Issue Position: Transparency in Congress

Issue Position

Charged with Speaker John Boehner with leading the transition, Greg Walden helped put in place the reforms laid out in the Pledge to America to begin restoring the public trust. These reforms include:

1. Read the bill. A requirement that legislation be available online for 3 days before a vote so that members of Congress and the American people have time to understand legislation.

2. A requirement that all bills include a citation of constitutional authority so that Congress respects the limits imposed on it by our founding document.

3. Changes to House rules to make it harder to increase spending and easier to cut it so that we begin a new era of fiscal responsibility in Washington.

4. An end to the practice of passing "comprehensive" or "omnibus" bills that package unrelated legislation together in an effort to avoid public scrutiny.

A ban on earmarks -- a first and necessary step to rein in out-of-control spending

House Republicans, led by Greg Walden and the GOP leadership, made the commonsense decision to place a total moratorium on earmark spending projects until out-of-control federal spending is brought under control.

Protecting the government watchdogs

To ensure a robust and healthy press corps, Greg Walden strongly supports a federal shield law for reporters -- much like many states already have on the books -- that would enable reporters to protect sources and pursue investigative stories without fear of reprisal from the government officials. Sensitive national security information would be exempt from the shield law.

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