witch 
hunt against the Speaker of the House.
  And make no mistake about it, that is exactly what they are doing. 
They have no new ideas on policy, and they cannot win a debate on the 
issues, so they are now resorting to political attacks against the 
Speaker of the House.
  Now what is the origin of all this? Well, back in February of last 
year, this is 1 month after this Congress began, Congressman Harry 
Johnston, a Democrat from Florida, told the Miami Herald that the 
Democrats, meaning the Democrat Party leadership in the House, 
including the minority leader, Dick Gephardt, and the Democratic 
National Committee, were meeting weekly to, quote, investigate Newt, 
end quote, referring to Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich. Congressman 
George Miller, who is a very fiery Democratic partisan, has sponsored 
many complaints against the Speaker, and he is quoted in a recent book 
by a very respected journalist and author, Elizabeth Drew, as 
confirming that the Democrats intended to attack the Speaker, saying 
quote: Newt is the nerve center and the energy source. Going after him 
is like taking out command and control. End quote.
  So what we are talking about now is a very dubious claim on the part 
of the Democrats that a draft discussion document in the Committee on 
Standards of Official Conduct should be publicly released when in fact 
the ranking Democrat on the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct 
says when there is

[[Page H10979]]

information to report, we will be complying with House rules in making 
such a report. That is an actual quote.
  These complaints are all politically motivated, and the public should 
know as well as our colleagues that since 1989 Democrats in the House 
of Representatives have filed literally hundreds and hundreds of 
allegations against Newt Gingrich without one, without one ethics 
complaint being referred for further action.
  In fact the only--just over the last year they have filed numerous 
complaints, all of which have been effectively dismissed, and the only 
remaining issue is a technical issue regarding tax laws, which relates 
to a college course that the Speaker was teaching, and I find it 
remarkable and commendable that he would teach a college course on the 
side, in addition to being Speaker of the House and a Congressman 
representing a Georgia congressional district.
  So what is going on here? Do our Democrat colleagues in the House, 
are they really attempting to divert attention from the ethical 
problems of the Clinton administration? Because some of us remember 
when Bill Clinton was sworn in; in fact, when he said on the campaign 
trail as candidate Clinton that he would have the most ethical 
administration in the history of the Republic, when arguably he has 
given us one of the more corrupt administrations in the history of the 
Republic, including 14 business associates and friends who have either 
been convicted or pled guilty in conjunction with the Whitewater 
matter, and that does not even begin to speak to his wife's involvement 
in those same affairs.

  So what is going on here? This has been, in fact, a very reform-
minded Congress. We passed the Congressional Accountability Act saying 
that Congress has to live under the same laws as everybody else, under 
the same laws that we impose on American citizens and businesses. We 
passed a very strict gift ban. We passed tough lobbying reform. And 
tomorrow on this floor I am going to be able to offer legislation with 
some of my colleagues, eliminating taxpayer funded pensions for Members 
of Congress convicted of felony crimes while serving in office.
  Mr. Speaker, that is something I attempted to do 2 Congresses ago in 
the 102nd Congress, but the leadership of the House then, the 
Democratic Party leadership, would not allow it, my bill to come to the 
House floor. Our leadership has allowed it. We will be debating on it 
and voting on it tomorrow. I am sure it will pass overwhelmingly.
  My legislation was the direct outgrowth of the House bank and post 
office scandals two Congresses ago, and we do not hear our colleagues, 
many of whom were serving then, talking, you know, expressing outrage 
or ire at not only the ethical lapses of the Clinton administration, 
but about the things that happened on their watch: The Dan Rostenkowski 
affair in the last Congress. There was concerted effort to cover up 
then-Congressman Rostenkowski's involvement in the House post office 
scandal and allegations of ghost employees. That was led by many of the 
Democrats who are now in an incredible, I think, feed of hypocrisy and 
role reversal attacking the Speaker.
  When we took over last January, we lost an independent audit by an 
outside accounting firm of House finances, and we found incredible 
disarray and mismanagement. Again that is something that happened, and 
the American people need to understand this, on the watch of the 
Democrat Party leadership. So they are hardly models of propriety, 
having conducted and presided over the whitewashed Congresses of years 
past, and somebody has got to stand up on this floor and provide a 
little institutional memory, if you will, and someone has to say to my 
colleagues and to the American people: Look, you are smarter than they 
think you are. They are banking on the facts, they are betting that you 
do not know and you do not care about the truth, and we think you do.

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