The House Oversight Committee demanding that White House officials turn over all work-related texts and emails that were received on personal accounts, including President Trump’s daughter Ivanka Trump and his son-in-law, Jared Kushner.
This new move comes as part of a probe that has spent years investigating whether senior Trump administration officials violated federal records laws by using private messaging services to conduct government business.
The subpoena also includes former chief strategist Steve Bannon and acting chief of staff Mick Mulvaney.
The authorization of the subpoena was approved by 23 Democrats and opposed by 16 Republicans. Ironically, House Republicans and Donald Trump relentlessly investigated and derided Hillary Clinton for using personal emails for official business during her tenure as secretary of state during the 2016 election.
Trump has years after his Electoral College victory, and just last month, the top House Republican on the panel, Jim Jordan, called on the committee to renew its examination of the Clinton case, despite FBI officials declining to charge her after an earlier investigation.
Yet Jordan was outraged about the new subpoenas, despite the fact that a lawyer for Mr Kushner and Ms Trump admitted to the committee that his clients did use private email accounts for government business and the White House has refused to voluntarily turn over any of these documents.
Democrats impeachment efforts stall.
But less than 24 hours later, they plan to subpoena the personal emails of the First Family.
They are so desperate to get the President. They just can’t help themselves.
— Rep. Jim Jordan (@Jim_Jordan)
Jordan argued that Clinton’s emails were a more serious scandal, due to the volume of emails that were destroyed.
“Our approach today should not be different merely because Donald Trump is president,” said Elijah Cummings, chairman of the committee.
“The committee has obtained direct evidence that multiple high-level White House officials have been violating the Presidential Records Act by using personal email accounts, text messaging services, and even encrypted applications for official business — and not preserving those records in compliance with federal law,” Cummings said. “What we do not yet know is why these White House officials were attempting to conceal these communications.”
(Featured image: Wikimedia Commons)