Later On

Eric Lipton reporting in the NY Times:

By most measures, it has been a rough year for Leo J. Wise, the first independent ethics cop for the House of Representatives. Lawyers are denouncing him as dangerous, lawmakers are threatening to cut his already limited powers, and a House committee has so far dismissed all but one case in which his office found evidence of wrongdoing.

And yet, in the weird world of Capitol Hill, by losing, Mr. Wise may actually be winning.

Wielding the sheer power of political shame over a Congress seemingly unwilling to police itself, he and his tiny band of lawyers in the Office of Congressional Ethics have helped spur worried party leaders to rein in abuses and make errant lawmakers pay a price.

This month, House Democratic leaders moved to ban the practice of awarding earmarks to private companies, long a source of scandals, a move that came just 12 days after the House ethics committee rejected recommendations from Mr. Wise’s office to further investigate two lawmakers for possible earmarks-related misconduct. And party leaders forced Representative Charles B. Rangel, Democrat of New York, to give up his gavel last month as chairman of the House Ways and Means Committee, even though the ethics panel only reprimanded him when Mr. Wise’s office found that he had improperly accepted a free Caribbean trip.

“I would not have bet on this outcome,” said Meredith McGehee, policy director at The Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan ethics group. “Leo may feel frustrated. But what he is doing is having a lot of impact.”

As chief counsel and staff director for the Office of Congressional Ethics, Mr. Wise — a soft-spoken, 33-year-old former Justice Department prosecutor with an impressive record of convictions — prepares detailed reports for each investigation, dossiers that the House is required to make public, even if it dismisses the accusation. And that, it turns out, has proved to be his best weapon. His 295-page report on the earmarks cases, chock-full of embarrassing details, was seized on by government watchdogs, editorial writers and political partisans in television advertisements, making it difficult to ignore on Capitol Hill.

“They had some pretty serious investigating,” said Representative Jeff Flake, Republican of Arizona, an opponent of earmarks who voted against creating Mr. Wise’s office but has since offered praise. “There is an impact, and it was certainly felt in this case.”

Just a month ago, Mr. Wise was telling colleagues that he was dispirited that the House ethics panel, the jury of sorts for the cases he brings, was repeatedly brushing aside or playing down his office’s findings. More recently, he has described himself as surprised but gratified by the unexpected results…

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