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Waxman Asks Cheney to Come Clean: Says Cheney should divulge identities of members of the White House's secret energy task force and specifics about Enron.
In April 2001 Reps. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., and John Dingell, D-Mich asked the GAO to provide information on the White House energy panel.
The White House refused to hand over the information to the GAO. In June the GAO sent Vice President Cheney a letter ordering him to turn over the information. Cheney refused. (See: GAO Investigates Cheney - Congress Pressures Cheney for Names).
Since 9/11 nothing much has happened on this. Not until now. On 12/04/01 Rep. Henry Waxman, House Committee on Government Reform, sent a letter to Cheney that says, in part:
"... release information about secret contacts your energy task force had with Enron Corporation, which filed for bancruptcy on December 2. Press reports indicate that Enron -- a major Republican contributor -- had detailed communications with the task force and other senior Administration officials. In light of Enron's financial collapse, it is important to know whether Enron communicated pertinent facts about its financial situation to the task force. It is also important to know to what extent the task force relied on information from Enron that may have been unreliable or self-serving.
I have previously written to express my concern about your task force's meetings with top energy company executives, many of whom contributed heavily to the Republican party. While you have refused to disclose information about these secret meetings, I hope that Enron's recent and sudden collapse amidst allegations of serious financial improprieties will cause you to reconsider your position."
(The full text of Rep. Waxman's 12/04 letter to V.P. Cheney may be downloaded here (580K PDF format)).
If Rep. Waxman and the GAO are successful, it will not be surprising to learn that Enron and other energy related companies had a large part to play in developing the current energy strategy which includes drilling for oil in the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR). (see: our archive of the USFSW ANWR website for more on the refuge).
It is no secret that the Bush administration is an oil administration. President George W. Bush's family has been running oil companies since 1950. Vice President Dick Cheney spent the late '90s as CEO of Halliburton, the world's largest oil services company. National Security Advisor Condoleezza Rice sat on the board of Chevron. Chevron named an oil tanker after her. Commerce Secretary Donald Evans was the CEO of Tom Brown Inc. -- a natural gas company with fields in Texas, Colorado and Wyoming -- for more than a decade.
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