Small Business Jobs and Tax Relief Act

Floor Speech

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Mr. GRASSLEY. Madam President, President Obama and his administration claim to be open and above board in their actions. As recently as July 1, the White House Chief of Staff, Jack Lew, told a television audience:

This administration has been the most transparent administration ever.

So I come to the floor now to say that is simply not the case, and I am going to highlight an outstanding example of how it is not the case.

Last month, an attorney with the Department of Justice from the Civil Rights Division attended a public meeting in Louisiana--a public meeting in her official capacity. Before the meeting began, this attorney, Rachel Hranitzky, reportedly asked whether any representatives of the media were present at this meeting. A reporter from the Daily Iberian identified himself. This Justice Department attorney then announced: ``You can quote those who speak, but you can't quote me.''

On what basis does the Justice Department presume to tell a reporter who can be quoted at a public meeting? The reporter had the same question. It has been reported that he asked her to cite legal authority which would support her claim that he could not quote a Justice Department attorney at a public meeting. Ms. Hranitzky provided no such law. She did say the Justice Department has special rules on how its attorneys can be quoted. She did not back up that statement, however. So here is a public meeting anyone could attend and hear a lawyer from their government speak on civil rights enforcement. Yet a representative of that government claimed that it was the policy of the Justice Department that the press would have fewer rights than the general public to quote what that government representative said at that public meeting. This undercuts the claim that ``[t]his Administration has been the most transparent administration ever,'' going back to the quote of the Chief of Staff.

This refusal to allow the public to know how government officials are performing their job is totally unacceptable--and I hope to everybody it would be unacceptable.

As appalling as this reported action was, what followed was even worse. Ms. Hranitzky tried to kick the reporter out of an open meeting because he questioned her. She relented after he said--regrettably but understandably, in my view--that he would not quote her.

Then the Justice Department attorney totally abused her power, according to press reports. She told the reporter she could have the Justice Department call the newspaper's publishers or editors and say something such as this: You don't want to get on the Department of Justice's bad side.

That statement represents a raw abuse of power.

We expect the Justice Department to investigate law-breaking and pursue appropriate cases without regard to politics. Threatening to use the power to bring a criminal case or civil action against any entity because it had the temerity to insist that the Department of Justice obey the first amendment is outrageous.

The newspaper has protested to the Justice Department and has not, to my knowledge, received any response. The Department's public comment on the incident does not deny that any of the reported statements were made.

That the Civil Rights Division and the Department of Justice have not committed to allowing the press to quote its attorneys at public meetings a month after one of its attorneys has claimed that it is the Department's policy not to permit such reporting is completely unacceptable. It leads one to ask: What does the Civil Rights Division wish to hide?

I have received many complaints concerning the enforcement actions of the Civil Rights Division. When the division's attorneys will not allow themselves to be quoted, we can only conclude that they are saying things about enforcing the law that the American people would never accept.

There are no statutes that deny the media the right to quote statements of Justice Department officials that are made at public meetings. If there were, they would violate the first amendment's protection of freedom of speech as well as protection of freedom of the press. There should be no Justice Department policies to that effect either, and for the very same reason.

This administration says it is transparent. It wants people to believe that, but then it wants to prevent the press from reporting what it says in public. To carry out that plan, it threatens those reporters with a politically motivated legal action. That is thuggish, not transparent.

To the extent the Department has a policy of preventing the press from quoting the statements of its attorneys at public meetings, that policy should be reversed immediately to comply with the first amendment. Whether it has a policy or not, the attorney who claimed that such a policy existed and tried to expel the reporter from a public meeting because he might quote her, and threatened the reporter for getting on the Department of Justice's bad side, should be appropriately disciplined.

I suggest the absence of a quorum.

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