Democrats are accusing House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) of canceling a hearing on the Financial Crisis Inquiry Commission this week because his committee uncovered documents which wouldn’t have fit his narrative about what went wrong with the agency.
Peter Kadzick, an attorney for FCIC Chairman Phil Angelides, told TPM that Angelides arrived in D.C. on Sunday night for the Wednesday morning hearing but was told by an Issa staffer on Monday evening that “they had found some documents at the last minute that didn’t fit the narrative.”
The Democrats’ report on the committee’s investigation says that Issa’s accusations about the FCIC were “largely unsubstantiated.”
In addition, Democrats said the information uncovered by congressional investigators raises “a host of new ethical questions about Republican commissioners and staff, including evidence that they leaked confidential information to outside parties on multiple occasions.”
Jeffrey Solsby, a spokesman for Issa’s committee, told TPM and other media outlets including the Wall Street Journal, that the hearing “was postponed to allow further review and analysis of the material gathered in the investigation.” He declined further comment.
The hearing had been intended to “explore what went wrong and what Congress can learn from the experience of the FCIC as it considers how to address the root causes of the financial crisis as well as whether to create such commissions in the future,” according to a staff briefing memo obtained by TPM.
Additional reporting by Susan Crabtree.
Ryan J. Reilly
Ryan J. Reilly is a D.C.-based reporter for TPM. Prior to joining TPM, he worked for a news website covering the Justice Department and was a researcher for Bloomberg News. His email address is ryan(at)talkingpointsmemo.com.
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