Staffing and Recruitment — Prepared House Office Plan
Draft created November 6, 2026. This standalone edition reuses the proposed 24-seat matrix and onboarding sequence from the sourced readiness chapter. It is a planning resource, not an approved budget, vacancy list, employment offer or clearance decision.
7. Staffing and recruitment matrix
The following is a planning complement, not an authorized payroll. Headcounts are proposed positions subject to funding, employee ceilings, compensation rules, and actual workload. House committees are individual employing offices; candidate selection and background screening belong to the authorized employer. The House Vacancy Announcement and Placement Service can assist recruitment but does not itself hire staff. House, “Positions with Members and Committees”.
| Function and planning seats | Recruitment pool and demonstrated capability | Vetting and conflicts review | Access and readiness requirement | First deliverable |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Staff director: 1 | Senior congressional management, inspector-general or complex inquiry operations | Management references, personnel judgment, budget and procurement record, outside commitments | Employing office appointment and administrative access | Approved organization, budget and decision register |
| Chief investigative counsel: 1 | Former DOJ Fraud Section, U.S. Attorney's Office or equivalent complex civil/regulatory investigators | Bar standing, prior-client and matter list, confidentiality obligations, recusal assessment | Appointment; role-specific record access; privilege training | Investigation charter and source-testing standards |
| Node investigative counsel: 4 | White-collar and administrative-law practitioners, including SDNY experience where relevant | Writing sample, examination exercise, conflicts, disciplinary history | Committee-specific designation; no assumed cross-node access | Legislative-purpose and custodian map |
| Forensic accounting lead and analysts: 4 | FBI forensic accounting, inspector-general audit, public-sector audit or comparable private practice | Ledger reconciliation exercise, credentials where claimed, independence and financial interests | Approved transaction-data workspace; statutory compartment authorization where needed | Reconciled public-source pilot ledger |
| Financial intelligence specialists: 2 | Former FinCEN, prudential regulator or AML analytical roles | Distinguish analytical expertise from disclosure authority; inspect former-employer obligations | No inherited SAR access; explicit lawful authorization for any restricted task | BSA authority and limitation map |
| Data engineering and link analysis: 3 | Reproducible ETL, entity resolution, graph analysis, provenance systems | Code sample, supply-chain review, entity-collision test, privacy competence | Least-privilege access and approved software; public-data pilot first | Auditable ingestion with reversible entity merges |
| Records and disclosure officers: 2 | Congressional records, e-discovery, archival and disclosure work | Custody exercise, redaction accuracy, retention competence | Formal record-custodian designation and approved repositories | Custody, retention, and release matrix |
| Litigation/privilege counsel: 2 | Congressional litigation, constitutional law, civil enforcement | Conflicts and recent representations; assess professional responsibility constraints | OGC coordination and actual authority to represent the relevant client | Enforcement triage and privilege log protocol |
| State liaison counsel: 1 | State AG/DA civil and criminal practice with evidence-transfer experience | Independence, disciplinary record, prior matters and reciprocal disclosure issues | Referral authorization only; no authority to direct state prosecution | State-intake and restriction checklist |
| Hearing/accessibility production: 2 | Evidence presentation, accessible media, transcript production | Source-verification exercise; editing and attribution standards | Access only to cleared release candidates | Source-linked hearing prototype |
| Independent methods/fact review: 2 | Audit, statistics, investigative research and legal research | Adversarial review exercise; ability to document disconfirming evidence | Separate reviewer access; no unilateral publication permissions | Tested alternative explanations and correction register |
The proposed complement is 24 seats. A smaller funded team should narrow scope before removing records governance, minority access, or independent review. Recruit capability rather than prestige. DOJ or SDNY service is neither a prerequisite for all roles nor a substitute for knowledge of congressional procedure. Current federal employees cannot be privately “borrowed”; any detail requires lawful institutional arrangements. Consultants require the approvals applicable to their role and cannot simply be used to bypass employee limits. The House Administration handbook describes committee employment authority, employee ceilings, and prior approval and contract conditions for consultants. Committees' Congressional Handbook, “Committee Staff” and “Consultants”.
Every candidate signs an accurate disclosure of former clients, matters, investments, outside work, and restrictions before task allocation. Qualified counsel assesses the rules actually applicable to that candidate, including the particular-matter and representation provisions of 18 U.S.C. § 207 where implicated; this is an individualized analysis, not a blanket ban on hiring former executive-branch employees. Prior service never authorizes disclosure of former-client confidences, classified information, grand-jury matter, SARs, or tax records. A new employer must obtain records through a lawful channel. 18 U.S.C. § 207.
8. Clearance and onboarding sequence
Treat employment screening, network authorization, national-security clearance, statutory access, and a task-specific need to know as distinct gates. A current or former clearance does not supply universal access. The House security office and the sponsoring committee administer the relevant process; private maintainers cannot grant access or promise completion within 60 days. CRS describes committee sponsorship and the procedures for staff access to classified information. Congressional Research Service, *Protection of Classified Information by Congress: Current Practices*, RS20748, May 29, 2026, pp. 3–5; verified copy of the primary CRS report.
In week one of an actual appointment, assign an unclassified work plan, conflict screen, approved account, training record, and supervisor. Submit any clearance request through the proper sponsor. Pending approval, keep the employee on public or otherwise lawfully accessible work. Do not move controlled records to a personal cloud account to avoid a delay. A SAR or tax compartment requires its own disclosure and safeguarding assessment even when everyone involved holds a national-security clearance. Access decisions are recorded by dataset, purpose, recipient, and expiration; the offboarding plan revokes access and preserves official records.
Recruitment sequence and review record
Start with authorized employing-office decisions and leadership capacity. Define the role and first deliverable, screen conflicts and demonstrated capability, identify the actual appointment/funding route, and assign only lawfully accessible work pending access approval. Keep screening and hiring records in the responsible office’s approved personnel system; no candidate personal information belongs in the public PWA or other unapproved service.
The selecting office records role, lawful employer, appointment/funding basis, relevant conflicts and recusals, access scope, supervisor, first deliverable and offboarding/preservation responsibilities. This model provides no invented candidate, salary, appropriation, appointment date or signature.
The November 7–January 5 transition schedule remains in the readiness chapter. Consultation with qualified House administrative/legal staff precedes institutional use.