To: "homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org" <homestead AT lists.ibiblio.org>
Subject: [Homestead] D.C. Whorehouse business as usual
Date: Thu, 03 Feb 2005 09:46:35 -0700
House GOP Leaders Name Loyalist to Replace Ethics Chief
By Mike Allen
Washington Post Staff Writer
Thursday, February 3, 2005; Page A01
House Republican leaders tightened their control over the ethics committee
yesterday by ousting its independent-minded chairman, appointing a
replacement who is close to them and adding two new members who donated to
the legal defense fund of House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-Tex.).
Republican officials have spent months taking steps to ensure DeLay's
political survival in case he is indicted by a Texas grand jury
investigating political fundraising, and House leadership aides said they
needed to have the ethics committee controlled by lawmakers they can trust.
Rep. Joel Hefley (R-Colo.), who clashed with DeLay so often that they
barely spoke and was considered wayward by other leaders, was replaced
yesterday with Rep. Richard Hastings (R-Wash.). Hastings has carried out
other sensitive leadership assignments and is known as a favorite of
Speaker J. Dennis Hastert (R-Ill.), who made the decision.
Hefley said in an interview yesterday that he believes he was removed
because he was too independent. He said there is "a bad perception out
there that there was a purge in the committee and that people were put in
that would protect our side of the aisle better than I did."
"Nobody should be there to protect anybody," he said. "They should be there
to protect the integrity of the institution."
The replacement of Hefley is the latest in a series of actions by GOP
leaders to crack down on a rebellious ethics committee that posed a threat
to DeLay and other Republicans.