John Bresnahan

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) has appointed four new members to the House ethics committee, completing the panel's lineup as it gears up for the uncomfortable investigation of Ways and Means Chairman Charles Rangel.

Pelosi named Democratic Reps. Ben Chandler (Ky.), G.K. Butterfield (N.C.), Kathy Castor (Fla.), and Peter Welch (Vt.) as the newest members of the committee, which polices lawmaker ethics and behavior.

"Each of these Members appointed to serve on the ethics committee has shown strong commitment to the integrity of the House of Representatives. I am confident they will continue their dedication by holding House Members to the highest ethical standards," Pelosi said in a statement. "The Ethics Committee will continue the work of strengthening Americans' faith in the institution of Congress, and these newly appointed Members will take the serious and substantive steps to do so."

On Tuesday, Pelosi announced that Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.) will become the new chairwoman of the ethics panel, formally known as the Committee on Standards of Official Conduct. Lofgren is the third chairman of the panel in two years. Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones (D-Ohio) died on Aug. 20 following an aneurysm. Rep. Gene Green (D-Texas) took over for Tubbs Jones, but he left the committee at the end of the last Congress.

The five Republicans on the ethics panel are Reps. Jo Bonner (Ala), Gresham Barrett (S.C.), John Kline (Minn.), Michael Conaway (Texas) and Charles W. Dent (Pa.). Bonner is the top Republican on the panel.

Lofgren and Bonner must first complete the investigation into Rangel's personal finances - but the committee would have to vote to continue the investigation first. The ethics panel is looking into Rangel's fundraising on behalf of the Charles B. Rangel Center for Public Policy at the City College of New York, as well as his failure to pay taxes on a vacation home and his control of multiple rent-stabilized apartments in a Harlem residential building.

Also on the ethics front, the new Office of Congressional Ethics will hold an open meeting tomorrow to review its proposed rules. The independent panel, chaired by former Reps. David Skaggs (D-Colo.) and Porter Goss (R-Fla.), has the authority to begin ethics probes on its own but has no authority to take final action against a lawmaker or staffer.