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Statement from Rep. Bob Inglis on television’s Inside Edition story on Congressional Travel
(October 14, 2008)
“Between stories of Botox, pregnant Desperate Housewives and news flashes on Britney, Inside Edition took a stab at Congressional travel.
“Here are the facts:
“Inside Edition is right that travel expenditures aren’t transparent. Those expenditures should be transparent because the public has a right to know what’s spent on trips and what’s accomplished. I’ve made it a habit of announcing, in advance, my travel plans and of posting reports on our Web site. While working with Inside Edition over the last couple of weeks to get a full accounting of expenses, I’ve become aware of inaccuracies and incompletion in the inadequate reports of travel expenses.
“I’m going to continue to seek information about the cost of the trips in question from the Science Committee and from the State Department, even if I have to file my own Freedom of Information Act requests.
“Inside Edition got it wrong, though, to imply that congressional travel isn’t important to the mission of the Congress. In the first paragraph of my first report on my first congressional trip, I wrote this:
- 'A world away at the Crown Plaza Hotel, Kuwait City, I replayed the scenes from the first day of my first “Codel.” In my first six years in Congress (1993 to 1998) I hadn’t traveled once. House Speaker Newt Gingrich had told us during those years that if we weren’t traveling, we weren’t doing our jobs right. Convinced by my 6 years out of office that the former Speaker was right, I had resolved to travel to Iraq as soon as possible after the 2004 election. I wanted to encourage the troops, to see the circumstances ‘on the ground’ and to have the opportunity to meet with the government forming in Iraq. All of those objectives would be met in the days that were to come.’
“On the Galapagos trip I learned more than I’d ever known about ocean acidification, a problem that may open a hole in the bottom of the ocean’s food chain as higher acidity water dissolves the shells of zooplankton. One billion people around the world depend on the ocean for their sustenance. Congress needs to attend to the challenge.
“On the Antarctica trip I got to join in the oversight of National Science Foundation expenditures of $288 million a year which includes research in Antarctica. Those expenditures are authorized by the Science Committee, of which I am a member. I think it makes sense for members of relevant committees to conduct reasonable oversight of their committee’s expenditures.
“As to the smaller points of the Inside Edition story and Web site:
“Spouses travel at their own expense except that, if military aircraft is used, a spouse may ride without paying. The theory of the exception is that the spouse's travel on the military plane doesn't add to the cost.
“Since returning to Congress in 2005, I have traveled 11 times:
- Five trips to Iraq and/or Afghanistan
- One trip to the southern U.S. border
- One trip to Brazil with the Foreign Affairs Committee (Inglis is a member of the Foreign Affairs Committee)
- Four trips (involving Antarctica, Greenland, Australia, New Zealand and Ecuador’s Galapagos Islands) with the Science Committee relating to climate change/ocean acidification (Inglis is a member of the Science Committee)
“Each trip has been preceded by a news release announcing my participation in the trip: (see below), and each trip has been followed by a report posted on our Website."
CODEL preview releases
- CODEL Lynch (Iraq)
- CODEL Baird (Galapagos)
- CODEL Baird (Antarctica)
- CODEL Engel (Brazil)
- CODEL Graham (Afghanistan)
- CODEL Inglis (U.S.-Mexico border)
- CODEL Lynch (Iraq)
- CODEL Shays (Iraq, Sudan)
- CODEL Boehlert (Antarctica)