House Government Reform and Oversight Committee Chairman Darrel Issa has led one partisan witch hunt after another since his party became the majority and he became committee chair. But his latest grasping-at-straws attempt to shame Democrats has blown up in his face.
Rep. Issa accused Democratic appointees on the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission (FCIC) — the independent commission established in 2009 to investigate the causes of the financial crisis — of financial mismanagement, disclosing confidential information, conflicts of interest and unethically pursuing a partisan agenda. But the documents produced in this investigation not only failed to substantiate these claims, they actually demonstrated improprieties by some of the Republicans on the Commission.
Now, Chairman Issa wants to brush it all under the rug and look the other way. We can’t let him!
Join PFAW‘s petition to the Government Reform and Oversight Committee now demanding that they investigate improprieties by Republican members of the FCIC.
Outrageously, upon canceling a committee hearing on the FCIC accusations, an Issa staffer was quoted as saying, “they had found some documents at the last minute that didn’t fit the narrative.” A report by committee Democrats, based on 400,000 internal FCIC emails, memos and other documents, shows that those documents didn’t just “not fit” Issa’s narrative, they outright refuted them!
Issa’s allegations of financial mismanagement, inappropriate disclosure and partisan conflicts of interest on the part of Democratic commissioners all turned out to be bogus — frivolous charges not based on evidence of any impropriety. HOWEVER, the same could not be said of Republican members of the Commission.
There is evidence that Republican FCIC Commissioners Peter Wallison and Bill Thomas violated ethics guidelines and shared confidential information about the commission’s work with political insiders and Republican consultants. And contrary to the FCIC’s mission, Republican Commissioner Wallison repeatedly urged his GOP colleagues on the FCIC to use their positions on the Commission to help Republicans in their efforts to repeal the Dodd-Frank financial reform bill.
Don’t let Chairman Darrel Issa get away with this blatant hypocrisy. His witch hunt failed, but now he, and his committee, MUST investigate evidence of improprieties and conflicts of interest by Republicans on the FCIC.
Thanks for standing up for justice and accountability — the American Way.
— Ben Betz, Online Strategy Manager
P.S. It’s hardly a surprise that partisan and corporate conflicts of interest have been found among Republican FCIC members — these are the same people who insisted on issuing a minority report of the Commission’s findings that whitewashed the findings of phrases like “Wall Street” and “deregulation” in an attempt to rewrite the history of the financial meltdown. But Chairman Issa decided to open this can of worms with his own ideologically driven attacks on the Commission’s Democratic members. Now, it’s his responsibility to do the right thing and hold the real culprits accountable.
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