Democrats Target Gingrich in Another Ethics Complaint : Congress: The Speaker broke House rules in using a taxpayer-funded journal to promote the sale of materials from a course he teaches, they say.

By MICHAEL ROSS

March 9, 1995 12 AM PT

TIMES STAFF WRITER

WASHINGTON — Democrats filed another formal ethics complaint against House Speaker Newt Gingrich on Wednesday, accusing the Georgia Republican of violating House rules by using a taxpayer-funded journal to promote the sale of audiocassettes and videotapes from a controversial college course he teaches.

“This isn’t the Home Shopping Network. This is the House of Representatives. And Newt Gingrich has no business using a 1-800 number to hawk videotapes on the House floor,” a fuming Minority Whip David E. Bonior (D-Mich.) said as he filed the latest in what are now four formal ethics complaints against Gingrich.

House rules prohibit members from using official resources to solicit support for outside organizations.

The latest charge refers to an incident last year in which Gingrich plugged his course on the House floor, reciting a toll-free number for ordering his lecture tapes. His remarks--and the phone number--were broadcast by C-SPAN and printed the next day in the Congressional Record, the official floor journal of the House and Senate. Democrats had failed to note the incident until it was described in news accounts last week.

In their complaint, the Democrats charged that on several occasions last year Gingrich used the House floor to promote his course, whose funding is also at the center of another complaint before the House Ethics Committee. That complaint alleges that the course, a mix of history and Gingrich’s views on social issues, is political in nature and should not have been funded by tax-deductible contributions channeled through a foundation closely tied to the Speaker and supported by conservative GOP contributors.

Gingrich, who has announced that he will give up teaching the course at an Atlanta-area college next week, branded the latest charge as nonsense and suggested that it was part of a media-aided plot by Democrats to destroy him.

“They have these daily strategy meetings to see how they can smear me and apparently this was the latest gimmick,” Gingrich said of the Democrats. Reporters who asked about it, Gingrich said, were helping Bonior to “fan a piece of nonsense into a serious story.”

He argued that the Constitution protects a member’s right “to say virtually anything on the House floor” and that reciting his toll-free number was not improper because he was only letting fellow members know how they could order the lectures, which cost $159.95 on audiocassette and $199.95 for the video versions.

“I didn’t sell them,” Gingrich said. “I just told members how they could get a copy if they wanted them.”

Bonior, however, said that the incident clearly violated House rules barring the use of official funds or other resources--in this case the Congressional Record--for private gain or outside causes.

“Newt Gingrich knows full well that you cannot use the Congressional Record to advertise or promote the work of an outside organization,” Bonior said. “As with so many of the other activities the Speaker is involved with, this doesn’t pass the smell test.”

While the two men traded accusations at rival news conferences, outside congressional observers saw merit in both their charges.

“Promoting your own course and reciting a 1-800 number on the House floor . . . lacks good taste and probably should not have been done. But, on the other hand, it probably rates pretty low down on the list of the world’s ethical abuses,” said University of Virginia political scientist Larry Sabato. He also noted that the new complaint served the Democrats’ partisan purpose of “keeping the heat on Gingrich” by ensuring that the focus of the media’s attention remains on questions about the Speaker’s ethics.

That impression was strengthened by the timing of the Democratic complaint. The incident occurred in April of last year, before Gingrich became Speaker. “No one took note of it or thought it worth mentioning back then, so you have to ask yourself--why now?” said a GOP leadership aide.

The Ethics Committee is already investigating three other complaints filed by Democrats against Gingrich, each centering on different facets of the complex web of political action committees, foundations, business dealings and campaign contributions that make up his political empire.

The complaints include allegations that Gingrich improperly accepted $200,000 worth of free air time by allowing his college lectures to be broadcast on cable television and that he initially sought to capitalize on the prestige of his office as Speaker by negotiating a lucrative book contract with a publishing house whose owner, media magnate Rupert Murdoch, has business interests pending before Congress.