Members of the Congressional Black Caucus have asked the House Ethics Committee for an investigation into lawmakers who sleep in their offices, saying it abuses taxpayer money.
More than two dozen lawmakers, all Democrats, sent a letter late last year to Ethics Committee Chairwoman Susan Brooks, R-Indiana, and top Democrat on the committee Ted Deutsch of Florida, questioning the “legality and propriety of a significant number of members choosing to use their Congressional offices as overnight lodging facilities.”
“Members who sleep overnight in their offices receive free lodging, free cable, free security, free cleaning services, and utilize other utilities free of charge in direct violation of the ethics rules which prohibit official resources from being used for personal purposes,” they wrote in the letter dated December 13.
The lawmakers asked for a response from the Ethics Committee by January 5 — and told CNN they have yet to receive one. Politico was first to report the letter Tuesday.
“The actions of these Members raise several obvious and potential violations that reflect negatively upon the decorum and credibility of the House as a body and as an institution,” the members wrote in the letter. “It is a practice that is problematic in many instances and wrong on many fronts.”
The Ethics Committee did not immediately respond to CNN’s request for comment.
House Speaker Paul Ryan and Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy are among the dozens of lawmakers who have shared they sleep in their offices.
Ryan told CNN in 2015 he sleeps in his Longworth office because it helps him get more work done.
“It actually makes me more efficient,” Ryan told CNN’s Dana Bash on “State of the Union” at the time. “I can actually get more work done by sleeping on a cot in my office. I have been doing it for at least a decade, and I’m going to keep doing it.”
During the #MeToo movement on Capitol Hill, sources told CNN the unique lifestyle on the Hill helped fuel a hostile culture. Several sources highlighted the members sleeping in their offices as problematic for women who work on the Hill.