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\n

Sen. Jon Ossoff is honing a new line of attack against his opponent for reelection, GOP Rep. Mike Collins, by zeroing in on an ongoing House Ethics Committee investigation into allegations that Collins\u2019 congressional office misused taxpayer dollars.<\/p>\n

\u201cCongressman Collins must cooperate with this investigation, he must commit to testifying and he must explain to the public and the press why he has refused to cooperate, why he has obstructed, and why he has stonewalled this investigation to date,\u201d Ossoff, a Georgia Democrat, said during a Tuesday morning press conference.<\/p>\n

His comments come at a pivotal moment on two fronts. On the campaign trail, the midterms are fast approaching and Ossoff is fighting to hang onto his seat \u2014 and Democrats, in turn, are counting on the incumbent to help the party reclaim the Senate majority in one of this election cycle\u2019s most closely-watched races.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, on Capitol Hill, there\u2019s been a renewed focus<\/u><\/a> in recent months on the need to hold members accountable for misconduct, and a bipartisan effort to overhaul the congressional ethics process is currently underway.<\/p>\n

The Office of Congressional Conduct \u2014 a nonpartisan, quasi-independent entity tasked with vetting and reviewing ethics complaints to then pass onto the House Ethics Committee \u2014 in January released a report<\/u><\/a> saying it found \u201csubstantial reason to believe\u201d that Collins\u2019 office used official funds for unauthorized purposes. Those purposes, according to the report, included appearing to hire and pay \u201ca district intern who had a preexisting personal romantic relationship with the office of chief of staff who did not perform duties commensurate with her compensation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Collins\u2019 chief of staff at the center of the accusations, Brandon Phillips, is no longer on payroll.<\/p>\n

The Office of Congressional Conduct further noted in its report that Collins \u201crefused to cooperate\u201d with its review and recommended the House Ethics Committee issue the lawmaker with a subpoena. Ossoff on Tuesday argued that Collins needs to \u201ccooperate fully with this matter\u201d and that \u201cthis is not going away.\u201d<\/p>\n

A Collins\u2019 campaign spokesperson, Meyer Siegfriend, said in a statement Tuesday afternoon that \u201cRep. Collins has fully cooperated with the House Ethics Committee on this bogus, politically motivated complaint and looks forward to the committee fully clearing him in short order\u201d \u2014 something Ossoff \u201cwould know if [he] weren\u2019t too busy abandoning Georgia to suck up to liberal activist donors in the Hamptons.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Office of Congressional Conduct did not immediately respond to a request for comment and the Ethics Committee, which is now conducting its own inquiry, does not comment on pending cases.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Sen. Jon Ossoff is honing a new line of attack against his opponent for reelection, GOP Rep. Mike Collins, by zeroing in on an ongoing House Ethics Committee investigation into allegations that Collins\u2019 congressional office misused taxpayer dollars. \u201cCongressman Collins must cooperate with this investigation, he must commit to testifying and he must explain to […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-26912","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-congress"],"amp_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26912","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=26912"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/26912\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=26912"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=26912"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/bluelightnews.com\/category\/politics\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=26912"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}