.MaddowBlog: Pres. Trump lawsuit hopes to limit the scope of congressional oversight
Close video The Rachel Maddow Show, 4/22/19, 10:36 PM ET Congressional Dems issue new subpoena as Trump sues As House Democrats issue a new subpoena for former White House Counsel Don McGahn, Rachel Maddow looks at why it is so difficult for Donald Trump to sue to stop congress from issuing subpoenas. share tweet email save Embed Last week, House Oversight Committee Chairman Elijah Cummings issued a subpoena to Mazars USA, directing the firm to turn over Donald Trump’s financial records.
But the Washington Post highlighted an interesting tidbit from the lawsuit, which I’d overlooked after initially reading the filing. The problem with that argument, said University of Baltimore law professor Charles Tiefer, is that Kilbourn v. Thompson is a case from 1880. “By reaching back to precedent to the 1880s, they’re seeking … to overturn the entire modern case law that the courts have put together to respect Congress’s investigative power,” Tiefer added, referring to Trump’s lawyers. “It’s a very long shot…. These suits look like an act of desperation by the Trump lawyers.
Trump’s lawyers effectively made the case, in an official court filing, that Congress can only conduct oversight in pursuit of legislative ends. If that were true, any effort on the part of lawmakers to scrutinize any controversy outside of legislative pursuits would be legally impermissible.
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