(Washington, D.C.) – U.S. Sen. David Vitter today introduced six bills addressing critical reforms in ethics and lobbying.

“Some members of Congress wrongly view their jobs as an entitlement, not a privilege to serve the country,” said Vitter.  “We need to restore good faith in government and permanently root out corruption and cronyism in Washington.”

            Vitter’s ethics reform package builds off his effort last year with a bipartisan working group on ethics reform and three pieces of legislation he submitted last year that addressed Indian tribe campaign contributions, spousal lobbying and members of Congress paying their families with campaign funds. 

            His tribal campaign contributions bill will close a loophole that currently allows Indian tribes to contribute to candidates and parties directly from the tribal treasury.  The tribal treasury combines all sources of a tribe’s funds and often includes money from gambling revenues.  In addition, this piece of legislation will require tribes to form political action committees (PACs) like all other organizations that seek to impact elections, such as labor unions, corporations and trade associations.  These changes will provide greater transparency of the political donations of Indian tribes.

“Indian tribes should have to adhere to the same rules as all other organizations that participate in the political process,” added Vitter.

Vitter’s bill prohibiting spouses from lobbying Congress seeks to reduce the influence of nepotism in the legislative process.  Under Vitter’s bill, if the spouse of a member of Congress was not serving as a registered lobbyist at least one year prior to the member’s election to Congress or federal office, or at least one year prior to his or her marriage to the member of Congress, the spouse would not be able to lobby any member of Congress.

            His legislation prohibiting members of Congress from paying their families with campaign funds aims to end the practice of siphoning political donations for personal or family gain.  The bill specifically targets candidate’s spouses and immediate family members, including sons, daughters, stepchildren and in-laws.

            “We need to move beyond last year’s weak ethics reform legislation and bring real change, and I applaud Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid for putting this issue at the top of this year’s agenda,” said Vitter.  “Americans have understandably lost confidence in Congress, and we have a duty to return to good government.”

            Vitter also submitted three new bills addressing ethics reform.  The first piece of legislation creates criminal penalties for members of Congress who willfully misrepresent information on financial reports.  Current law allows the attorney general to file a civil suit against those who knowingly falsify financial reports, but this new legislation would allow the attorney general to also file criminal charges with penalties of imprisonment.

            The other new pieces of ethics legislation submitted by Vitter increase penalties for registered lobbyists who fail to comply with current lobbying disclosure requirements and clarify the issue of charter flight reimbursement.  The charter flight bill will require members, officers and employees of the U.S. Senate to disclose all flights on charter and private aircraft and reimburse the owner of the aircraft at fair market value of a similar charter flight.  Currently, the reimbursement rate is gauged on the price of a first class ticket on commercial carrier, which is generally much lower than the cost of a typical charter flight.

            “Members of Congress should not be entitled to special privileges that average Louisianans are not entitled too,” said Vitter.  “We are public servants, not celebrities.”

            Vitter will be pushing these proposals in the U.S. Senate debate on ethics reform set to begin next week.