WASHINGTON -- More than four months after passage of the CARES Act, the Congressional Oversight Commission charged with monitoring $500 billion in Treasury Department funds still lacks a chairman.
As a result, U.S. Rep. French Hill, R-Ark., will be entrusted with the gavel when the commission holds its first public hearing today.
Under the law, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., are supposed to jointly select a leader for the five-member body.
Thus far, they have failed to do so.
Despite lacking a chair, the commissioners have released three monthly reports on the lending programs.
In June, they met with Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin and Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell.
Today's hearing will focus on lending programs for small and mid-sized businesses.
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Tim Stretton, a policy analyst with the nonpartisan Project on Government Oversight, said it's "greatly irresponsible" for congressional leadership to leave the position unfilled.
Although McConnell and Pelosi come from different parties, "Congressional oversight should never be a partisan issue," he said.
"Congress has a vested interest to make sure that $500 billion, which is a huge amount of money for Congress to appropriate, is being spent in the way Congress intended and, frankly, is having the desired outcome," he said.
Spokesmen for McConnell and Pelosi did not respond to requests for comment Thursday.
The CARES Act, which created the commission, was signed into law on March 27 after receiving near-unanimous bipartisan support.
The $2.2 trillion package included $500 billion for a U.S. Treasury Department fund -- money that was earmarked for business loans, loan guarantees and other investments.
Under the law, the commissioners are supposed to evaluate efforts by the U.S. Treasury Department and the Federal Reserve System Board of Governors "to provide economic stability as a result of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic of 2020."
When the commission was formed, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., appointed Hill, a former Little Rock banker and onetime Treasury Department deputy assistant secretary, to the commission.
Joining him were U.S. Rep. Donna Shalala, D-Fla., a Pelosi appointee; U.S. Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa., a McConnell appointee; and Bharat Ramamurti, a former aide to U.S. Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass., who was appointed by Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer, D-N.Y.
On May 5, Pelosi told reporters that she and McConnell had been discussing potential chairmen, adding, "hopefully we'll have a decision soon."
But May and June passed without an announcement.
In late June, Politico, the Wall Street Journal and others reported that former Joint Chiefs of Staff Chairman Joseph Dunford was being vetted for the post. But Dunford subsequently withdrew from consideration.
Lisa Gilbert of Public Citizen, a liberal consumer advocacy group, said the delays are troublesome.
"Oversight of our taxpayer dollars, at this moment, is critical," said Gilbert, the organization's executive vice president.
She credited the four commissioners with continuing despite the apparent Pelosi-McConnell impasse.
"We've been hopeful ... and impressed with what they've been doing. We'd like them to be able to move with speed, with volume," she said.
Kim Wehle, a former associate independent counsel for the Whitewater investigation, portrayed the inaction as irresponsible.
"[Four] months without a chair (and counting), the commission still cannot fully function to oversee $500 billion in CARES Act spending for purposes of identifying waste and abuse. This makes no sense," she wrote in an email.
"As Congress spars over the terms of another COVID bill to address containing the pandemic, widespread food and housing insecurity, and the damaged economy, it would be nice to have months' worth of data to help with those decisions. But that proverbial car sits in the front yard, broken and waiting to be fixed," she wrote, adding, "Pelosi and McConnell are to blame."
In an interview, Hill said he hopes the vacancy will be filled.
"I'm disappointed we don't have a chair but that's the state of play," he said.
Pelosi and McConnell have made " a good faith effort" to fill the position, but came up empty, Hill said.
"No one has said 'Yes.' Someone has to want to do this particular mission," he added.
For now, commissioners will rotate chairmanship responsibilities, he said.