Congress must stop being a body of cowards and start using it’s “Inherent Contempt Powers.” These powers entitle the Legislature to compel both DOJ Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstien and FBI Director Christopher Wray (under threat of imprisonment within its own jails) to submit unredacted documents which they have thus far refused.
The Supreme Court’s last ruling on the subject still stands as a prerogative of Congress’s own Separation of Powers.
The court ruled in 1821 that unless Congress has this leverage, it could be “exposed to every indignity and interruption that rudeness, caprice and even conspiracy may mediate against it.”
It also has the power to offer immunity to those claiming their 5th Amendment Right against self-incrimination so as to further ensure compliance. Ten and half years ago, even The Grey Lady had a piece on this.
New York Times
Congress Has a Way of Making Witnesses Speak: Its Own Jail
By Adam Cohen – Dec 4, 2007
Here’s an excerpt from the story:
The Congressional Research Service issued a report in July (2007) that confirmed Congress’s Inherent Contempt Powers. It explained how they work. ‘The individual is brought before the House or Senate by the sergeant at arms, tried at the bar of the body, and can be imprisoned in the Capitol jail.’ Congress can do this, the report concluded, to compel them to testify or to punish them for their refusal to do so.
This means Congress is full of crap when saying that it must first submit a criminal referral to the DOJ when pressuring DOJ and FBI officials to comply with Congressional subpoenas.
They’re just afraid of how it might look. They need to get over that fear on behalf of the American citizenry.
