Posted on 10/04/2010 2:34:56 PM PDT by cd jones
Topic: White Water House says taxpayers should not be stuck with $285,864 fine.
AP 2-4-98 JIM ABRAMS
By JIM ABRAMS Associated Press Writer
WASHINGTON (AP) The House resolved Wednesday that taxpayers should not have to pay $285,864 in sanctions a court levied on a senior presidential aide for misleading statements made about the White House's health care reform task force. The nonbinding resolution, passed 273-126, states that the sanctions imposed by a U.S. District Court judge on Ira Magaziner in December should not come out of public funds.
"Today the House can send the president a message. Mr. President, protect the taxpayers. It is wrong to make taxpayers pay this fine," said House Ways and Means Committee Chairman William Archer, R-Texas.
Judge Royce C. Lamberth said Magaziner, who headed the 1992 health care reform task force, and other White House advisers misled the court by insisting that the task force was composed of only federal employees when it was not. He ordered that $285,864 be paid to a doctors' group that sued to get access to the task force's deliberations and the failed effort to devise a national health care plan.
The White House has said that if the ruling stands the sanctions will be paid from government funds.
Sixty-four Democrats joined 209 Republicans in backing the resolution, offered by Rep. J.D. Hayworth, R-Ariz., but some Democrats pointed out that it was of little importance because it is not legally binding. "The only impact this debate will have on the Treasury is the extra few thousand dollars it will cost us to print this silly debate," said Rep. Barney Frank, D-Mass.
But Rep. Jim Kolbe, R-Ariz., a member of the House Appropriations Committee, said the resolution should send a message to the White House that if the court fees are paid from public funds Congress may cut future funding for the White House by a similar amount.
Concerns were raised by several lawmakers about setting a precedent by making a government employee personally responsible for fines levied against government offices.
"It could have an impact," said Rep. Benjamin Cardin, D-Md., "a psychological effect and a chilling effect on people who want to serve their government on task forces that look at problems."
I would give anything to go back to 1998, Clinton and all.
The House resolved Wednesday that taxpayers should not have to pay $285,864 in sanctions a court levied on a senior presidential aide for misleading statements made about the White House's health care reform task force. The nonbinding resolution, passed 273-126, states that the sanctions imposed by a U.S. District Court judge on Ira Magaziner in December should not come out of public funds.
I find myself stuck in ‘whitewater’, ‘monica’ era.... have bunch of FR stuff from then. Now that was intertainment!
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