CRS Senior Specialist Under Fire for Criticizing Agency

Thursday, Feb. 9 , By John McArdle, Roll Call Staff
One of the top analysts at the Congressional Research Service said that Director Daniel Mulhollan has ordered him to apologize by close of business Friday for writing a memorandum that criticized Congress’ nonpartisan research agency for an “incoherent” policy that advocates neutrality and suppresses the analytical skills of its researchers.

But CRS Senior Specialist Lou Fisher has indicated that an apology will not be forthcoming, and agency officials have not explicity outlined any punishment. Instead, the expert on separation of powers, who has written more than a dozen books on the subject and regularly testifies before Congress, has reached out to lawmakers to highlight what he believes to be growing problems at CRS.

In the past weeks, Fisher has sent letters to some 30 Members and a dozen Congressional committees expressing his concerns with the agency’s direction.

“CRS is now in a dumb down mode telling analysts that they must be ‘neutral’ in what they say and write and must not take ‘positions,'” he wrote a letter to one Senator.

“For my first 32 years at CRS I was encouraged to ‘speak out’ in defense of legislative prerogatives, separation of powers, checks and balances, and constitutional government,” Fisher wrote. “For reasons I don’t fully understand, the treatment within CRS is now punishment.”

Fisher goes on to argue that CRS is in danger of violating its original charter under the Legislative Reorganization Act of 1970, in which Congress formed the agency “to help keep the legislative institution strong and capable of functioning as a coequal branch.”

CRS spokeswoman Janine D’Addario confirmed today that Fisher has been asked to apologize to his supervisor for the “intemprent and contemptuous remarks” in his January memorandum, “which he has publicized far and wide.”

D’Addario called Fisher’s memo “harsh and unprofessional” but said she was not prepared to comment on what would happen if Fisher did not apologize.

In his January memo to Mulhollan, Fisher wrote, “I have testified before congressional committees about 38 times … I am invited because I have an expert opinion to share. … I am certainly not partisan in my CRS work or in my outside writings. But I have always considered myself free to analyze an issue on the basis of all available information and reach a professional conclusion. That is what other analysts do. … That is what the people I work with on the Hill – Republican and Democrat – expect. Anything short of that would be mere descriptive writing.”

Fisher wrote that he’s seen an increasing push by CRS administrators for “neutrality” in analytical work, a push that is against the agency’s core mission.

“If we err on the side of caution at every turn, we risk legitimate and much more serious criticism that our products lack analytical rigor, interest, and value.”

Fisher’s memo to Mulhollan was in response to a rebuke from Robert Dilger, Fisher’s supervisor in the Government and Finance Division, for comments Fisher made in a Jan. 10 article in Government Executive. Fisher was quoted as saying Congress and the court system “have overly deferred to the executive branch when it comes to punishing whistleblowers or suppressing information.”

Dilger’s memo to Fisher stated that the 35-year CRS veteran appeared “to compromise your ability to be perceived as meeting CRS standards of impartiality and objectivity.”

In a statement issued Thursday, Mulhollan wrote, “CRS researchers are instructed from the time they are hired that their role is an educative one, not an advocative one. If CRS is to serve all Members of Congress and all congressional committees, it must be understood to be equally valuable to those on competing sides of an issue.”

Mulhollan added that in their research and analysis for Congress, “CRS staff often reach conclusions that elucidate the issues presented. However, CRS must not suggest or appear to be suggesting that it has a policy position on an issue. If an appearance of imbalance or partisanship were to occur, those of our congressional clients with opposing views would understandably be less inclined to seek CRS services on that subject, or any other, in the future.”

In his January memo Fisher made it clear to Mulhollan that he knew his outspoken views on the direction in which CRS administrators are moving the agency could lead to punishment.

“I imagine in my status as a Senior Specialist I have few if any rights,” Fisher wrote to Mulhollan. “Clearly the leverage is with you and your aides. You can take steps to fire me. … If it comes to that we can go through the process and see what happens.”

Sen. Robert Byrd (D-W.Va.), one of the Members to whom Fisher sent a letter, came to the specialist’s defense.

“Lou Fisher is a scholar of integrity and insight,” Byrd said in a release today. “He has assisted me on many occasions. … The Republic needs people who understand the role of the Congress, who share a determination to protect the people’s liberties, and who are unafraid to point out when Congress abdicates that role or when another branch of government tries to steal it away. Quite simply, the Congress needs people like Lou Fisher with the brains and the backbone to help us do our work. I only wish that more people, including some who have sworn to protect and defend the Constitution, shared his passion.”

KJ