Waters backs down from vote on ethics probe

Rep. Maxine Waters is backing down from her effort to force an investigation of the House ethics committee, which canceled her trial last month amid accusations of improper conduct by its attorneys. 

In a speech on the House floor Thursday afternoon, Waters (D-Calif.) killed her plan to bring a privileged resolution to the floor that called for a probe of the ethics panel, claiming that it would not have its intended effect. Instead, she called on the panel to provide an official statement explaining the circumstances surrounding the delay of her trial and the sanctions levied against two of their attorneys.

{mosads}”Upon the advice of my colleagues whom I trust and admire, I am not pushing for a vote on this resolution today,” she said. “In doing so, however, I am requesting that the committee set the record straight, on its own accord, in a bipartisan manner.”

Waters’s decision saves members of the House from having to side with her stance in a recorded vote, and sets back part of her strategy to publicly highlight internal problems in the House ethics panel. 

The California Democrat has sought to stay on the offensive ever since she was charged over the summer as the result of a 2008 meeting she helped arrange between Treasury officials and representatives of OneUnited Bank. The bank ended up receiving $12 million in Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) funds. Her husband owns hundreds of thousands of dollars in the bank’s stock and previously served on its board of directors.

Waters — a senior member of the Financial Services Committee — has vehemently denied the charges, and attempted to turn the tables on the ethics committee after it recently put Morgan Kim and Stacy Sovereign, two attorneys investigating her case, on administrative leave.

The resolution would have created a bipartisan task force that would have made recommendations “to restore public confidence in the ethics process, including disciplining both staff and members where needed,” according to a draft copy.

The 10-term lawmakers explained that the authority of such a task force, created under a privileged resolution, would run out at the end of the year under congressional rules.

“The investigation and report called for by the resolution would have to be completed immediately, which apparently is not feasible now given the calendar,” she said. 

She also said that Democratic leaders could kill the resolution via procedural moves for political reasons.

“We all know how a vote on a privileged resolution plays out,” she warned. “The leadership, for reasons which are both practical and political, would use a parliamentary procedure, either a motion to table or a motion to refer, to essentially kill the bill.”

Still, Waters said, her colleagues told her they still want more information about the suspension of the ethics committee’s attorneys.

“During those conversations with colleagues, members have come alive, and the basic concepts of justice and fairness have permeated every conversation,” she said. “They have suggested that this issue is one that should be explored willingly, not just by the force of a vote by the whole House, and that parliamentary procedure should not thwart transparency.”