Pressure Mounts on DOMA Defense

More Congressional Democrats are pressing House Speaker John Boehner for answers on the leadership’s planned legal defense of the Defense of Marriage Act.

In a Wednesday letter, three members of the Committee on House Administration — Ranking member Robert A. Brady of Pennsylvania, and Reps. Zoe Lofgren and Charles Gonzalez — asked for information on a contract signed by the House general counsel and former solicitor general Paul Clement, who left his previous firm, King & Spaulding, after it abruptly withdrew from the litigation last month.

Clement subsequently became a partner at Bancroft PLLC in Washington, D.C., which has since taken on the litigation for the House.

But the three Democrats questioned whether taxpayer funds have been appropriately authorized for the $520-an-hour, blended-rate attorney fee, as well as discounts for non-attorney time.

“We request you instruct the General Counsel to furnish the Committee a list of the hourly rate paid each employee of the Bancroft firm working on the litigation and an explanation on how the blended rate was calculated,” the representatives wrote. “The American people deserve a fuller explanation about the circumstances surrounding the decision to spend $500,000, and most likely much more, of their tax dollars to defend this indefensible statute."

Read more at The Hill.