Some Industry Hit-List Letters to Issa Remain Secret

Despite a splashy media event publicizing industry complaints about federal regulations, House Oversight Committee Chairman Darrell Issa (R-CA) has withheld some of the wish-list letters he got from lobby groups who may be campaign contributors.

Democrats on the panel have been urging Issa to live up to the transparency vows he has made publicly, asking him to share the complete set of anti-regulatory letters he solicited from industry groups.

Issa on February 7, 2011, released some of the letters he had received in response to his solicitation to 150 industry groups. The responses were published in an unsearchable 20 megabyte pdf file, which hardly made it easy for journalists or the public to research the results.

The watchdog group Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW) has released a searchable version of the documents Issa released.

• Previous Stories: WatchDog of January 26, 2011, EJToday Headlines of February 8, 2011,  and February 2, 2011.
• Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW): "Crew Posts the Letters Issa Won't," Release of January 25, 2011; "CREW Releases Searchable Version of Issa Documents," Release of February 8, 2011.