From probing alleged abuses by the Internal Revenue Service to investigating government mistreatment of whistle blowers, few congressional panels generate as many headlines as the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
When the committee’s current chairman, California’s Darrell Issa, is term limited out of the high-profile job later this year, a pair of Ohio Republican congressmen are among those vying to succeed him in the next Congress.
The dueling Ohio contestants – Jim Jordan of Champaign County and Mike Turner of the Dayton area – hold western Ohio congressional districts on either side of the district represented by House Speaker John Boehner, who has publicly remained neutral in the contest to replace Issa.
Issa hasn’t publicly endorsed a successor, either. Two other congressmen besides the Ohioans have said they’re seeking the job: Utah’s Jason Chaffetz, who heads the Oversight Committee’s National Security Subcommittee, and Florida’s John Mica, who chairs its Government Operations subcommittee.
“He is supportive of any of the committee members that are interested,” said Issa’s spokeswoman, Becca Watkins.
Jockeying is expected to begin in earnest after November’s election, when members of Congress return to Washington to organize for the following year’s legislative activities. Roughly 30 members of the House Republican Steering Committee will decide who gets the post.
In past chairmanship races, factors including seniority in Congress, fundraising for GOP causes, legislative expertise, popularity and political ideology have influenced the decision.
MikeTurner.JPGDayton-area GOP Rep. Mike Turner is also seeking the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee chairmanship.Sabrina Eaton, The Plain Dealer
Turner is the more senior of the two Ohioans seeking the job and the most politically centrist of the four candidates. He is a member of the Republican Main Street Partnership group for moderate Republicans, which is headed by former Bainbridge Township GOP Rep. Steve LaTourette.
His lifetime American Conservative Union vote rating is 75 percent, compared with 94 percent for Chaffetz, 93 percent for Mica and 100 percent for Jordan.
The Ohio pair also take different approaches at committee hearings, with Jordan, chair of its Economic Growth, Job Creation, and Regulatory Affairs Subcommittee, vigorously challenging witnesses about the IRS’ handling of tax exemption requests from conservative groups and teaming with Issa on letters to nettle the Obama administration.
Turner, 54, is less reliably confrontational than Jordan, although he’s made hearing headlines by describing the lavish “swag bags” dispensed at an IRS convention in California, and a General Services Administration convention in Las Vegas.
Turner, a former Dayton mayor who was elected to Congress in 2002, declared his candidacy in a June public statement. It said he sees the job as a way to “conduct responsible oversight and adopt meaningful reform to eliminate and prevent waste, fraud, and mismanagement” and that he’s received “support and encouragement from a large number of my colleagues.”
Turner subsequently told other news outlets he’d focus the committee more on ways to trouble-shoot government programs and less on chasing scandals, as Issa has done. He also said he’d like to work better with Democrats on the committee than Issa, who turned off the microphone of the committee’s top Democrat during one contentious episode.
An outspoken advocate of Wright-Patterson Air Force Base and of restoring pension cuts to Delphi retirees, Turner currently chairs a House Armed Services Subcommittee on Tactical Air and Land Forces. Last week, his office declined to comment on his chairmanship bid.
Jordan, a 50-year-old former wrestling coach and state legislator who was elected to Congress in 2006, has chaired the far-right House Republican Study Committee and acts as a spokesman for House of Representatives conservatives. Jordan’s staffers indicated his interest in the Oversight chairmanship last year.
In addition to his Oversight Committee work, which has included the IRS investigation and examining whether the federal government made banks drop the accounts of disfavored businesses, Jordan serves on the Judiciary Committee and the Select Committee on Benghazi. He has a law degree from Capital University but never practiced law.
Jordan said he believes the Oversight Committee plays a vital role in scrutinizing government activities and helping to define the differences in how each party views government functions and the reforms that need to be made.
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