Congress struggles with questions about ethics investigations after 3 members resign

WASHINGTON — U.S. Senate Republican leaders Tuesday defended the secretive process used in that chamber to investigate allegations of wrongdoing, though they did confirm referring a complaint made against Arizona Democratic Sen. Ruben Gallego to the Ethics Committee.

“At the beginning, we always start very, very privately to protect members because we don’t want to facilitate frivolous accusations,” said Senate Ethics Committee Chairman James Lankford, R-Okla. “We want to facilitate accurate accusations. And actually work through to be able to hold each other to account.”

The comments came just a few hours after Speaker Mike Johnson, R-La., said he would lead the effort on that side of the Capitol to improve the process for filing an ethics complaint, especially those that have to do with sexual harassment.  

“You may know this, I have two daughters who work on Capitol Hill on committee staff. (This is) very serious to me. I’m a father. I’m not just the speaker of the House,” he said. “For that very reason we have to protect women and anyone who feels like there is any inappropriate behavior whatsoever. So if there are ways to tighten the rules, suggestions, we’re seeking that from all members. We’re open to that.”

Johnson said he hoped that any votes to change House rules would be bipartisan, if not unanimously adopted. He also reflected on a long history of misconduct by members of Congress. 

“There’s always been untoward activity among political figures. I mean going back to time immemorial. There’s always been marital infidelity. There’s always been despicable behaviors,” he said. “It occurs to us that it may not have been exposed and as transparent as it is today because of the very active press corps and 24-hour news cycle and smartphones and everything being recorded.”

Discussions around whether to keep ethics rules and investigations as they are now or overhaul the process began last week after California Democratic Rep. Eric Swalwell and Texas Republican Rep. Tony Gonzales both resigned amid sexual misconduct allegations. 

Florida Democratic Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick then resigned Tuesday just before the House Ethics Committee could recommend what repercussions she should face after the panel found her guilty on more than two dozen violations. 

GOP accusation on social media

Swalwell’s resignation may not be the end of that scandal, however. 

Florida Republican Rep. Anna Paulina Luna wrote in a social media post on April 15 that it “seems like the Senate has its own trash to take out. @LeaderJohnThune You need to look into the allegations against one of your Senators, it’s very disturbing. My chief will be contacting your chief.”

Her comments apparently referred to Arizona’s Gallego, who was friends with Swalwell, but has sought to distance himself from the former congressman since news of the allegations by multiple women broke earlier this month. 

Thune said during Tuesday’s press conference that “specific matter” has been referred to the Senate Ethics Committee and that he didn’t “know the particulars of the allegation.”

“The Ethics Committee in the Senate is designed to ensure that this institution and its members conduct themselves in a way befitting of the office and that we’re doing things in an ethical manner,” Thune said.  

Gallego’s office did not immediately respond to a request for comment. 

‘A quiet manner’

Lankford said Senate Ethics Committee members are “extremely serious about taking on allegations, especially allegations like sexual harassment, all the different things that are out there … But we do function in a quiet manner.”

The committee, he said, gets “hundreds of different allegations” that its members then work through to determine if they should proceed. 

“As you know, in the political world that we live in, a lot of allegations come to us that they’re unfounded at the end of it,” Lankford said. 

The Senate Ethics Committee, he said, is unlikely to move to a model similar to that of the House Ethics Committee, which releases statements when it begins investigations into members, sometimes detailing the allegations. 

“There’s a lot more public that comes out on it and they find out at the end of it that it becomes the theater of the allegation,” Lankford said. “So it facilitates more allegations because it creates more theater.”

The Senate panel hasn’t published a press release since August 2024 and its two-page report for 2025 disclosed the committee dismissed 160 of 181 alleged violations due to “lack of subject matter jurisdiction” or because “they failed to provide sufficient facts as to any material violation of the Senate rules beyond mere allegation or assertion.”

The annual report adds the Senate panel issued zero “private or public letters of admonition” and had no “matters resulting in a disciplinary sanction.”

The last time the committee issued a public letter was in March 2023, after South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham solicited “campaign contributions in a federal building” for Georgia senatorial candidate Herschel Walker. 

Lankford later expanded during the afternoon press conference on his belief that some ethics allegations are more political than genuine. 

“Our focus is all folks have to be heard on this but we live in a political world. In a political world if every ethics charge goes out there, everyone then grabs that ethics charge, uses it in a campaign and says ‘There’s been an ethics charge out there, the Ethics Committee is talking about it.’ And suddenly it becomes drama and facilitates more things coming at us,” he said. “We want to take seriously every victim, every accusation. But we also understand the environment that we work in.”