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Rep. Shelley Berkley conducts office business in her home on Capitol Hill. After her failed Senate bid, the house has been put up for sale.
By Karoun Demirjian (contact) 
Sunday, Dec. 23, 2012 | 2 a.m.
Sun archives
Sun Archives
WASHINGTON — The House Ethics Committee ended more than a year of speculation about whether Rep. Shelley Berkley unethically advocated for policies to benefit her husband’s kidney care practice, finding her not guilty of the allegations we knew about and guilty of one — involving her husband’s unsettled accounts with Veterans Affairs — that we didn’t.
But the committee’s decision last week opens a new chapter of head-scratching over a greater question: What are the rules on routine congressional advocacy when that advocacy involves a lawmaker’s spouse — who also is a constituent?
It’s not expressly clear — and that’s one thing Berkley and the Ethics Committee agree on.
“The House should create much clearer guidance for the community and the public on conflicts-of-interest rules,” the Ethics Committee wrote in its decision. The committee "believes the time has come to engage in comprehensive review of the House’s conflicts standards so that they are clearer and more easily digested by the House community.”
The committee also cited its recent review of Rep. Maxine Waters, who was accused of using her position to give a bank her husband had a major stake in access to the Obama administration. The committee absolved her of guilt this year.
Berkley was accused of using her position to lobby colleagues in Congress against lowering Medicare payments for kidney care. She also worked to prevent the Obama administration from closing Las Vegas’ only kidney transplant center. Her husband, Dr. Larry Lehrner, is a kidney doctor whose firm holds the sole contract for that transplant center and serves many patients on Medicare.
The committee absolved Berkley of guilt on those points but found she did abuse her position when she urged Veterans Affairs to respond to her husband’s requests — more than one year’s worth, she said — to be paid for services provided to veterans.
“Berkley violated House rules and other laws, rules and standards of conduct by improperly using her official position for her beneficial interest by permitting her office to take official action specifically on behalf of her husband’s medical practice,” the committee wrote.
Berkley maintained she was just helping her husband the same as she would any constituent.
Berkley said in an interview Thursday that when she made the request to the VA to move things along in 2008, her office was dealing with several “major problems of doctors not getting paid by Medicare — and when this came up it was no different.”
“I treated my husband no differently than any other constituent,” she said.
And there is the crux of the problem.
When the House Ethics Committee this year determined it would conduct a full investigation of Berkley, ethics experts speculated that the charges against Berkley — and Waters — were uncharted territory for the 224-year-old House of Representatives.
“In the past, male legislators did not have wives who were involved in businesses,” Robert Stern, a visiting public policy professor at the University of California, Berkeley who is known for his research on ethics, told the Sun at the time. “They’re both female legislators accused of trying to help businesses owned by their husbands. It’ll be real interesting how these turn out.”
Berkley is picking up that refrain — and watching with keen interest how the conversation proceeds, as it is now a part of her congressional legacy.
“The rules have to change to keep up with the reality of the 21st century and the fact that there are more and more women here who are married to successful men — and how do you interact?” Berkley said. “If your spouse is your constituent and they have an issue, are they precluded by virtue of the fact that they are married to a congressperson from exercising their same rights as anybody else? Do they lose those rights?
“My situation is going to be front and center in that discussion,” she said.
For one, that this article didn't mention that Berkley's net worth spiked to $8 million dollars!!!, spiked because of simply helping a constituent???, means we now have a new definition of what's tragically comic!!! And it even leads to a second point needing to be made, that the editing of this article is what such an ommission comes down to, and only because you can rest assured that the LVRJ is down with having WHITE COLLAR CRIME spread in Nevada, period!!! I mean, bringing up Maxine Waters instead of Berkely's haul? Hey, the fact of the matter is that there has always been a concern that female representatives would be in Washington as cover for their husband's interests. SO NO NEW LAWS ARE NEEDED!!! And what's happened is that when the law makers had to come to grips with underhanded dealings that they even expected, still, they kicked the can down the road!!! PEOPLE WAKE UP, THE MIDDLE CLASS IS BEING PLAYED, AND ALL AND ONLY BECAUSE IT'S THE ONLY GROUP IN THE WORLD WITH POWER OTHER THAN THE RICH. PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, WAKE UP!!!
Looks like Joe Heck's accusations and those from that trashy show "The Agenda" were pointless - as anyone with a quarter of a brain cell knew. That's the real crime.
You got to wonder; when the NYT mentions you, perhaps your in the wrong party.The need for a national paper to point out this situation really illustrates that local reporting is mere propaganda. The rich doctor lobby continues making health care unaffordable for all with big brother Dr. Joe among others.
"If your spouse is your constituent and they have an issue, are they precluded by virtue of the fact that they are married to a congressperson from exercising their same rights as anybody else? Do they lose those rights?"
This is a red herring. A congressperson responding to a constituent is not generally getting a direct benefit. If other constituents were having the same problem as the spouse then there is a question of whether any benefit to the congressperson spouse is of concern. Berkeley cleary had a direct benefit and solely gained by her actions for her husband.
Barkley uses her political clout for her own gain - not the people. She is in the same class as harry reid, who has refused to tell us how he spends the money now going on 4 years. No budget Harry and he wants more tax money. I guess Barkley just follows in Reid's shoes - useless politicos wasting our dollars.
Why is it politicos, when campaigning for office, tell us they are so smart and have the answers to everything but, when caught with their hands in the cookie jar, tell us they're to dumb to know right from wrong? The use of common sense should be enough to warn them when an "iffy" situation arises and, if so, should err on the side of caution. I don't buy their whining and have no use for the crooks, liars and cheats who want to parse ethics by snidely claiming that "it depends on what the definition of is is."
There is no equivalence with Clinton here , Shelley was clearly more culpable