WASHINGTON – Newly cleared House Republicans are preparing a broad investigation into national security agencies and law enforcement agencies, raising the possibility of politically charged clashes with the Biden administration over access to sensitive information such as highly classified intelligence and details of ongoing criminal investigations being conducted by the Department of Justice.
The House plans to vote this week on a resolution to create a special judiciary subcommittee on what it calls “arming the federal government,” an issue Republicans say could include reviewing the investigation into former President Donald J. Trump.
The panel would be overseen by Rep. Jim Jordan, a Republican from Ohio, who is also expected to become the chairman of the Judiciary Committee. It remains to be seen who else will insert President Kevin McCarthy, who has made numerous concessions to a far-right faction in his party to win the presidency.
In an interview with Fox News Friday night, Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, a chief negotiator for far-right lawmakers who pressed McCarthy’s team to make concessions, described the panel as part of the deal reached for his support. He said McCarthy had promised to provide the subcommittee with at least as much funding and staff as the last House special committee that investigated the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on Capitol Hill.
“So we have more resources, more specificity, more power to prosecute this recalcitrant Biden administration,” Roy said. “This is really important.”
A spokesperson for Jordan did not respond to a request for comment, but both he and McCarthy have talked for months about their desire for such an investigation and have pledged to voters during the 2022 campaign to conduct one.
“We will factor in the swamp, from the withdrawal from Afghanistan to the origins of covid to the FBI’s use of weapons,” McCarthy said in his early remarks on Saturday. “Let me be very clear: We are going to use the power of the purse and the power of the subpoena to get the job done.”
The language of the resolution establishing the subcommittee would give the panel essentially open jurisdiction to discuss any civil liberties issue or to examine how any agency of the federal government has collected, analyzed, and used information about Americans, including “ongoing criminal investigations . ”
The Justice Department has traditionally resisted making information about open criminal investigations available to Congress, suggesting that legal and political fights over subpoenas and executive privileges are most likely ahead.
