Pat Dollard

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The Hill:

Rep. Charlie Rangel has reportedly reached a deal on ethics charges that will avoid a public trial that could have hurt his party ahead of the fall elections.

WCBS TV in New York reported that Harlem friends of Rangel said a deal had been struck, and details of the deal could be unveiled when the ethics panel meets as scheduled at 1 p.m.

The network reported Rangel will admit to wrongdoing as part of the deal.

The House ethics panel is meeting ahead of a scheduled organizational session for Rangel’s ethics trial. Rep. Jo Bonner (Ala.), the panel’s ranking Republican, said he didn’t know if there was a deal as he entered the meeting, and declined further comment.

Minutes before the WCBS report, Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) defended her caucus’s record on ethics. She said Democrats had implemented “the toughest ethics reform in a generation” when they took over the House in 2006.

At the same time, she said her pledge to “drain the swamp” did not mean individual ethical lapses by Democrats would not occur under her watch.

“Drain the swamp we did as this was a terrible place,” Pelosi said at her weekly press briefing. “We made a tremendous difference, and I take great pride in that.

“Are there going to be individual issues to be dealt with? I never said that there wouldn’t be. But we have a process to deal with them and it would be internal and it would be external.”

Rangel is under scrutiny on a number of issues, including failing to report rental income from a Caribbean beach rental and holding three rent-controlled apartments in New York City. Earlier this year, he gave up his chairmanship of the tax-writing Ways and Means Committee.

Democratic leaders throughout the week had put pressure on him to reach a deal. Senior Democrats such as Rep. George Miller (D-Calif.), a close ally of Pelosi’s, had said he should do a settlement rather than go through with a trial.

Pressed on whether or not the public could trust the Democrats given Rangel, a former chairman of the tax-writing committee, is alleged to have evaded taxes, Pelosi on Thursday responded that Rangel had already been seriously penalized.

“Mr. Rangel stepped down as chairman of the Ways and Means Committee,” she said. “That was a very serious penalty for Mr. Rangel.”

The Speaker brushed aside concerns that Rangel’s problems could hurt her party. She said Democrats helped clear out the House Republican leadership headed by former Rep. Tom DeLay (Texas), and described them as a “criminal syndicate.”

“What I am talking about is public trust in terms of passing legislation … it is about the people’s interest, not a criminal syndicate operating [in Congress],” she said.

Under Pelosi’s leadership in 2008, the independent Office of Congressional Ethics (OCE) was established to review allegations of ethics violations by lawmakers.