House October Surprise Task Force

The House October Surprise Task Force (formally Task Force of the Committee on Foreign Affairs to Investigate Certain Allegations Concerning the Holding of Americans as Hostages by Iran in 1980) was a task force instituted by the United States House of Representatives in 1992 to examine the October Surprise allegations: that during the 1980 United States presidential election the Reagan campaign had sought to negotiate a solution to the Iran hostage crisis in competition to the US government of Jimmy Carter, in order to prevent the successful resolution of the crisis giving Carter an electoral boost. Following the publication of the report in January 1993, Task Force chairman Rep. Lee H. Hamilton published an editorial in The New York Times summarising the Task Force conclusion that "there was virtually no credible evidence to support the accusations."

The House October Surprise Task Force followed investigation of related matters in the Iran-Contra affair by the Tower Commission, in which the October Surprise allegations had already been aired, and rejected.Media investigations of the October Surprise allegations took off in 1991 following the publication in April of a New York Times editorial by Gary Sick and a PBS Frontline documentary, and there were calls for a Congressional investigation.

In October 1991 the Senate's Foreign Relations Committee approved an investigation; but the bill for the $600,000 budget was filibustered by Republicans. Some hearings were held by the Sen. For. Relations Subcmte on Near East and South Asian Affairs (then chaired by Terry Sanford) in November 1991 until an unnamed senator, invoking a rarely used rule requiring Senate permission for committees to hold formal hearings, filed an objection, bringing the hearing to a close whilst Gary Sick was testifying. In December 1991 Senators Terry Sanford and James M. Jeffords appointed a special counsel to investigate. This report, published on 19 November 1992, concluded that there was probably no Republican deal to delay hostage release, but that William Casey (Reagan's campaign director) "probably 'conducted informal, clandestine and potentially dangerous efforts' on the campaign's behalf to monitor the hostage situation."