Resolution Relating to the Consideration of House Report 113-415 and an Accompanying Resolution, and Providing for Consideration of H. Res. 565, Appointment of Special Counsel to Investigate Internal Revenue Service

Floor Speech

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Mr. DUNCAN of Tennessee. Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Florida for yielding. I can't cover all of the issues that are being raised here today, but I do want to say this: I spent 7 1/2 years as a criminal court judge in Tennessee before coming to Congress trying felony criminal cases, and so I have interest in this question about the waiving of Fifth Amendment rights.

Let me just mention what some others have said about this. Alan Dershowitz of Harvard said Lois Lerner's statement of innocence opened a ``legal Pandora's box. You can't simply make statements about a subject and then plead the Fifth. Once you open the door to an area of inquiry, you have waived your Fifth Amendment right; you've waived your self-incrimination right on that subject matter.''

Paul Rothstein, a well-respected law professor at Georgetown University--and both of these gentlemen are very, very liberal politically. Professor Rothstein said of Lois Lerner, that she ``has run a very grave risk of having waived her right to refuse to testify on the details of things she has already generally talked about. She voluntarily talked about a lot of the same things that lawmakers wanted to ask her about in her opening statement. In that situation, when you voluntarily open up the subject they want to inquire into and it is all in the same proceeding, that would be a waiver.''

Cleta Mitchell, a lawyer who specializes in ethics laws stated, ``Lois Lerner came before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. She gave an opening statement in which she said, `I'm not guilty, I haven't done anything wrong.' The second way in which she waived her Fifth Amendment privilege was when she voluntarily, willingly, agreed to meet with the Department of Justice lawyers. To me, this is a pretty clear case of how she has waived her Fifth Amendment rights not to testify and not to answer questions. She just is being selective, and the one place she will not answer questions is with anyone that she thinks might ask her hard questions.''

Hans von Spakovsky of The Heritage Foundation, another legal expert, said, ``Under the applicable rules of the Federal courts in the District of Columbia, the interview she gave to prosecutors meant that she waived her right to assert the Fifth Amendment.''

The SPEAKER pro tempore (Mr. Hultgren). The time of the gentleman has expired.

Mr. NUGENT. I yield 30 seconds to the gentleman.

Mr. DUNCAN of Tennessee. If we allow somebody to come in and say they are not guilty--repeatedly say they haven't done anything wrong, if we allow people to say that and do that in these types of proceedings and then plead the Fifth, we are making a mockery of the justice system and making a mockery of the Fifth Amendment privilege in this country.

Last, I would just say this: there has been some mention about some liberal groups being targeted. There were over 200 conservative groups audited and targeted and investigated in this investigation. I think there were three that might have been classified as liberal.

It was so obvious what was intended by the IRS activities in this situation, and so I support this rule and support the underlying resolution.

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