Pensions to Congress's convicts 'indefensible'

Posted by Christi Parsons at 4:02 pm CST

More than a dozen former members of Congress have felony convictions on their records but are still receiving taxpayer-funded pensions, and House members think that’s a crime.

On Tuesday, they voted unanimously to strip officials of their public retirement benefits upon conviction of official wrongdoing, including bribery and conspiring with foreign interests.

At present, only a conviction of a crime like treason or espionage requires forfeiture of a congressional pension, which means that lawmakers with other serious offenses on their rap sheets continue to draw benefits.

The Senate last week passed a similar measure disqualifying lawmakers convicted of official misconduct, bribery or related perjury, and the two chambers will now try to work out their differences on the matter.

“We have several hundred thousands dollars paid out of the treasury every year to convicted former members of Congress,” said Rep. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.), who has been pushing for a more sweeping version of the change for years. “These are public officials who were indicted, convicted and then lost all of their appeals. I think it’s indefensible.”

Rep. Robert Ney (R-Ohio), for example, convicted in a recent federal bribery investigation, at retirement age could qualify for a full pension of $29,000 by one estimate by the National Taxpayers Union. Rep. James Traficant (D-Ohio), convicted of bribery and racketeering five years ago, could get $40,000.

The measure passed Tuesday would require forfeiture of the pension benefit for conviction of offenses like bribing public officials and witnesses and wrongfully acting as agents of foreign principals. Perjury in investigations of those crimes would require forfeiture, also.

"In the past few years, America’s faith in Congress has been undermined by scandal after scandal,” said Rep. Nancy Boyda (D-Kansas), sponsor of the House measure. “I find it absurd that the politicians behind those scandals are still eligible for congressional pensions . . . This bill is a major step toward restoring the public trust in Congress."

But Kirk, who has been backing a more wide-ranging pension change for several years, thinks the list of crimes should be much longer, and include everything from tax evasion and wire fraud to intimidation of contributors and racketeering.

“We’ve had over a dozen members of Congress convicted of felonies, many of them for felonies not on the short list,” Kirk said. “I think it’s unfortunate if we pass reforms to cancel the pension but don’t do it right.”

Congress has considered similar pension changes in the past, but the House and Senate have never agreed on such a crackdown in the past.

But supporters say they hope the change will become law this time, as new Democratic leaders are making ethics reform one of their top priorities in the new Congress. Republicans lost control of Congress in last fall’s elections, fueled in part by voter anger over recent congressional ethics scandals.

“Congressional pensions are already more generous than those given to rank-and-file federal workers, not to mention those in the private sector,” said Pete Sepp, a spokesman for the National Taxpayers Union, a watchdog group also pushing for the change. “If Congress can’t get around to reforming the system, the least they can do is make sure that taxpayers don’t subsidize criminals.”