[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 149 (2003), Part 9]
[House]
[Pages 12247-12248]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




    ENCOURAGING SECRETARY TOM RIDGE TO RELEASE TAPES OF CALLS FROM 
                  DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC SAFETY IN TEXAS

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under a previous order of the House, the 
gentleman from Texas (Mr. Lampson) is recognized for 5 minutes.
  Mr. LAMPSON. Mr. Speaker, tonight I strongly encourage Secretary Tom 
Ridge to release the tapes of the call from the Department of Public 
Safety in Texas asking for the Department of Homeland Security to track 
down Texas House Democrats who fled to Oklahoma last week.
  I came up here for literally years talking specifically about the 
issue of missing children. I find it a little astounding that I am 
standing here talking about something that is really having such a dire 
effect on the people of the State of Texas because of the incident that 
occurred recently, where people literally attempted to cram legislation 
down the throats of Texas citizens without giving them a voice in that 
process, a very onerous thing to have happen.
  I want to turn my tasks to what I can make a serious difference with 
on families, something about children. But here I am, asking the 
Secretary of Homeland Defense to step into a situation where his own 
agency could have delivered information, and still might, deliver 
information that could make a difference in helping us understand what 
it was that drove those 51 legislators out of the State of Texas and 
over into Ardmore, Oklahoma, to send a message, to send a message that 
we are not going to take being excluded from participating in the 
process of making legislation anymore. Whether it is at the Federal 
level or whether it is in the State of Texas, it is wrong.
  The people of this country created a system that we all participate 
in through our representatives. When representatives are excluded, then 
the people are excluded. Their voices are not heard.
  Back to our request of Secretary Ridge, the use of the Homeland 
Security Department for political reasons is shameful, and it needs to 
be investigated. We need to know answers of why, what happened.
  I remember when I was teaching at Lamar University in Beaumont, 
Texas, during the years of the early 1970s, the Watergate era. Like all 
Americans, I was absolutely shocked and dismayed at the wanton abuse of 
power of the Nixon administration. Secretary Ridge's decision to not 
release these tapes yesterday brings back memories for me of that dark 
era in American history. That is not what we are about in the United 
States of America. We should not have a secret government that keeps 
stuff from the people.
  The Nixon administration used the FBI for political reasons, and then 
they refused repeated requests from journalists to review their 
actions. Two weeks ago, the majority leader, the gentleman from Texas 
(Mr. DeLay), told numerous reporters that he wanted the FBI to use its 
resources to track down the Democrats who went to Oklahoma.
  The thought of using the FBI for such reasons, in my opinion, is 
unconscionable. Now we have learned that the Texas Department of Public 
Safety used the Homeland Security Department to track down a plane 
belonging to former Texas House Speaker Pete Laney. The Department of 
Homeland

[[Page 12248]]

Security should be used for protecting Americans from terrorists, not 
for political objectives, regardless of from whom the political 
objectives come.
  Many of my colleagues have asked to review those tapes of the phone 
calls between the Department of Public Safety in Texas and the 
Department of Homeland Security, but we are told by Secretary Ridge's 
office that the tapes are currently unavailable. That makes me and many 
of my colleagues wonder why.
  Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman yield?
  Mr. LAMPSON. I yield to the gentleman from Texas.
  Mr. DOGGETT. Mr. Speaker, I know the gentleman was expressing concern 
about using the Federal Bureau of Investigation with reference to 
political purposes. The gentleman is aware that it was the gentleman 
from Texas (Mr. DeLay) who himself talked about calling out the G-men, 
the government men, and mentioned using the FBI. We have seen that 
movie ``U.S. Marshal'', pulling in the U.S. Marshal on this. This is 
all in addition to Homeland Security. He said that he had a former 
Justice Department official on his staff investigating this and that 
they pulled in some United States attorney, those are the people in 
charge of prosecuting crimes in the State of Texas, but some United 
States attorney down there who was also diverted to this political 
task.
  Mr. LAMPSON. Reclaiming my time, Mr. Speaker, I understand that that 
exactly happened. Supposedly, it was in San Antonio. Those are not 
things that should be happening in our government.
  If we learned anything from the Watergate era, it is that the 
government needs to be accountable for its actions. It cannot be held 
accountable if important documents are not available to journalists and 
Members of the United States Congress so they can review them. So we 
need to review these tapes to ensure that nothing improper happened and 
the Department of Homeland Security is working to protect us against 
terrorists and not members of the Texas House of Representatives.

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