Campaign Legal Center Calls on FCC to Probe Questionable Stockholdings

The Campaign Legal Center, a nonpartisan government-watchdog group, called on the Office of Government Ethics, the federal agency that oversees ethics rules, to investigate whether the Federal Communications Commission complied with financial-conflict rules when it permitted several top officials to own stocks in apparent violation of the agency’s own rules. The Campaign Legal Center said FCC officials owned stocks in cable and telecommunications companies. Federal law bans FCC employees from owning stock in any company that is “significantly regulated” by the agency. The group also sent a letter to the FCC’s Office of Inspector General asking investigators to review why ethics officials allowed seven FCC officials to collectively own thousands of dollars in stock in companies such as AT&T, Comcast and IBM, according to public financial-disclosure forms filed by the employees. An agency isn’t required to begin an investigation upon receipt of the organization’s complaints. An FCC spokeswoman said that the agency’s ethics officials believe that the individuals identified in the complaints “have taken all necessary steps in order to ensure they were and are in full compliance with all relevant ethics conflict of interest rules.”