With gavel gone, Issa aide heads to Senate

A top aide to Rep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) is heading to the Senate to lead the communications shop of the Senate Commerce Committee. 

Issa spokesman Frederick Hill has been named the communications director for the Commerce panel, likely Chairman John Thune (R-S.D.) announced on Tuesday.

“Frederick’s many years of communications experience on one of the most active committees in the House of Representatives will make him a valuable member of my Commerce team,” Thune said in a statement Thursday morning. “I look forward to utilizing Frederick’s communications ability as I roll out my agenda for the Commerce Committee in the 114th Congress.”

{mosads}Hill, the former deputy staff director for communication on Issa’s House Oversight Committee, helped foster the combative style that marked the California Republican’s chairmanship, which ends this year. His selection for the Senate panel could foretell friction between Thune and Senate Democrats as the panel gears up to tackle a number of major issues.

Hill worked with Issa for the past 13 years. Republican committee term limits in the House have forced the lawmaker to step down from the oversight panel, where he has been a thorn in the White House’s side on issues ranging from the IRS to ObamaCare.

The Senate panel is gearing up to lead a major rewrite of the nation’s communications laws, a move that is already creating partisan divides over the possibility that Republicans will attempt to use the process to eliminate or write weak laws on net neutrality, the notion that all Internet traffic should be treated equally. 

The panel will also oversee federal regulators’ attempts to write new laws for commercial drones, oversee transportation rules and keep an eye on NASA as part of its broad jurisdiction.