DOJ To Court: House Can’t Sue To Enforce Subpoenas

The Hill reports:

The Trump administration told a federal judge on Thursday that Congress cannot sue the executive branch, attempting to fight off a House committee’s subpoena for documents related to aborted efforts to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census.

James Burnham, an attorney with the Justice Department, argued that Congress cannot use the courts to enforce its subpoenas. It can only use the legislative tools it has at its disposal, he said.

“If they are enforceable in the courts that would be a revolution in the history of the relationship between the branches,” Burnham said. “These cases would multiply like rabbits.”

Schiff began with something in the category of “you cannot make this stuff up.”

“Today the DOJ is in court resisting the House subpoenas. The judge said, if Congress cannot enforce the subpoena in court, what remedy is there?”

The DOJ lawyer said, “Impeachment.”

[Laughter]

— Teri Kanefield (@Teri_Kanefield) January 30, 2020

The Senate just broke into laughter at the hypocrisy of the @GOP to be claiming that the House should be fighting for subpoenas in court, while the DOJ is in court arguing that subpoenas against the President can’t be enforced because impeachment is the only remedy.

Funny crying

— Elizabeth C. McLaughlin (@ECMcLaughlin) January 30, 2020

SCHIFF: “While we’ve been debating whether POTUS can be impeached for bogus claims of privilege, the DOJ is resisting subpoenas in court today… the judge says ‘if Congress can’t enforce its subpoenas, what remedy is there,’ & DOJ’s response is impeachment! You can’t make it up” pic.twitter.com/Tim1HHDgBO

— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) January 30, 2020