Cooper Denies Lobbyist Accusations

A four hour congressional hearing on rural electric cooperatives ended yesterday with a lobbyist accusing Tennessee Representative Jim Cooper of illegally accessing a protected website for its national organization.

California Democrat Henry Waxman closed the House Oversight and Government Reform committee hearing after Glenn English – a former Oklahoma congressman who now lobbies for rural electric co-ops – said that Cooper was under investigation by the FBI for accessing his organziation’s password-protected website. Cooper denies the allegation and the FBI wouldn’t comment on it.

At issue is Congressman Cooper’s probe into the business practices of Pedernales Electric Cooperative, the country’s largest member-owned utility near Austin. The co-op has been under a cloud of controversy for nearly a year because of expensive trips and compensation packages for its executives. The utility’s president and general manager were forced from their positions and just last week its entire board of directors was replaced.

In a statement released last night, Cooper called English a “desperate Washington lobbyist” who made a false accusation to take the spotlight off of Pedernales and other rural co-ops. Cooper also says he had full authorization to the website in question – given to him from a top co-op insider.

Committee Chairman Waxman seemingly agreed. NashvillePost.com reports that Waxman said English was trying to intimidate the committee and that the committee would continue to look into credible allegations of misconduct by co-ops.

Web Extra

In an earlier report, we said the meeting ended abruptly because of the accusation against Cooper. In reviewing a video of the hearing, we determined

that hearing ended shortly after the accusation. This is the final chain of events of the hearing:

Lobbyist Glenn English accused Cooper of accessing the website in the month of December 2007. Cooper interrupted English, but wasn’t recognized by Chairman Waxman until English finished his testimony by saying he would not answer anymore questions. Chairman Waxman then recognized Cooper, who responded to English’s accusations by saying he was given access by a co-op “insider.” After Cooper’s comments, Chairman Waxman adjourned the committee hearing.

Congressman Cooper recently published a paper that criticizes rural co-ops, like Pedernales, for among other things, not returning dividends to its members.