Put Personal Financial Disclosures Online
The House Judiciary Committee is currently deciding what will or will not be included in the House’s ethics reform bill. While the Committee is talking about requiring greater transparency from lobbyists they aren’t taking simple steps to make the House more transparent. Last week, Ellen proposed that the Judiciary Committee take one simple step to make the House more transparent by putting personal financial disclosure forms online. (This is also a recommendation in The Open House Project report.) You can help make this happen by following this link and contacting Speaker Pelosi and the members of the Judiciary Committee and asking them to include a provision putting personal financial disclosures online in the ethics bill. If you want to know why you should care about the online disclosure of personal financial disclosure forms you can read Ellen’s post and continue reading this post. (See also the Congresspedia entry on personal financial disclosure.)
Continue readingOnline Journalist Ejected from Press Gallery
Citizens and journalists are taking to new mediums to report on Congress. These new mediums, however, are not recognized by the U.S. Senate Press Gallery. Today, ConsumerAffairs.com reports that it's Congressional reporter, Joe Enoch, an award-winning investigative journalist, was ejected from the Press Gallery after he was denied renewal of expired credentials because he wrote for an online venture. According to the Senate Press Gallery, ConsumerAffairs.com is not a "legitimate journalistic enterprise." This is a shining example of what Rob Bluey pointed to in his Hill op-ed and in his Open House Project recommendations to create a credentialing to bloggers and citizen journalists. The right to report is not limited to those employed by elite media institutions. ConsumerAffairs.com founder and editor in chief James R. Hood puts it best when he says, "The Constitution of the United States guarantees freedom of the press to everyone; it does not establish a legitimacy litmus test."
Continue readingRep. Markey Takes to YouTube
In a first for Congress, Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA) took a video camera and filmed the first user created video from the perspective of a Congressional Committee Chairman. This is an amazing step in the right direction for Congress as they grapple with adopting to new mediums of communication and new technology. Also, I'm glad that Rep. Markey has decided to embed his YouTube video on his member web site and push the envelope as David All and I suggest in the Open House Project section on Member Web Use Restrictions.
Continue readingThe Open House Project at Heritage
This morning the Heritage Foundation hosted a terrific panel of the primary conveners of the Sunlight sponsored Open House Project - John Wonderlich, Rob Bluey, Matt Stoller and David All. And while the conversation touched on some of the specific recommendations of the work, it was mostly a very articulate and thoughtful musing by the four 20-something leaders of the effort about how they marshaled the online collaborative effort across a sharp political divide on bringing the House into the 21st century. The genuine bipartisanship was hated by one right-wing blogger, but was defended by two of the conveners -- Rob Bluey and David All. Can't wait to hear what Stoller has to say.
Continue readingFeinstein asks for McConnell’s help on S.223
On Monday, Sen. Dianne Feinstein (D-CA) asked Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) to help her pass S.223, the Senate campaign finance electronic filing bill. McConnell has been abetting a Republican objection to the bill by refusing to reveal information about who in his party does not approve of this no-brainer legislation. While McConnell states that Republican Senators want to offer amendments to the bill he also refuses to identify and describe these amendments. Feinstein is committed to passing this bill and McConnell has said that he supports it. McConnell must meet with Sen. Feinstein to work together to pass this bill without poison pill amendments. Feinstein's letter asks for McConnell to identify to her the amendments that Republican Senators wish to offer. If they have the kind of support that S.223 has than they could be added. If they are controversial, they should go through the regular committee process. This is very simple and fair. Read the letter:
Continue readingMay 10: Open House Project at Heritage Foundation
Update: If you can't attend watch the screencast here.
We are opening the House and changing Congress. This Thursday (May 10) at 10 a.m. the Heritage Foundation is hosting a panel discussion on The Open House Project recommendations. The panel speakers include Sunlight Program Director John Wonderlich, David All of the David All Group, Director of the Center for Media and Public Policy at the Heritage Foundation Robert Bluey, and MyDD's Matt Stoller. The event will no doubt feature some of the most interesting conversation regarding making the House open, accesible, and fit for the 21st century that you will find in Washington, D.C. If you have an interest in the future of politics and the future of Congress you should attend this event. Plus, when else are you going to see Matt Stoller at the Heritage Foundation? You can RSVP here.
Continue readingWe are opening the House
We just returned from a terrific press conference on the Hill where we released the results of the Open House Project. Rep. John Boehner (R. OH) and Rep. Brad Miller (D. NC) joined some of the collaborators of this project as we talked about our recommendations for bringing the House into this century and the collaborative, online way the project was conducted. We very much appreciated Boehner's and Miller's support as we did that of House Speaker Pelosi who sent a letter welcoming the report. C-SPAN covered the press conference and as soon as we know when it will be aired, we'll update this post.
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Reporting a Possibility of Impropriety as Actual
Last Friday, I emailed Peter Byrne to inform him of the critique I'd posted of his article which states that Sen. Dianne Feinstein committed serious ethical improprieties. Byrne wrote that Feinstein, in her capacity as chair or ranking member of the Senate Military Construction and Veterans Affairs Subcommittee, benefited two businesses in which her husband, Richard C. Blum, had a financial interest. In the critique, I argued that the evidence Byrne cites, when closely examined, either doesn't support or in fact contradicts the allegations he makes. He disagreed with my analysis (I am simultaneously posting an updated version of the analysis to incorporate additional information he provided), and I emailed back to say I still thought the information he provided was not sufficient to support the charges leveled in his article. He responded:
Continue readingMake Congress File Personal Financial Forms Electronically
The Sunlight Foundation and nearly a dozen other groups today sent a letter to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi to urge her to add to the upcoming lobbying reform legislation a provision that would require members to electronically file their personal financial disclosure forms. These reports provide detailed information on each members' personal financial assets, and are critical to the public's understanding of whether their representative's private interests might conflict with his or her public duties as a lawmaker. Congress, which has required electronic filing of reports by lobbyists, campaign committees and 527 organizations, has failed to make personal financial disclosure reports available on the Internet-even in PDF format. Instead, the reports and the information contained in them are buried in the basement office of the House Clerk.
The House Ethics Manual states that "...public disclosure of assets, financial interests, and investments has been required as the preferred method of regulating possible conflicts of interest of Members of the House and certain congressional staff. Public disclosure is intended to provide the information necessary to allow Members' constituencies to judge their official conduct in light of possible financial conflicts with private holdings."
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