Investigations Into Alleged House Lapses

Legislative issues are outside the usual range of this website, but we'll pass along the following nice write-up from an IEC member concerning a matter that has been in the news lately:

The House of Representative’s Committee on Standards of Official Conduct released a statement related to the investigation of several Representative’s official travel to the Caribbean which was funded by the Carib News Foundation. The Investigative Committee found that most Members did not violate any House rule, reg, law or other standard of conduct: 

The Investigative Subcommittee found that these Members did not violate any House rule, regulation, law or other standard of conduct.  Only after the initiation of the Subcommittee’s investigation was it learned that payments were made for their travel that were impermissible.  Unfortunately, because false and misleading information was provided to the Committee, the Members inadvertently received impermissible gifts of travel that require repayment for the costs of their trips…Since the Members were provided false information by others, and relied upon that information in seeking approval to accept the trips, the Committee concludes that the Member committed no wrongdoing…

However, the report finds that that Charles Rangel did violate the House gift rule.   

Forbes has a related article.