Has the Swamp Been Drained? Pelosi & Boehner Trade Blows

ABC News’ Matthew Jaffe reports: Just before the House Ethics Committee convened this afternoon to assess ethics charges against Rep. Charlie Rangel, D-NY, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Minority Leader John Boehner today argued about Pelosi’s efforts to “drain the swamp” of corruption in the House. “Drain the swamp, we did it because this was a terrible place and we made a tremendous difference and I take great pride in that,” Pelosi said this morning at her weekly news conference. “Are there going to be individual issues to be dealt with? Yes. I never said that there wouldn’t be, but we would have a process to deal with it and it would internal and it would be external.” When Pelosi tried to wrest control of the House from Republicans in 2006, she vowed to “drain the swamp” of GOP corruption. “Individual discretions are not right,” she said today. “They must be judged and there must be accountability and there must be transparency, not to condone that. What I’m talking about is the public trust that what we do here – in terms of passing legislation and the rest – is about the people’s interest, not a criminal syndicate operating out of this place.” While Pelosi tried to avoid commenting specifically on Rangel’s case, she said the Ethics panel process will run its course and the political ramifications of the case in an election-year will be known in due time. “The process will work. It’s bipartisan,” Pelosi said of the panel. “And the chips will have to fall where they may politically, but upholding the highest ethical standards is a top priority for us.” At his own press conference only minutes later, Boehner disagreed. “The fact is the swamp has not been drained,” he said. “I think that the American people expect that their members of Congress should be held to a high ethical standard,” he said. With the House poised to start its summer break this weekend, Boehner said, “Our members are going to be out there doing town hall meetings. What are the Democratic members going to be doing? They’re going to go hide.” -Matthew Jaffe