On Wednesday the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee will hold a hearing to discuss a recent report issued by the Office of Special Counsel (OSC) that detailed White House Senior Counselor Kellyanne Conway’s repeat violations regarding the Hatch Act.
The Hatch Act restricts, as noted by the Oversight Committee’s statement announcing the hearing, federal employees, “from engaging in “political activity” on federal property, while “on duty,” when “wearing a uniform or official insignia identifying the office or position of the employee,” or when using government property, such as vehicles, computers, printers, copiers and telephones.”
As CNN reports Conway is not expected to attend setting up another likely court battle between the Trump Administration and the Democrat led House Committee.
On Monday CNN reported that White House Counsel Pat Cipollone wrote a letter to the House Oversight Chairman Elijah Cummings, telling the Democrat from Maryland, there has been a longstanding precedent of the White House declining to testify before Congress.
As you know, the precedent for members of the White House staff to decline invitations to testify before congressional committees has been consistently adhered to by administrations of both political parties, and is based on clearly established constitutional doctrines
Pat Cipollone, via CNN.
In response to the letter, Cummings said, “We cannot have people disobeying the law,” Cummings said. “The President is not above the law. And neither is Ms. Conway above the law.”
The OSC, which has no relationship to the Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Office, has called for Conway to be fired for her repeated violations of the Hatch Act.
