As we reported Wednesday, the Office of Congressional Ethics found Rep. Alex Mooney, R-W.Va., misspent campaign money for personal use and the OCE referred the case to the House Ethics Committee.
The OCE “is an independent, non-partisan entity charged with reviewing allegations of misconduct against Members, officers, and staff of the U.S. House of Representatives and, when appropriate, referring matters to the House Committee on Ethics,” according to its website. In other words, it’s an independent entity with no enforcement power.
In total, the OCE reported Mooney failed to properly disclose more than $40,000 in campaign expenditures since 2017. The OCE ultimately concluded: “There is reason to believe [lack of proper disclosure] has had the effect, whether intended or not, of concealing thousands of dollars of personal use.”
The House Ethics Committee will now do its own investigating. It has the power to subpoena and to impose penalties if it finds wrongdoing, which can range from fines to recommending the House vote to expel Mooney.
We hope something comes out it — at the very least, a fine or a formal reprimand. Fraud is fraud, at any level of society, and the people to whom we entrust the running of the country should be held to a higher standard. The people who make the laws are not exempt from them.
Allow us to rephrase: The people who make the laws are not supposed to be exempt from them.
We’re always skeptical of internal investigations, and the House Ethics Committee is essentially an internal investigative body. The committee is made up of five Republicans and five Democrats. While the body is bipartisan, the fact remains that Mooney will be investigated by his peers, and they are likely aware that any penalties issued will set a precedent that can be used against any other representative — including the committee members themselves.
Internal investigations and reviews — in any industry — tend to either turn up nothing or to find wrongdoing but to impose no significant consequences.
While law enforcement might be the most prominent example of this, it happens in government (as we’re seeing now) and in the corporate world.
In fact, in his book “Corporate Crime and Punishment: The Crisis of Underenforcement,” John C. Coffee Jr. discusses the prevalence of deferred prosecution agreements when companies are found to have committed an offense. Under a DPA, the corporation pays a fine, goes on a short probation — often with a required internal investigation — and then the charges are expunged. Corporations then hire a law firm to run the investigation. As Coffee notes, the lawyers, who are now being paid by the company, aren’t going to bite the hand that feeds them.
In short, internal investigations don’t work — not as well as they should, anyway. In a perfect world, investigations, in all fields and industries, would be done by an outside entity that has the power to impose penalties. In the case of Mooney’s potential campaign fraud, the ultimate decision should not rest in the hands of the people with whom he works.
But this is not a perfect world. Still, we hope something comes of the House Ethics Committee’s “investigation.”
