House Judiciary Committee Democrats on Tuesday announced their plans to subpoena current and former members of Trump administration. Specifically, the Committee wants to learn more about Trump's "'zero tolerance' policy and other family separation policies and practices; detention of children and families; and discussions about or offers of presidential pardons to Department of Homeland Security officials or employees."
The goal of the subpoenas, according to Democrats, is to hold the Trump administration for "obstruction of justice, public corruption, and other abuses."
According to Judiciary Committee Chairman Jerry Nadler (D-NY), this is a move to have oversight over the Trump administration.
“This week, the Committee will take an important step in moving forward with oversight of the Trump Administration. For months, we have held hearings and sent letters to the agencies of jurisdiction involved with implementing a catastrophic and inhumane family separation policy at the Southern border. Many questions remain and it is past time for a full accounting of this policy and practice," Nadler said in a statement. "The Committee will also move forward with our efforts to request information from critical witnesses as part of our ongoing investigation into obstruction, corruption and abuse of power by the President and his associates. As always, I remain open to reaching a reasonable accommodation and will not issue subpoenas if the information we are seeking is voluntarily provided. We will get answers one way or the other.”
The Committee plans to subpoena:
- Rick A. Dearborn - former White House Deputy Chief of Staff
- Michael T. Flynn - former National Security Advisor
- Joseph “Jody” H. Hunt - Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Division of the Department of Justice
- Jared C. Kushner - Senior Advisor to the president
- John F. Kelly - former White House Chief of Staff
- Corey R. Lewandowski - Campaign Manager for Trump's 2016 campaign
- Robert R. Porter - former White House Press Secretary
- Rod J. Rosenstein - former Deputy Attorney General
- Jefferson B. Sessions - former Attorney General
- Keith M. Davidson - former attorney for Stormy Daniels
- Dylan Howard - Chief Content Officer at American Media, Inc.
- David J. Pecker - CEO of American Media, Inc.
Various members of the House Judiciary Committee Democrats sent letters to Department of Homeland Security (DHS) heads and a U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) Commissioner for various reasons, including to investigate the deaths of children being held in detention centers.
Nadler and Subcommittee Chairs sent a letter in February to President Donald Trump to demand answers after he declared a national emergency at the southern border and to request hearings with White House Counsel Pat A. Cipollone and Justice Department officials.
"Contrary a series of misleading statements that have come from the White House, including your referring to a number of incorrect and unsubstantiated statistics today, there is no national emergency at the southern border," the letter read. "Undocumented immigration has been decreasing for years. Border crossing attempts are at 40-year lows. For example, Customs and Border Protection (CBP) apprehended over 1.6 million people attempting to enter the country without authorization in 2000; but over the last few years, CBP has apprehended just a fraction of that, between 400 and 500 thousands individuals yearly."
The Committee's Ranking Member, Rep. Doug Collins (R-GA) believes this has to do with Special Counsel Robert Mueller's scheduled testimony next week.
"Today’s latest effort to relitigate the special counsel’s investigation remains unimpressive and unproductive. Mr. Mueller’s team issued more than 2,800 subpoenas before concluding that no Americans conspired with Russia," Collins told Fox News. "Even if Chairman Nadler still believes subpoenas are conversation starters, it’s hard to imagine this handful of subpoenas will do anything but reinforce the principal conclusions we’ve been able to read about for months,” Collins said in a statement.
Nadler has made it his personal mission to obtain documents for an extensive Trump probe. This is just his latest move in a bigger game.
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