WASHINGTON, DC -- U.S. Rep. Sander Levin (D-Royal Oak) offered the following statement in support of the Ethics and Rules Package Reform measures today on the floor of the House of Representatives:

I rise in strong support of the Honest Leadership and Open Government rules package currently before the House. 

Reform of the way this House conducts its business is not an option.  It is an absolute necessity. A recent poll found that only 37 percent of Americans approve of how Congress is doing its job.  Does anyone here doubt that the ethical scandals and procedural abuses of recent years are a major factor for this low public approval rating?  In 2006 alone, four Members of the House resigned their seats under a cloud.  Two of these former Members have already been convicted for unethical and illegal ties to lobbyists.

I do not believe that these specific abuses represent the majority of Members, but I do believe it is the responsibility of the Majority party to set out strong rules that can begin to regain the trust of the American people in their institution of Congress.

For many years now, our constituents have been bombarded by media reports of cozy relationships between Congress and special interests lobbyists.  They are incensed by news reports of Members accepting all-expense-paid trips to play golf in Scotland, the flagrant abuse of House rules to hold 15-minute votes open for hours for the sole purpose of affecting the outcome, the widening Jack Abramoff lobbying scandal, and the lack of accountability and transparency in how congressional earmarks are awarded. 

I mentioned that our constituents learned about these abuses from the media, in their morning newspapers and on the nightly news.  Too often in recent years, it is also from the media that rank-and-file Members of Congress have learned about special interest provisions that were secretly inserted into legislation in the dead of night and brought up for a vote before Members had an opportunity to read what they were being asked to vote on.  This form of secret legislating has got to stop, and it will stop under this reform package.

The reform package before the House will also curb a large number of the other abuses that have come to light.  These reforms will ban gifts from lobbyists, expand and tighten the restrictions on congressional travel paid for by outside groups, prohibit travel on corporate jets, and require greater public disclosure of targeted special interest legislation.  The reforms will also prohibit the practice of holding votes open for the sole purpose of affecting the outcome. 

There are many other needed reforms contained here, but the one I want to single out is the provision that restores pay-as-you-go budgeting.  Pay-as-you-go budgeting simply means that Congress will not consider any legislation to boost entitlement spending or cut taxes unless it is fully paid for.  Before they were abandoned in 2002, the pay-as-you-go rules helped to turn record deficits into record surpluses in the 1990s.  Since abandoning pay-as-you-go, the cumulative deficit for the past four years has totaled over $1.36 trillion.  We simply cannot continue to pile up more and more debt and pass it along to our children and grandchildren. 

For all these reasons, I urge all my colleagues to join me in voting for the House rules reform package before the House.

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