Four days after U.S. Rep. Pete Visclosky, D-1st, told the press that the Department of Justice has subpoenaed documents from his campaign committees and congressional office related to The PMA Group, a now defunct Washington, D.C., lobbying firm, he has announced that he has asked a colleague on the Energy and Water Subcommittee of the House Appropriations Committee to assume responsibility for managing the Fiscal Year 2010 Energy and Water appropriations bill.

Visclosky told the Chesterton Tribune today that he is retaining his chairmanship of the subcommittee and will continue to participate in all discussions of the appropriations bill, including casting his vote when required, but that he fears the possibility of becoming a lightning rod for “partisan political” attack if he himself were to undertake the chair’s usual role of overseeing and shepherding the construction of the bill.

Visclosky has begun his third year as chair of the Energy and Water Subcommittee, on which he has served for over a decade, and has been a member of the House Appropriations Committee since October 1991.

Visclosky said that U.S. Rep. Ed Pastor, D-Ariz., has agreed to manage, in his place, the assembly of the Fiscal Year 2010 Energy and Water appropriations bill.

“I am an institutionalist and I believe that meticulous consideration of the bill is vitally important,” Visclosky said. “But I anticipate there will be some who for partisan political advantage will try to disrupt the orderly consideration of the bill. As a member who respects the committee and the appropriations process, I thought this was a reasonable step to prevent that from happening.”

“I did not want any distractions created that would impede the full and thoughtful deliberation of this coming year’s Energy and Water appropriations bill,” Visclosky also said.

That bill will fund, roughly to the tune of $30 billion, a variety of programs, including flood control, nuclear weapons, cleanups, and energy policy, Visclosky noted, and the chair of the subcommittee typically does “a lot” to manage the bill. “You have $30 billion and you put the bill together in conjunction with the ranking member. It’s been the culture of the subcommittee to work together to assemble all the parts.”

The subcommittee then reports back with the completed bill to the full Appropriations Committee, which in turn introduces the bill to the full House.

Visclosky said that he asked Pastor to manage the bill, rather than ranking member Chet Edwards, D-Texas, because Edwards chairs another subcommittee. Pastor is a senior member of the subcommittee in his own right, Visclosky said, “and he knows the issues too.”

“I do not want people, because of circumstances, to disrupt the orderly deliberation and I thought this was the most elegant way to avoid that,” Visclosky said.

“Throughout my career in Congress I have conducted myself with integrity out of respect for the people who I represent, the House of Representatives, and myself,” Visclosky said in a statement released separately by his office. “I have represented the people of Northwest Indiana to the best of my ability and I have always abided by the law and adhered to the rules and code of ethics of the House. . . . As we work through this process, I intend to work as hard as I always have on behalf of the people of Northwest Indiana.”

On Friday Visclosky announced that the Department of Justice has issued subpoenas to his two campaign committees, his congressional office in both Washington, D.C., and Merrillville, and to certain of his employees requesting documents related to PMA, reportedly under investigation by the FBI.

Associates of PMA--which since 1989 specialized in obtaining lucrative government contracts or “earmarks” for its high-tech clients--as well as associates of Êthe clients themselves have donated hundreds of thousands of dollars to Visclosky’s campaign committees.

It was reported in February that three contributors to Visclosky’s campaign committees--listed in Federal Election Commission records as PMA associates--appear to have had no true affiliation with PMA at all. Visclosky quickly followed that revelation with the announcement that he would return a total of $18,000 in contributions made over the last two election cycles by those three men.

Posted 6/2/2009