[Congressional Record Volume 171, Number 9 (Thursday, January 16, 2025)]
[Senate]
[Pages S222-S223]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                       REMEMBERING ELISE J. BEAN

  Mr. BLUMENTHAL. Mr. President, I rise today to acknowledge the life 
and contributions of one of the Senate's truly outstanding staff 
persons: Elise J. Bean. Elise, who worked for almost 30 years for 
Senator Carl Levin on various subcommittees of the Homeland Security 
and Governmental Affairs Committee, died on January 14 at the age of 
68. She started in the Senate as an attorney/investigator on the 
Subcommittee on Oversight of Government Management and ended as staff 
director of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (PSI), leaving 
when Senator Levin retired. Having chaired PSI in the 118th Congress, I 
am personally grateful that this historic subcommittee continues to 
benefit from the powerful and enduring legacy that Elise left.
  Anyone who knew Elise would tell you that there was no one like her. 
She was an institution of congressional oversight. During nearly three 
decades in the Senate, Elise drove some of the

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Chamber's most significant investigations and, thereafter, was a force 
behind the Levin Center for Oversight and Democracy for a decade. 
There, she relentlessly promoted bipartisan, fact-based oversight. 
Elise embraced the notion that Congress is not only capable of high-
quality oversight and, in doing so, would turn the tide of history 
toward fairness and equality.
  In the days when Elise ran the PSI staff from its basement office in 
Dirksen, she led by example, spending long hours at her massive wooden 
desk, with tall stacks of reports and research lining the perimeter and 
posterboard hearing exhibits leaning on the walls. She was an 
irrepressible advocate for better financial policies by exposing 
wrongdoing, corruption, money laundering, tax avoidance, and all manner 
of form-over-substance abuses. She got there by way of the facts, hard 
work, and bipartisanship. PSI's reports were heavy tomes, accompanied 
by additional volumes of documentary evidence. She was undeterred in 
seeking the truth, such as when she worked every day through the DC 
Snowpacalypse of 2009-2010 in PSI's offices interviewing witnesses, 
lest PSI's ongoing financial crisis inquiry fall behind. For her many 
investigative and other achievements, she has been honored on a global 
scale--by the Washingtonian, the National Law Journal, the 
International Tax Review, and more.
  In her 2018 book, ``Financial Exposure,'' Elise joked about regularly 
drinking Manhattans with Republican colleagues--which was true--but her 
across-the-aisle attitude was real. Elise invited bipartisan 
involvement in every stage of PSI's investigations, leading to a final 
product that was often bipartisan. Her work paved the way for passage 
of bipartisan legislation, such as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act, the CARD Act 
of 2009, the Dodd-Frank Wall Street Reform and Consumer Protection Act, 
and corporate transparency reforms, to name just a few.
  ``Well, why not?'' Elise would often say. She was not cowed by power 
or distracted by really anything. She would teach you, too, as she did 
for hundreds of law clerks and staff, if you were willing to work--
seriously work. And for people who wanted to be in public service, she 
made good on the promise of doing something important to contribute to 
the common good by being a constructive teacher and mentor. She also 
taught classes, published studies and a book, and started a law 
journal. Through the Levin Center, she hosted oversight boot camps for 
the next generation of staffers and was a regular lifeline for advice.
  Elise was generous not just in her work, but also in her sense of fun 
and warmth for so many people in her circle. Elise threw parties for 
any reason at all--to recognize staff milestones, a holiday, a Friday, 
or because the azaleas blooming in spring were lovely. She was devoted 
to her family, including her husband Paul and her sons Jacob and Joey, 
and delighted in getting to know the families of her staff and friends. 
She looked for the good in people, in our government, and created more 
good in the world. Those who knew her will cherish and strive to 
continue her legacy.

                          ____________________