Oversight and Accountability
Jason Chaffetz caught a lot of flack for his investigations into the Obama administration, but he has no regrets.
Jason Chaffetz is a polarizing figure. As the Chairman of the House Oversight Committee, Chaffetz was a constant thorn in the side of the Obama administration and rankled many democrats with his investigations into the State Department’s handling of the Benghazi attack and later, Hillary Clinton’s private email server. For Republicans though, Chaffetz’s work proved pivotal in ultimately building a case against Clinton even before she became the 2016 Democratic nominee for president.
Anyone charged with holding power accountable will ultimately be accused of bias and partisanship against the target of their inquiries. And while Chaffetz forged on for years amongst these criticisms, his abrupt departure from congress shortly after the election of a republican president didn’t help to quell them.
This week on PolicyCast, Chaffetz confronts those criticisms head on, explaining how he came to join the House Oversight Committee, what motivated his push on high profile investigations, and why he ultimately left congress.
Chaffetz also discusses the intersection of technology and public policy, a major theme that has come up in the study groups he conducts as a Fall 2017 Resident Fellow at the Kennedy School’s Institute of Politics.
HKS PolicyCast is the official podcast of Harvard Kennedy School, featuring weekly interviews with scholars and leading practitioners in public policy, leadership, and international affairs. It is hosted by filmmaker, writer, and policy wonk Matt Cadwallader.
