Eric Swalwell, Tony Gonzales, and now Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick - and the question hanging over Congress: who will be next to resign?

Congress hasn’t had a great two weeks. And what’s bad for Congress is bad for the nation, bad for voters, and, most of all, bad for Democracy.

Another duly elected member of Congress has resigned under a cloud of scandal, suspicion, and infamy.

This time it is Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, Democrat of Florida, who stepped down this week after months of legal and ethics trouble. She has been federally indicted over allegations that she helped divert more than $5 million in FEMA-related disaster relief funds connected to a COVID-era vaccination contract, money prosecutors say was routed in part toward her 2021 congressional campaign. 

Cherfilus-McCormick has pleaded not guilty and denies wrongdoing. But the timing of her resignation was hard to miss. The House Ethics Committee had already found that a long list of alleged violations had been proven by “clear and convincing evidence” and was preparing to consider sanctions. Then she resigned.

And she is not alone. Within days, Congress saw three resignations from members facing ugly scrutiny: Eric Swalwell, Tony Gonzales, and now Cherfilus-McCormick. 

Swalwell, Democrat of California, resigned after allegations of sexual assault and misconduct surfaced; he has denied the most serious allegations. Gonzales, Republican of Texas, resigned after admitting to an affair with a staffer, while facing a House Ethics investigation into alleged misconduct involving the employee in question.

This is not merely “bad optics.” This is Congress starting to look less like a legislature and more like liability.

The pattern is worth paying attention to. The House Ethics Committee does not have ordinary jurisdiction over former members. Once a member leaves office, the committee often loses its ability to finish the investigation, publish findings, or recommend punishment. That does not mean the person is innocent. It does not mean they are guilty either. But it does mean the public may never learn what the investigation would have uncovered.

So resignation can be many things at once. It can be an admission that the political battle is over. It can be a way to spare family and staff from a public spectacle. 

It can also be a legal strategy.

If you are facing possible criminal charges, civil exposure, or even just a politically devastating public ethics report, the smartest move may be to get out before the committee puts anything else in writing. The Ethics Committee cannot put you in prison, but it can create a record. And records can be subpoenaed in a court of law.

That is what makes the current moment so interesting. Congress may not be done cleaning house.

Rep. Cory Mills of Florida looks especially vulnerable. The House Ethics Committee has an ongoing matter involving Mills, and the committee’s own historical chart lists him under “sexual misconduct and/or dating violence” allegations, with the outcome marked “ongoing.” Other reporting has described accusations involving assault and campaign-finance issues; Mills has denied wrongdoing and said he has not been charged or found guilty of anything.

Then there is Ilhan Omar.

Omar is not in the same category as Swalwell, Gonzales, or Cherfilus-McCormick — at least not yet. She has not resigned. She is not, as far as the public record shows, in the middle of the same kind of House Ethics endgame. But the financial disclosure story around her husband’s businesses is not nothing.

Her original disclosure reportedly listed companies co-owned by her husband, Tim Mynett, as worth between $6 million and $30 million. After scrutiny, the amended disclosure reduced their joint assets to somewhere between $18,004 and $95,000, with her office blaming an accounting error.

I’m sorry, but a potential $30 million swing is not the kind of “oopsie” that inspires public confidence.

House Oversight Chairman James Comer has requested records tied to Mynett’s companies, citing concerns that their reported value rose from $51,000 in 2023 to as much as $30 million in 2024, while investor and business information remained difficult to verify publicly. Omar’s office calls the scrutiny political. 

Maybe it is political. That does not make the questions illegitimate.

That is the problem with Congress right now. Everyone wants “due process” when the accused person is on their team, and instant resignation when the accused person is on the other team. But the public is not stupid. We can hold two thoughts in our heads at once: allegations are not convictions, and repeated clouds of scandal are not weather.

Congress has a trust problem. A staffer problem. A money problem. A power problem. And perhaps most of all, it has an accountability problem.

So yes, there may be more resignations. There may be more ethics investigations. There may be more “accounting errors,” more sudden retirements, more stilted statements about wanting to focus on family, faith, constituents, or the fight ahead.

But whatever the excuse, the trend is clear.

Lawmakers behaving badly are discovering that the public has had enough.

Both parties will be stronger, and the nation will be stronger, if wrongdoers are drummed out of a job.

(Contributing writer, Brooke Bell)