In a letter Monday to Republican congressional leaders, senior Democrats on a House panel that oversees the NRC noted that the commission recently voted to renew an operating license for a Vermont nuclear plant they said is of the same design as some of the troubled Japanese reactors.
Chavez has said that he will not renew the license of a major television station when it expires in May because he says Radio Caracas Television is a tool of the American empire.
The decision was made after the Iraqi government refused last week to renew the firm's operating license because of a 2007 incident in which the Iraqi government says security guards -- then employed by Blackwater -- fired on and killed 17 Iraqis.