Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington
Citizens for Responsibility and Ethics in Washington (CREW), is a nonprofit 501(c)(3) watchdog organization devoted to U.S. government ethics and accountability.[2][3][4] Founded in 2003 as a counterweight to conservative government watchdog groups such as Judicial Watch, CREW works to expose ethics violations and corruption by government officials and institutions and to reduce the role of money in politics.
Its activities include investigating, reporting and litigating perceived government misconduct, requesting and forcing government information disclosure through Freedom of information legislation requests, and filing congressional ethics complaints against individuals, institutions and agencies.[5][4] Its projects have included the publication of "CREW's Most Corrupt Members of Congress", an annual report in which CREW lists the people it determines to be the most corrupt in the federal government of the United States. From 2005 to 2014, the annual reports named 25 Democrats and 63 Republicans.
CREW was founded in 2003 by former federal prosecutor Melanie Sloan and white-collar lawyer Norm Eisen who went on to serve as President Barack Obama's chief ethics lawyer and later his ambassador to the Czech Republic. Liberal political consultant David Brock became CREW's chairman in 2014 and stepped down in 2016. He was replaced by Richard Painter, who took a leave of absence to run as a Democrat in Minnesota's 2018 U.S. Senate special election. Under Painter's leadership, CREW pursued aggressive litigation against the Trump administration, which it called the "most unethical presidency" in U.S. history. CREW filed 41 lawsuits during George W. Bush's administration, 38 during Obama's administration and, by January 2018, 180 against the Trump administration.[6]
Personnel[edit]
Norman L. Eisen, an attorney specializing in fraud, and eventual (in 2009) Special Counsel for Ethics and Government Reform in the White House, co-founded CREW in 2003. He became known for his stringent ethics and anti-corruption efforts, and for limiting registered lobbyists from taking positions in the administration.[26][42]
Melanie Sloan served as CREW's first executive director. In August 2014 former Republican activist and current Democratic activist David Brock was elected chairman of CREW's board, and Sloan announced her intention to resign as executive director, pending Brock's hiring of a new executive director. Prior to co-founding CREW in 2003, Sloan served as one of more than 300 Assistant U.S. Attorneys in the District of Columbia from 1998 to 2003 after having worked for congressional Democrats John Conyers, Charles Schumer, and Joseph Biden.[43] Mark Penn, pollster for Bill Gates, Tony Blair, both Bill and Hillary Clinton, also became a director and vice president at CREW.[44]
Brock was elected as CREW's board president after laying out a broad plan to turn the organization into a more muscular organization. Along with Brock, consultant David Mercer and investor Wayne Jordan joined CREW's board of directors.[26][45]
Noah Bookbinder, a former Justice Department prosecutor and Chief Counsel for the U.S. Senate's Judiciary Committee where he advised Judiciary Committee Chairman Senator Patrick Leahy (D-VT), was named executive director of CREW in March, 2015.[46]
Brock left CREW in December 2016, and was replaced as chairman of the board of directors by former George W. Bush ethics lawyer Richard Painter.[47]
Funding[edit]
Roll Call reported that CREW doesn't disclose its donor list, and quoted former Deputy Director Naomi Seligman as saying that "donors play no role in CREW's decisions as to the groups or politicians we target."[21] Donors to CREW have included such groups as Democracy Alliance, Service Employees International Union, the Arca Foundation,[64] and the Gill Foundation.[21][65][66]
In January 2012, Democracy Alliance dropped a number of prominent organizations, including CREW, from their list of recommended organizations to receive donations. Support was withdrawn because these groups are more apt to work outside the Democratic Party's infrastructure.[67]