WASHINGTON, D.C., USA — Homeland Security Chairman Sen. Gary Peters said Sen. Jon Ossoff's experience as an investigative journalist attributed to his announcement on Wednesday.
Ossoff (D-Ga.) was named Chairman of the U.S. Senate’s Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations by Peters.
At just 34 years old, Ossoff is the youngest to chair the committee, which was first led by Sen. Harry Truman, who investigated war profiteering from 1941-1948.
After joining the Senate, Ossoff stepped down as CEO of Insight TWI, a 30-year old investigative media production company he led since 2013.
According to a news release from Ossoff's office, under his leadership, the company produced internationally broadcast journalistic investigations of organized crime, official corruption, ISIS atrocities, war crimes committed by peacekeeping troops, corporate abuses, and human trafficking.
“As a former investigative journalist, Senator Ossoff is uniquely qualified to chair this prestigious subcommittee, which is instrumental to holding our nation’s most powerful entities accountable for wrongdoing,” Sen. Peters (D-Mi.) said. “I look forward to working with him to shed a light on fraud, financial crimes, and other kinds of malpractice whether they take place in the public or private sector.”
Ossoff said he looks forward to leading this historic committee.
In 1957, under Chief Counsel Robert F. Kennedy, the Subcommittee investigated labor racketeering, the news release said. In 1963, the Subcommittee’s famous Valachi hearings exposed the Sicilian Mafia.
More recent investigations have included corporate abuses and financial crimes, international terrorism, domestic and transnational organized crime, war crimes, Enron, SARS preparedness, domestic surveillance, WMD proliferation, the security of U.S. energy supply, the 2007-2008 financial crisis, and the Iranian nuclear program.
“This Subcommittee will pursue the truth, inform the public, and hold power to account,” Ossoff said. “I look forward to working with Ranking Member Ron Johnson of Wisconsin and my Subcommittee colleagues to serve the American public.”