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Did you know that former Members of Congress can receive a pension even after being convicted of a crime? Earlier this week, I filed a bipartisan bill that would put a stop to that.

Under current law, if a pension-eligible Member of Congress is convicted of certain crimes, he or she can still receive that pension until a final conviction is reached. The problem is that a criminal conviction isn’t “final” until all possible appeals have been exhausted or have expired, which of course could drag on for years. This leaves you (the taxpayer) funding the pension payments of those convicted criminals for however long it takes for a final conviction to be reached.

So the bill I filed this week, called the “No CORRUPTION Act” (HR 3327), would mandate that any Member of Congress found guilty of these crimes would immediately become ineligible to collect any pension earned while serving in Congress. This would apply upon initial conviction, not years down the road after reaching final conviction.

I actually filed this bill during the last Congress as well. The difference today is that both the Democrat and Republican leadership on the House Oversight Committee have joined this effort as original co-sponsors, so I think we have a good chance of moving this forward. There’s also a bi-partisan companion bill that’s been introduced in the Senate.

It’s yet another example of what needs to be fixed in “The Swamp.”