DCWATCH
NOT MAKING FRIENDS, AND LIKING IT
LEO WISE ISN’ T ALL THAT DIFFERENT FROM
a lot of bright, thirtysomething Washing-
ton lawyers: He has a law degree from
Harvard and spent four years at the U.S.
Department of Justice as a prosecutor
rooting out corporate crime. He’s had
the public service bug forever—in high
school, he was president of Key Club
International. And he’s so polite and ear-
nest that his former Justice Department
colleague Colleen Conry, now a Ropes
& Gray partner, describes him as “Abe
Lincoln with blond hair.”
So why is Wise on his way to becom-
ing one of the least-liked lawyers on
Capitol Hill? He can thank lawmakers
themselves. Two years ago, the House of
Representatives, at the urging of Speaker
Nancy Pelosi (D-California), voted to
establish the Office of Congressional Eth-
ics. Wise, 32, left the Justice Department
in 2008 to become its founding staff direc-
tor and chief counsel. His task is to inves-
tigate complaints against lawmakers and
help quell public outrage over a series of
scandals involving House members.
The office is small—a $1.5 million bud-
get and a four-lawyer staff—and is largely
toothless: Wise has no subpoena power.
In essence, he investigates and reports
to a bipartisan board, but the House can
ignore him if it so chooses. Even as they
praise Wise, some anticorruption crusad-
ers have raised doubts
about his office. “It has to
rely entirely on the voluntary participa-
tion of witnesses, which really handcuffs
the agency,” says Craig Holman, chief
lobbyist for Public Citizen.
rare airing of congressional dirty laundry that likely would have remained
under wraps before.
Wise’s aggressiveness has sparked
criticism. The House Ethics Committee
excoriated Wise’s staff for the Graves
report and implicitly threatened to keep
similar reports secret in the future. Members of the Congressional Black Caucus,
speaking anonymously to Capitol Hill
newspapers, have wondered if they’re
being inordinately targeted, a charge
that Wise calls baseless. Representative
Marcy Kaptur (D-Ohio), who is under
investigation for contributions from lobbyists for the now-defunct PMA Group,
said she doesn’t see the purpose of the
Office of Congressional Ethics when the
House already has an ethics committee.
“I have never understood the difference,” Kaptur says.
A year from now, House members
will get to decide whether to keep Wise’s
office around, though he says he didn’t
come to Congress to please anyone. “At
the end of the day, if the House doesn’t
want an office that does this,” Wise says,
“then the House will get rid of it.”
—DAvID INGRAM
Versions of these articles first appeared in The
National Law Journal, a sibling publication of
Corporate Counsel.
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WHO’S IN THE LOBBY
Client
Registered
Lobby/Law Firm
Lobbyists
Issues
AT&T
Accenture
The Crane Group, Inc.
DIEGO M. RADZINSCHI
These highlights were selected by Corporate Counsel from recent lobbying registrations filed with the secretary of the Senate. Up to the first three lobbyists are listed.
Eli Lilly and Company
Grocery Manufacturers Association
Sidley Austin
Crowell & Morning International, Ltd.
Lucie Gokovich
Robert Hall III, Arthur Silverman, and
William Simmons
Kate Leeson and Daniel Maldonado
Mel Levine
Daniel Coats, Lloyd Hand, and Theodore
Hester
Peter Goodloe and William Sarraille
Kate Clemans and Henry Pistell
General telecommunications issues
Monitor Defense, Transportation, Interior, Homeland
Security, and Commerce appropriations issues
Health care reform legislation
Air Force air mobility program
Department of Homeland Security funding for
alternative nuclear detection
