Larry Margasak

Ethics panel: Rep. Buchanan may have broken law

WASHINGTON (AP) — A congressional ethics panel says there is substantial reason to believe Rep. Vern Buchanan of Florida tried to get a business partner to lie to the Federal Election Commission.

The independent Office of Congressional Ethics transmitted its findings in January to the House Ethics Committee. The ethics committee said Wednesday it is continuing its investigation of the Republican lawmaker, but released the independent report in accordance with House rules.

The report said the partner knew that contributors to the Florida Republican were reimbursed from 2005 to 2007. The panel said Buchanan attempted to persuade the partner to falsely deny to the FEC that reimbursements were made.

Buchanan’s attorney told the Office of Congressional Ethics the allegations are false.

The report said Buchanan may have violated federal law and House rules.

Rep. Bachus says ethics panel cleared him

WASHINGTON (AP) — The chairman of the House Financial Services Committee says he’s been cleared by an ethics panel in an investigation of his investment activities leading up to and surrounding Congress’ $700 billion bailout of Wall Street.

Alabama Republican Spencer Bachus said Monday that the Office of Congressional Ethics voted 6-0 on Friday to dismiss allegations that he profited from nonpublic information learned on the job.

Congress in March passed legislation explicitly banning lawmakers, the president and thousands of other federal workers from profiting from nonpublic information learned from their official duties. The bill, which is now law, also will let the public see more of government officials’ financial dealings, and view them online more frequently.

The 10-term House member easily won his March primary.

Lawmakers move toward citing Holder for contempt

FILE - In this April 24, 2012 file photo, Attorney General Eric Holder speaks in Little Rock, Ark. A House Committee is preparing a contempt citation against Holder in a dispute over access to documents from a flawed gun tracking operation. (AP Photo/Danny Johnston, File)(Credit: AP)

WASHINGTON (AP) — A House Committee is preparing a contempt citation against Attorney General Eric Holder as it applies pressure for more documents from a flawed gun-tracking operation.

An official of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee said Friday a final decision on issuing the citation hasn’t been made. The official, who wasn’t authorized to be quoted by name on the subject, said the citation could be avoided if the Justice Department produces documents sought by the committee.

The committee has subpoenaed nearly two dozen categories of documents on the Fast and Furious operation, but no documents have been produced from a dozen of those categories, the official said.

In Operation Fast and Furious, U.S. agents hoping to track weapons allowed hundreds of guns to flow from U.S. gun shops in Arizona into Mexico. Two of the guns were later discovered at the scene of the killing of a U.S. border agent.

The Justice Department on April 19 wrote committee Chairman Darrell Issa, R-Calif., saying it was regularly producing requested documents.

“We have provided documents to the committee at least twice every month since late last year as part of the department’s ongoing efforts to comply with the committee’s subpoenas and other requests for information,” wrote Assistant Attorney General Ronald Weich.

“In addition to producing or making available over 7,300 pages of documents to the committee, we have provided briefings for the committee staff as requested, and have facilitated staff interviews of numerous department officials.”

The department will continue its rolling production of documents, Weich said.

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Feinstein: No action on concealed weapons bills

WASHINGTON (AP) — Sen. Dianne Feinstein is asking Democratic leaders to block votes on concealed weapons bills.

At issue is legislation requiring states to honor concealed gun permits from other states.

The California Democrat says that would undermine states’ rights. Feinstein says reciprocity would allow someone to carry a concealed gun in a state where he or she would not qualify to do so.

State requirements vary widely on rules for concealed weapon permits.

Feinstein says the bills are especially harmful to domestic violence victims, because someone convicted of hurting them could then cross state lines, with a gun, to hunt them down.

Feinstein says major law enforcement groups oppose the legislation.

New grilling set for current, former GSA officials

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform conducts the first hearing on incidents of wasteful spending by the General Services Administration, the real estate agency for federal buildings, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Monday, April 16, 2012. Being sworn in to testify, from left are, GSA Inspector General Brian Miller, former GSA Administrator Martha Johnson, Jeff Neely, former regional commissioner of the Public Buildings Service, Pacific Rim Region, GSA Chief of Staff Michael Robertson, and David Foley, deputy commissioner of the GSA Public Buildings Service. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)(Credit: AP)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Congress is turning up the heat in its investigation of an $823,000 General Services Administration conference at a Las Vegas resort in 2010.

Lawmakers will be learning more Tuesday from a fired GSA executive who threw a party there on the taxpayers’ dime. He has been sent a letter by his former agency demanding reimbursement of $1,960 to pay for the party in his room.

Robert Peck is set to testify in the second day of hearings before the House Transportation and Infrastructure Committee on the agency’s misuse of taxpayers’ money. Peck was commissioner of the Public Buildings Service at the GSA, which is in charge of federal buildings and supplies.

Another witness, current Deputy Commissioner Susan Brita, was instrumental in asking Inspector General Brian Miller to investigate.

GSA executive asserts right to remain silent

Appearing before the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, former GSA official Jeff Neely declines to answer questions at a hearing about wasteful spending and excesses at a Las Vegas conference, on Capitol Hill in Washington, Monday, April 16, 2012. Neely, formerly the regional commissioner of the Public Buildings Service, Pacific Rim Region, was ordered to leave the witness table after invoking his rights to not testify on the advice of his counsel. (AP Photo/J. Scott Applewhite)(Credit: AP)

WASHINGTON (AP) — The General Services Administration investigator who revealed a wild agency spending spree said Monday he’s investigating possible bribery and kickbacks, and has already recommended criminal charges to the Justice Department. The key figure in the scandal invoked his right to remain silent at the House hearing.

Inspector General Brian Miller made clear that he’s not done investigating GSA current and former officials, following his lengthy report April 2 on an October 2010 Las Vegas conference that cost taxpayers $823,000.

The regional executive who hosted the Western Regions Conference, Jeffrey Neely, invoked his Fifth Amendment rights and his chair remained empty the rest of the House Oversight and Government Reform hearing. He could face a criminal investigation.

“We do have other ongoing investigations including all sorts of improprieties, including bribes, possibly kickbacks but I’d have to check precisely on kickbacks,” Miller told the committee.

He added later, “We have recommended criminal charges.”

Toward the end of the three-and-a-half hour hearing, GSA chief of staff Michael Robertson said he had informed the White House of the inspector general’s preliminary findings last year. Robertson testified that he told a White House lawyer, Kim Harris, about the report shortly after May 2011 “when I became aware that the IG had briefed (then-GSA administrator Martha) Johnson.”

After the hearing, Robertson said in a statement, “To clarify the point I made in my testimony today, I only mentioned in passing the existence of an IG investigation as I bumped into a White House staffer that I regularly worked with on GSA issues.”

Committee members from both parties could barely restrain themselves as they sometimes shouted their outrage over the spending. They not only raged on about the overall figure, but at specific taxpayer expenditures for a mind-reader, over-priced commemorative coins, bicycles for a team-building exercise and trips by GSA employees and their family members to the Las Vegas strip.

Lawmakers said they couldn’t understand why Johnson, the agency head who resigned after Miller’s findings became public, waited for months to take action after receiving a preliminary report almost a year earlier. And demanded to know why Johnson granted Neely a $9,000 bonus after learning of the conference.

“I gave that $9,000 bonus because I was focused on performance and because I, the recommendation came from the buildings commissioner,” Johnson said.

Johnson, who said she resigned to allow the GSA to fix its problems under new leadership, said she was “extremely aggrieved by the gall of a handful of people to misuse federal tax dollars, twist contracting rules and defile the great name of the General Services Administration.”

She said she learned after taking office that the Western Regions Conference “had evolved into a raucous, extravagant, arrogant, self-congratulatory event.”

Before she resigned, Johnson fired two top deputies. Since then, Neely and seven others were placed on administrative leave.

She was not the only GSA executive to apologize. David Foley, deputy commissioner of the Public Buildings Service, said he was sorry that he participated in an awards ceremony at the conference, which became a viral video on social media.

He made a joking reference at the ceremony to Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton, the District of Columbia congressional delegate, and presented an award to a GSA staff member who made a rap video making fun of the conference spending.

Meanwhile, the GSA has ramped up its disciplinary review. Ten officials are now on administrative leave, two more than previously reported.

On Monday, the agency released letters to one fired GSA executive, Robert Peck, and two on administrative leave — Neely and Robert Shepard, a regional executive — demanding they pay back some of the taxpayers’ money for parties held in their rooms at the Las Vegas conference.

The amounts were $922 for Shepard, $1,960 for Peck and $2,717 for Neely.

Previously, Neely had told investigators that the $2,717 party he threw in his Las Vegas hotel suite was an employee-awards event, according to a transcript of the interview.

“This is an award recognition ceremony ….” Neely told an internal investigator. “That’s what this was. That’s…not a Neely party right. I actually … it was in a suite that wasn’t even mine.”

The investigator then confronted Neely with his email saying that he and his wife “are hosting a party in our loft room. There will be wine and beer and some munchies….” There was no mention of awards.

When Neely insisted again it was an awards event, the skeptical investigator told him, “You realize how this looks?”

“I get it that it looks funny,” Neely said.

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