Senate leaders are moving to tighten congressional ethics rules, though — with only a one-vote majority — they are treading more lightly and more slowly than their enthusiastic colleagues in the House.
Last week, newly minted House Majority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., followed through on her campaign pledge to limit the influence of lobbyists, leading the House in adopting rule changes to ban gifts and meals paid for by lobbyists and the use of corporate jets.
The Senate is expected to echo the gift ban, though the restriction on jets — which was seen as too broadly crafted by some — may be modified. There is also likely to be debate on the establishment of a separate ethics panel to enforce any new rules — an idea that has support on both sides of the aisle.
Though the House rules are already in place the final language cravfted by the Senate may eventually force modifications. Unlike the House, which changed its internal rules and did not need to pass legislation, the Senate is working on an actual bill. The House must agree on and pass its own version of that legislation for the new Senate rules to take effect.
Will the Democrats move to put a revised lobbying law in place? All those who have talked to The Examiner on the issue expected some sort of measure to be hammered out given voter ire over the issue and the DNC’s desire to keep control of Congress in 2008. Even the states — most recently Oregon and Ohio — are tightening regulation of lobbyists.
Passage of new laws does not mean that the potential for ethics problems will be gone. The impetus to find ways around the rules is strong, and it will be hard to crack the informal network of favors that has long underpinned life in Washington. Most importantly — though there has been discussion of the idea — there has not yet been a strong movement to alter campaign finance rules. Without a change in how the funding flows, the money will still be able at settle at lowest levels of human behavior far too easily.
Associated Press contributed to this column
Dee Ann Divis is the business editor of The Washington Examiner. Contact her at [email protected]
