Today, Barney Frank announced that he is permanently banning his committee staff from communicating with Peter Roberson, a former aide whom Frank fired after he learned Roberson was in talks to represent Intercontinental Exchange Inc., the world's largest derivatives clearinghouse, on the Hill. Roberson left and took the job with the group. Now, says Frank:
Stories about this correctly noted that there is a one year ban on his interaction with members of the Committee staff, but I do not think that is adequate. I am therefore instructing the staff of the Financial Services Committee to have no contact whatsoever with Mr. Roberson on any matters involving financial regulation for as long as I am in charge of that Committee staff.
This is definitely a laudable step, going above and beyond the one-year contact ban any staffer now faces if they leave the Hill to become a lobbyist. But Roberson can still lobby the Senate Banking Committee, and other former staffers who left the committee more than a year ago are free to lobby whomever they want. I've asked Senate Banking Committee Chair Chris Dodd's office if the senator will consider banning Roberson as well, and if they will consider extending the one-year ban to any of their staff members who have left for K Street.
Frank obviously intends this as a harsh deterrent measure for a staffer who joined the committee recently and worked on a piece of legislation while negotiating employment with a private interest, not a general policy. But if a ban of this proportion -- for the length of a member of Congress' term in charge of a committee-- is appropriate here, why shouldn't it be applied more broadly? That is to say, if you worked for a committee chair, you would be banned from lobbying that committee while that member was in charge. I can think of a few reasons why this might be a bad idea, but it seems to make more sense than the arbitrary year-long time period.
-- Tim Fernholz
