When one of his staffers recently announced that he was leaving to lobby for the financial industry, House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank, D-Mass., took the unsual step of criticizing him and removing him from all committee business. He also told the staffer not to darken his committee’s door as long as he remains chairman.
We praised Frank in these pages for diminishing the influence of big business on government. Unfortunately, our enthusiasm was not shared by the Democratic committee chairmen and Republican ranking members in the House of Representatives. We called all of them to see if they would adopt this “Frank Rule” and shut the revolving door for their staff. Number of responses: zero.
Last week, I had the opportunity to ask House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, whether he would consider such a policy in the event that Republicans retake the majority this year.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I’ll take a look at it.”
That’s a more positive answer than I’d expected, but he really should take a look at it. As disappointing as it is to see a congressional majority comfortable with a corrupt status quo, it would be even more disappointing to see the minority party, with every incentive to shake things up, shrug off a good-government idea that could turn to political gold.
Republicans see a congressional majority within reach, in part because of an anti-incumbent mood shared by voters who might not normally vote Republican. The GOP took advantage of a similar situation in 1994. Taking advantage of Clinton’s overreach, they accompanied their standard platform with promises to end abusive congressional practices. They won, and the following year, they enacted the first truly effective transparency requirements for lobbyists.
Democrats returned to power in 2006, campaigning against a Republican “culture of corruption.” They won and followed up with a 2007 law that improved that transparency.
The Frank Rule, as a campaign promise, might be just the peace offering for voters this year, angry as they are at the crooked and opaque legislative process they watched unfold during the health care debate.
When congressional employees “cash out” and enter the lucrative world of lobbying, they don’t just change jobs; they also make you wonder. Can the job-seeking part of anyone’s brain be completely separate from the part that drafts legislation?
What are we supposed to think, for example, when a senior policy adviser to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., who helped craft the health care bill jumps ship right after Obamacare passes and becomes a partner at a major D.C. firm that represents the pharmaceutical industry? Do you suppose the drugmakers stand to benefit from that legislation?
The return of staffer-lobbyists to Capitol Hill is equally awkward. When Senate Finance Chairman Max Baucus, D-Mont., sat down last year to negotiate with the health care lobby, he was sitting across the table from two of his former senior staffers, who together represented two dozen health insurance, health care, health research and pharmaceutical companies and trade organizations.
Who do you suppose wrote the bill? Whose interests do you think it will serve?
On Capitol Hill, there is no stigma attached to such behavior. But there would be if more lawmakers followed Frank’s example. K Street’s incentive to hire them would diminish, and money would have to find a less direct channel to power that involves less corruption of those who actually write laws.
Frank’s fellow Democrats should look closely at what he has done, if they want to keep their majority. So should the Republicans, if they want to take it away. Voters are upset at what they see right now, and they are likely to reward anyone who promises to change it.
David Freddoso is the Examiner‘s online opinion editor. He can be reached at [email protected].
