By Tara Kavaler ||Arizona Republic
Now in control of the U.S. House of Representatives, Republicans have promised to hold the Biden administration accountable for its actions on a wide range of fronts, something they argue that Democrats failed to do when their party held a majority in Congress.
Much of this will take place before the House Committee on Oversight and Accountability, the House’s main investigative panel on which Republican Reps. Andy Biggs and Paul Gosar of Arizona sit. Biggs and Gosar, who were among former President Donald Trump’s most loyal supporters on Capitol Hill, also are a couple of President Joe Biden’s most unrelenting GOP critics.
Gosar spokesperson Anthony Foti told The Arizona Republic in a written statement that Gosar “is looking forward to restoring government accountability that has been absent under the Biden regime and it begins with investigating Biden’s support for an invasion along the southern border in which the Congressman’s district is ground zero. No stone will be left unturned.”
Gosar and other House Republicans have taken heat for referring to immigration as an invasion, rhetoric embraced by white nationalists.
Among the other issues important to Gosar: Biden’s handling of classified documents, the administration’s potential interference with social media companies to restrict speech and using government agencies such as the Department of Justice and the FBI to go after political adversaries.
In a written statement, Biggs told The Republic: “The House Oversight & Accountability Committee will hold the federal government responsible for its actions. Members of the Committee will ensure that the federal government does not abuse its power over the American people. In the 118th Congress, we’ll be examining the Biden Border Crisis, the COVID response, the Biden Family, Big Tech censorship, Ukraine funding, and much more. We’ll leave no stone unturned.”
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What is the House oversight committee’s role?
The House oversight committee has become hyperpoliticized in recent history, but hasn’t always been that way.
“At times in the past, oversight was regarded as not particularly interesting or newsworthy. Things such as procurement reform, which is important but not attention-grabbing,” said John J. “Jack” Pitney Jr., professor of government at Claremont McKenna College and an expert on how Congress works. “It is very clear that the vision of the majority on the oversight committee is simply to score points against the Biden administration. And so the mission of the minority is to undercut that effort.”
