The top House Republican preparing to investigate the Biden family said Thursday that he does not plan to subpoena President Joe Biden despite being prepared to issue a subpoena to his son, Hunter.
“There is no plan to subpoena Joe Biden. There are plans to subpoena Hunter Biden,” GOP Rep. Jim Comer told CNN in a sit-down interview.
The admission by Comer, the likely next chairman of the House Oversight Committee, that subpoenaing a sitting president unleashes a series of thorny issues of executive privilege underscores the complex task ahead for Republicans as they claim to try to tie foreign business Hunter Biden dealings with father.
It also comes after the Trump White House rebuffed congressional requests on official and private matters, citing privilege and other claims the Biden White House is likely to highlight against the GOP requests.
Asked why he plans to subpoena Hunter Biden and not his father, Comer told CNN that trying to compel testimony from a sitting president is “complicated,” and said Republicans are planning a different approach once they secure a majority in the Senate. Parliament.
“Democrats sent out subpoenas like spam, and that’s why it’s hard to get people to come,” Comer said.
But at the same time, Comer reiterated that his committee’s investigation is focused on the sitting president, not his son.
“This should be called the Biden investigation, not the Hunter Biden investigation,” he said, echoing comments he made during a news conference earlier Thursday.
While in the White House, then-President Donald Trump and his administration asserted executive privilege and other legal protections they said protected him as president, fighting to fend off Democratic subpoenas for his tax returns, accounting records and the documents and testimony of witnesses to several committees and the first House impeachment inquiry.
The House Select Committee investigating Jan. 6, 2021, continued its congressional pursuit of the Trump administration, successfully taking testimony from several Trump aides, but not from the former president himself. The committee issued an eleventh-hour subpoena last month for Trump to testify and turn over documents, but has rejected that possibility by filing a lawsuit likely to challenge the congressional order.
Now, as Trump’s GOP allies seek to turn things around for a Democratic president — one who defeated their party’s current front-runner in the 2020 election — they face the same intense challenges as their colleagues across the aisle during the last government.
The likelihood that Congress will be able to enforce a subpoena issued to a sitting president, even if it relates only to activities before taking office, is low and has little precedent in American history, experts say.
“In all administrations, Democratic and Republican, the Department of Justice has long argued that a sitting president cannot be compelled to appear before Congress primarily because of enforcement of the work of the presidency and cross-branch candor,” according to Ryan Goodman, a former special counsel. for the Ministry of Defense and editor-in-chief at Just Security.
“This position does not affect whether the actions in question occurred before or during a president’s term. Executive branch lawyers will probably fight hard to hold that line and it could take years to go to trial,” he told CNN.
The White House said Thursday that the GOP investigations are politically motivated and a waste of time.
“Instead of working with President Biden to address issues important to the American people, like lower costs, congressional Republicans’ top priority is to go after President Biden with politically motivated attacks filled with long-discredited conspiracy theories,” a spokesman for White House Counsel. Ian Shams said in a statement to CNN.
“President Biden is not going to let these political attacks distract him from focusing on the priorities of the American people, and we hope congressional Republicans will join us in addressing them instead of wasting time and resources on political vendetta,” he added. Shams.
Private attorneys representing members of the Biden family did not respond to requests for comment.
