DCCC chairman decries GOP ‘hypocrisy’ on Countrywide

The top Democratic campaign official in the House is accusing his Republican counterpart of hypocrisy for attacking a Democrat over Countrywide loans, then deleting the attack from the campaign group’s website after it was revealed its own chairman was caught up in the same debacle.

“Where there’s hypocrisy, we’re going to call them out on it,” Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee Chairman Steve Israel told reporters Wednesday.

According to screenshots obtained by The Hill, the National Republican Congressional Committee posted a blog entry in 2009 criticizing Rep. Edolphus Towns (D-N.Y.) for blocking a Republican’s request to subpoena records from Countrywide Financial to determine whether members of Congress received preferential loans. At the time, Democrats controlled the House and Towns was chairman of the Oversight and Government Reform Committee.

When it was revealed that Towns had received loans from Countrywide, the NRCC hit Towns again, saying it raised the possibility Towns was part of a VIP program that gave preferential treatment to people in positions of power. Towns denied he had been given preferential treatment.

But the ensuing investigation by Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) resulted in four members of the House — all Republicans — being referred to the House Ethics Committee. On Tuesday, the name of the third member from that group was made public: Rep. Pete Sessions (R-Texas), chairman of the NRCC.

Within hours, the blog posts on the NRCC website were taken down.

“Mysteriously, Countrywide disappeared from their website last night. How strange. How strange,” Israel said. “The issue is hypocrisy. You can’t point the finger at somebody and then when you’re caught up in that mess, start deleting stuff from your website.”

The NRCC did not immediately respond to a request for comment. But on Tuesday, Sessions spokeswoman Torrie Miller said the congressman had been treated the same as every other customer.

“Out of an abundance of caution in managing his personal finances, Congressman Sessions specifically requested that he not be extended any special benefits or treatment from Countrywide,” Miller said.