GLOUCESTER, Mass. — October 26, 2012 — The Obama administration, through its Commerce Department and National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, has declined to respond to inquiries as to whether it would release before the Nov. 6 election a special investigator’s set of case studies into allegations of abuse and excesses against American fishermen by federal law enforcers still insulated and protected by top Commerce and NOAA officials.
Sen. Scott Brown and his opponent, Democrat Elizabeth Warren, also each issued new statements to the Times this week urging the release of the report.
Brown has evolved in his three years in the Senate into a fierce critic of NOAA fisheries policy generally and especially law enforcement. Evincing a penchant for bipartisanship, he convinced his colleague, Democratic Sen. Tom Carper, to bring the Senate Subcommittee on Federal Financial Management that he chairs to hold a field hearing in Boston. The Carper subcommittee gave Brown the stage — at Boston’s Faneuil Hall — to ask Lubchenco’s top fisheries assistant, “What does it take to get fired at NOAA?”
“This report has been done for months and the delay is inexcusable,” Brown said Thursday in an email to the Times. “I have repeatedly asked for this report to be released and will continue to do so.”
“The Department of Commerce should immediately release Special Master Swartwood’s final report,” Warren said in an email or her own. “Fishermen who were intimidated, abused, and harmed by NOAA law enforcement need to be cleared, and they should receive the compensation they are due. The public also has a right to this important information, so appropriate changes can be made to ensure that there will be no further unfair enforcement practices.”
In an email, Congressman John Tierney said, “It is outrageous that repeated requests made by me and my colleagues for release of the most recent report by the Special Master have fallen on deaf ears.”
“As I reiterated in my last letter to Acting Secretary Blank, fishermen and the community have waited long enough for answers,” said Tierney, who has joined with Brown and Congressman Barney Frank, as well as North Carolina Republican Rep. Walter Jones, in calling for Lubchenco’s dismissal. Tierney represents Cape Ann; Frank’s district includes New Bedford, Jones the Outer Banks of North Carolina
Within the delegation, Kerry has maintained cordial diplomatic relations with Lubchenco. His press office issued a statement at the start of the month asserting the importance of getting Swartwood II released “at the earliest possible date.” But his spokeswoman Jodi Seth addded that “it is just as important that it be comprehensive. Sen. Kerry has been assured that the administration has been working hard to meet both those standards.”
Read the full story at the Gloucester Times