Breaking the rules: as Congress frets over Clinton, two of its most ethically challenged Republicans are getting off scot-free - Tom DeLay and Bud Schuster

Washington Monthly, June, 1997 by Nurith C. Aizenman

If you're wondering what progress was made since then, the answer is: Absolutely None.

The committee has taken full advantage of its own procedures to accomplish as little as possible. And opportunities for foot-dragging abound. Once a complaint is filed, the accused party is given 30 days to respond. During that period, the committee's staff c2n begin to collect information on the case. However this is a purely optional step -- and one which congressional sources say was not taken in either the Shuster or DeLay complaints.

By the time the 30 days were up, Congress had adjourned, temporarily halting all action on complaints. Normally this would not have been a problem because traditionally complaints have carried over into the next Congress. But once again, Nancy Johnson threw a wrench in the works. Johnson asked the House parliamentarian for advice on whether the pending complaints should automatically carry over. He responded that since the Ethics Committee would have to be reconstituted for the new Congress, it would be up to the new committee to decide. Johnson seized on this interpretation. The Ethics committee's end-of-the-Congress report stated that the parliamentarian had "ruled" that the complaints had "expired." "Technically, everything is over," proclaimed Chief Ethics Counsel Ted Van Der Mied. The status of both the Shuster and DeLay complaints was suddenly thrown in doubt.

It is as yet unclear whether either complaint will be put back on the agenda. If they are not, Ruskin will face an uphill battle to refile them. Two of the members who signed the letters of refusal he needed to file his Shuster complaint have since retired. And there is speculation that Congress will soon vote to close the letter of refusal route -- leaving Ruskin with the near impossible task of finding someone willing to actually sponsor complaints against Shuster and DeLay.

In any event, it will be a while before the committee has a chance to even contemplate the issue. So far only two of the 10 slots on the Ethics Committee have been filled. And as of late January a moratorium was declared on all complaints until a special task force could come up with recommendations for improving the Ethics Committee. The moratorium's ostensible purpose was to clear the air after the House voted to reprimand Gingrich for ethical violations and "assess" him $300,000. This breathing space might have been a good idea if it had lasted a few weeks -- but the moratorium has now been in place for four months. "It's the equivalent of the police saying, `We're not going to have any arrests until we figure out what we're doing!" says Dan Buck. Confidence in the task force was was also shaken earlier on when Co-Chair Bob Livingston announced he was bringing in Washington lawyer Richard Leon as the task force's legal counsel. Leon happens to be the attorney for none other than ... former Bud Shuster aide Ann Eppard. Meanwhile the task force keeps pushing back the deadline for concluding its work. And few expect its recommendations to involve anything more than marginal tinkering.