White House warns Democrats about planned investigations into administration

WASHINGTON (AP) — The White House has issued a warning to Democrats about their planned investigations into the Trump administrationgoing so far as to claim that such investigations – a standard oversight function of Congress – could constitute “egregious criminality.”

White House counsel Will Scharf issued the warning in a letter dated Monday to Rep. Robert Garcia, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee.

Garcia would most likely chair the powerful panel in the new Democratic-controlled Congress that will sit in January. Garcia warned Trump officials to “hire a lawyer” as his party was on its way to blowout victories in last week’s midterm elections.

In response, Scharf wrote that “threats against executive branch officials intended to dissuade them from accessing public service, or processes intended simply to abuse or instill fear in the recipient, may cross the line into blatant criminality.” The existence of the letter was first reported by Punchbowl News.

It’s just the latest push as the White House prepares to face newly empowered Democrats in the House and Senate next year, a showdown with major implications for congressional authority and the balance of power between branches of government.

Garcia rejects White House letter

Outside the Capitol on Wednesday, Garcia told reporters that “Donald Trump is clearly hiding something” and that Democrats “will not be threatened or intimidated.”

“The truth is he needs to understand that Congress is a co-equal branch of government,” Garcia said.

He doubled down on his post-election “lawyer” post, saying the White House was “thin-skinned” and couldn’t “take any kind of heat.”

“If you have taken advantage of the American public, you should get a lawyer,” Garcia said. “If you are the CEO of a company and you are defrauding the American people, you should hire a lawyer.”

Democrats are preparing a massive surveillance program to examine how Trump and his family become richer since his return to power. The Republican president and his White House have long denied any wrongdoing.

Garcia also wants to examine how the administration is handling the investigation into Jeffrey Epstein And Immigration and customs control operations. Other targets include Trump’s ballroom at the White House and other construction projects, as well as the role of the Trump family in mining transactions and that of Trump crypto transactions with special correspondent Steve Witkoff.

Republican watchdog chairman says panel is ‘highly independent’

Kentucky Republican James Comer, current chairman of the oversight committee that conducted a wide-ranging investigation into former President Joe Biden and his family, told The Associated Press on Wednesday that he had not yet read the White House letter but stressed that the committee was “very independent.”

“No matter who sits in the White House, there will always be a strong desire for the Oversight Committee to serve as a check and balance within the executive branch, regardless of the political scenario,” Comer said.

He said he thought Garcia’s comments in support of the lawyer were in “bad taste” but that Democrats “won the election and this will be his commission.” So if he strays from the line, I assume his members will try to rein him in. »

Attorney General Todd Blanche said in a CNN interview broadcast Sunday that “there could be” a crime to investigate if Democrats’ rhetoric becomes threatening. He appeared to strike a more conciliatory tone during an appearance in Missouri this week, saying “Congress has oversight power. It always has and it always will. The Department of Justice, the federal government, works with Congress to answer their questions – whether through subpoenas or letters – so we will not stop working with Congress.”

“Nothing I said this weekend, or in the past, should suggest otherwise,” he added.

Yet elsewhere, Justice Department officials resisted. Aaron Reitz, U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Texas, wrote to Connecticut Sen. Richard Blumenthal on Wednesday asking him to preserve all documents relevant to his investigations.

Blumenthal is set to chair a powerful Senate investigative committee in January. Reitz called Blumenthal’s efforts “an intention to deprive citizens of their basic constitutional rights,” referring to his October letter to people who donated to the new White House ballroom.

Other lawmakers respond to White House warning

Incumbent Republican Thomas Massie of Kentucky, a Trump critic, said he hoped Democrats wouldn’t waste their new powers on “stupid things.”

“I hope they have real hearings on real things, not another Russia-gate,” he said, referring to a previous congressional investigation into ties between Trump’s first presidential campaign in 2016 and Russia. Trump has repeatedly denounced the investigation as a “hoax.”

“I think there is real corruption on the fringes,” Massie said of Trump and some of those close to him. Massie lost his primary election to a Trump-backed Republican challenger.

Rep. Mark DeSaulnier, Democrat of California, who is expected to be the next chairman of the House Ethics Committee, said he would not back down from any investigation because of the White House’s warnings.

“If they try to intimidate me, at least for me, they won’t get to me,” said DeSaulnier, who was a Republican before switching to the Democratic Party in 2000. “I don’t work for a mafia, a mafia organization.”

___

Associated Press writer Eric Tucker and AP video journalist Nathan Ellgren contributed to this report.