Democrats that control the U.S. House of Representatives want to establish two new committees to increase oversight over president Donald Trump and how his administration will actually spend the $2 trillion coronavirus emergency stimulus package signed into law last week.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) wants to establish the House Select Committee on the Coronavirus. This committee will consist of a bipartisan group of lawmakers that will ensure the $2 trillion allocated by Congress to heal the wounded U.S. economy amid the COVID-19 pandemic isn't misspent by the Trump administration.
"Where there's money, there's also frequently mischief," said Pelosi.
Majority Whip James Clyburn (D-SC) has been asked by Pelosi to chair the new committee. Most of the new committee's members will be Democrats. House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) will appoint the Republicans he wants to sit on the panel.
"Congress has taken an important step in meeting this crisis by passing three bills with over $2 trillion dollars in emergency relief," wrote Pelosi in a letter to House members. "We need to ensure those tax dollars are spent carefully and effectively."
Pelosi said the new select committee "will root out waste, fraud, and abuse. It will protect against price gouging and profiteering. It will press to ensure that the federal response is based on the best possible science and guided by the nation's best health experts."
Pelosi also wants to organize another House committee. This one will be a 9/11-style, independent commission that will investigate Trump's and his administration's response to the onset of the coronavirus pandemic.
Trump keeps receiving strong condemnation for initially downplaying the severity of the COVID-19 pandemic to protect his chances for re-election in November. Critics note Trump delayed the U.S. response to the pandemic despite being warned of its coming severity and its injurious effects in January by the U.S. Intelligence Community.
"Anything that affects this many people in our country -- their health and affects our economy in such a major way, involves the allocation of so many trillions of dollars -- we really do have to subject to an after-action review," said Pelosi.
"Not to point fingers but to make sure that it doesn't happen again in the manner in which it happened."
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-CA) began circulating draft legislation about this independent board on Friday. The legislation will establish a panel of 10 members consisting of people of varying and relevant backgrounds to the healthcare crisis. The board will exclude current administration officials.
The board will also examine how governments at the federal, state and local levels, and the private sector, responded to the pandemic. The legislation will give the new board the power to hold hearings and a subpoena power; make preparedness recommendations to Congress and the Executive Branch. Thiss board, however, will begin its operations after February 2021, "hopefully after the pandemic has been overcome and after the presidential election," said Schiff's office.
"This is not an exercise in casting blame or scoring political points, but something that the American people should rightly expect from their government as an exercise in accountability," said Schiff in a statement.
McCarthy said Pelosi is being driven by a political motive to create "redundant" and unnecessary oversight.
