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Ranking member on Judiciary considering options to probe Sestak offer details
The ranking member on the House Judiciary Committee said Monday that he's studying options for investigating the Sestak affair if the administration does not responded to calls for an inquiry.
Rep. Joe Sestak (D-Pa.) said Friday that former President Bill Clinton had conveyed an offer of an administration post if Sestak did not run against Sen. Arlen Specter for the Democratic Senate nomination. Sestak said he immediately brushed off the offer, and White House counsel Bob Bauer released a memo Friday saying "we have concluded that allegations of improper conduct rest on factual errors and lack a basis in the law."
Smith also doubted the ability of the Department of Justice to conduct an "objective investigation," saying that the department was "too politicized."
The congressman said a probe was warranted because of "so many suspicions that have been raised."
"If it was a presidential advisory board, which one?" Smith said of the offer and lack of elaboration on details.
Sestak told reporters that he couldn't remember the exact offer, but "at the time I heard the words presidential board ... it was about either intelligence or defense."
Smith said the "factual errors" blamed in the White House memo "could be not getting their stories right."
"We will never know if all we do is rely upon what the White House tells us," he said, adding that he was "not exactly holding my breath for the Judiciary Committee" to open an investigation into the affair.
Smith said he still has options on the table, including conducting a minority hearing or exercising an option of inquiry.
"Those options I will consider in the next couple of weeks," Smith said.
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