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Watchdog calls for DOJ investigation of Romney’s financial forms
A watchdog called for an investigation Friday into Republican presidential front-runner Mitt Romney’s inaccurate financial disclosure filing.
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) wants the Justice Department to look into the incorrect filings that “omit at least 23 investments” and were filed with the Office of Government Ethics (OGE), the group states.
“Mr. Romney says the errors are minor, but then again he also claims earning $374,000 in speaking fees isn’t much money,” CREW executive director Melanie Sloan said in a statement.
“In reality, filing an inaccurate disclosure form can be a criminal offense. As a result, the Office of Government Ethics should forward the matter on to the Department of Justice to determine whether Mr. Romney deliberately withheld information.”
OGE should refer the case to the Department of Justice to investigate if the mistakes were deliberate because OGE does not have enforcement authority, CREW stated in a letter to OGE acting director Don Fox.
CREW states that there are “at least” 23 investments left off the financial disclosure form included in his personal tax returns, which were released this week. Eleven of those “are held in foreign countries known to be offshore tax havens.”
"The inescapable fact is that by releasing over 600 pages of information regarding his finances, Mitt Romney is clearly coming down on the side of disclosure. Any document with this level of complexity and detail is bound to have a few trivial inadvertent issues,” Andrea Saul, a Romney spokeswoman, said in a statement.
Romney’s campaign will file an amendment to the financial disclosure, Saul added, calling the changes “minor” and “technical.” The “overall picture” of Romney and his wife’s finances will remain the same.
But CREW’s Sloan pointed to Romney’s reluctance to disclose his tax returns, saying “perhaps this was because he knew the 2010 return wouldn’t match up with the disclosure form.” Amending his form “is not sufficient” because “intentionally filing an inaccurate disclosure form is a federal crime,” she stated in the letter to Fox.
“[S]ome filers have been prosecuted for willfully filing inaccurate reports,” Sloan said. “Americans need to have confidence that everyone is held to the same standard.”
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