Political Quotes

“periodically, I report to the Senate on the work of the Rules Committee investigation into alleged fraud and irregularities that may have affected the outcome of the 1996 Louisiana Senate election. Our committee is conducting this investigation under the authority given the Senate pursuant to article 1, section 5 of the Constitution of the United States. Briefly recapping, I reported on May 8 of the committee's efforts to secure a bipartisan investigation. On May 23, I reported our efforts to obtain the detail of FBI agents to the committee and the agreement to issue over 130 subpoenas, although for election records only. Then, on June 26, I reported that the Rules Committee Democrats had, unexpectedly, withdrawn from the investigation--after only 2 weeks of committee action in the field. FBI support, likewise, was terminated by the Attorney General. I also reported that the results of the investigation had revealed a significant failure, by election officials, in numerous Louisiana statutory provisions designed to safeguard the election from voter fraud. Given these numerous breaches of law, although many appeared to be unintentional, I believed the Senate had an obligation to examine a broad number of areas where the potential for fraudulent acts and voting could have occurred. On July 31, the committee authorized me to continue the preliminary investigation and granted me, by resolution, the authority to issue subpoenas.”