FOR
IMMEDIATE RELEASE
March
21, 2002
LIEBERMAN ANNOUNCES INTENT
TO ISSUE MORE SUBPOENAS
WASHINGTON - At a Governmental Affairs
Committee business meeting Thursday, Chairman Joe Lieberman,
D-Conn., announced his intention to issue additional subpoenas
to Enron and Arthur Andersen, LLP, as well as to past and
current members of Enron’s Board of Directors.
The subpoenas will seek information about
Enron’s communications with the White House or other federal
agencies regarding the National Energy Policy; their
communications with the Commerce Department, the Energy
Department, the Overseas Private Investment Corporation, the
Export-Import Bank, the Securities and Exchange Commission,
the Commodity Futures Trading Commission, the Federal Energy
Regulatory Commission and the Department of Labor; and their
communications with the White House regarding those agencies.
"Senator Thompson and I have reached
agreement on a number of subpoenas that will go out and,
therefore, according to the rules of our Committee, the
subpoenas will not need to be voted on by the Committee,"
Lieberman said. "We are trying to be as thorough as we
can, to turn over every stone we can turn over to understand
what government agencies knew about Enron’s practices and
whether there was anything they could have, or should have
done to prevent the company’s collapse, and to make sure
something like this never happens again."
The subpoenas will request information from
January 1992 through December 12, 2001.
Lieberman said he would also write letters
to the White House and the United States Archivist seeking
information about the current and previous White Houses’
contacts with Enron regarding the agencies listed above and
the National Energy Policy.
The Committee expects to issue the subpoenas
within the next few days.
On February 15, Lieberman issued two
subpoenas to Enron and Anderson for their contacts with
certain federal regulatory agencies, and the Permanent
Subcommittee on Investigations issued 51 subpoenas in January.
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