House GOP to Change Ethics Rules

The Republican members of the House of Representatives are planning to make it more difficult to begin ethics inquiries. At the present time, the rules require that an inquiry be held open if the Ethics Committee vote is tied--there is an equal number of Republicans and Democrats on the committee, so a tie vote would be presumed along party lines. The Republicans, however, would require that the vote must be a majority to keep an ethics inquiry open.

In addition, rumors suggest that House Speaker Dennis Hastert is considering replacing the Republican Ethics Committee chairman in 'retaliation' for the Committee's admonishments of Republican House Majority Leader Tom DeLay last year. The GOP has previously altered the party's stance on leadership positions so that DeLay could remain in his post in the event that he is indicted for election fraud charges in Texas. Prior to the revision of party rules, both the Republicans and Democrats held that any member of the House who was under indictment for any reason could not serve the party in a leadership position during the period of indictment.

It seems that the GOP is willing to alter its party rules and ethics rules for the House in order to protect a single individual--Rep. DeLay. Even the conservative group Judicial Watch seems to agree with that assessment, and they are in fact pressing the House to strengthen its ethics rules rather than going through with these plans that would significantly weaken, and essentially eliminate, any possible ethics violation investigations.