Senators Mark Warner and Marco Rubio made it crystal clear to Merrick Garland that his attempt to block their oversight, by saying it conflicts with “ongoing investigations,” isn’t going to work. Democrats thought they had the magic phrase to stonewall conservatives who are investigating the weaponization of the Just Us Department. The rats have been in charge of the cheese for so long they think they own the place. There are new watchdogs in the House and these ones will have teeth, for a change, the senators explain. They’re on a rat hunt.
Oversight not negotiable
Congressional oversight duties of Senate and House committees aren’t something “negotiable” which can be shirked lightly. Not even by Merrick Garland. As Senator Mark Warner declared, “we are united.” Not only that, they’re determined. We “have to find a way to do our job. That means we need these documents.”
The specific documents he’s talking about right now are the classified ones seized from both Donald Trump and Joe Biden. There are boxes and boxes of other documents on other cases but this policy should cover them all.
The two top dogs on the Senate Intelligence Committee, Mark Warner and Marco Rubio, “jointly said they spoke for their entire committee in demanding access to documents.” In this case the classified ones concerning Trump and Biden but the statement applies across the board. “I don’t know how congressional oversight on the documents, actually knowing what they are, in any way impedes an investigation,” Rubio explained Sunday, January 29.
Warner and Rubio together call for document oversight for national security https://t.co/KG6Don4Bzj via @politico
— Senator John Cornyn (@JohnCornyn) January 29, 2023
Both Trump and Biden stand accused of improper “storage and handling of the documents.” The investigations seem to be proceeding very differently in the two separate cases. The FBI is reportedly tripping all over themselves to convict Trump on anything at all, especially if it involves Russia. Meanwhile, they’re working real hard to avoid even starting an investigation into Hunter Biden’s laptop or the authentic email evidence it contains. Evidence rumored to be of corruption in the Obama administration, influence peddling, and election rigging. Along with illicit drug use and human trafficking.
The conservative senators underscored the “urgent need to understand whether the recent document discoveries associated with Trump and Biden pose a risk to national security.” That’s the whole point of their oversight committee. Both caches of documents “included classified material.” That means the senators have “a right to know the content to the extent that it could affect national security.”
They really want to know, right now, did either Trump or Biden have anything which “contained sources and methods for gathering intelligence.” If so, they want to know if it was current enough to even make a difference. Old news is harmless and not worth raiding people over.
No concern about criminal matters
The senators insist they don’t care what crimes anyone committed, other than jeopardizing national security. That’s an oversight job for House watchdogs. “We’re not interested in the timeline, the tick-tock, the who-got-what, who-did-that,” Rubio insists.
After all, “as members of Congress who have access to classified materials, the senators might already have access to the specific documents, but they just don’t know which ones they are.”
Another point Rubio raised was the threat of defunding the DOJ. He claims he’d prefer not to “go down that road” but the possibility of withholding funds from the involved agencies does exist.
Trump and Biden documents: Warner and Rubio united in demanding access from intelligence community – CBS News https://t.co/QakBRIGCyV
— Jo Reitkopp 🇺🇸🇮🇹🇮🇱 (@JoTrumpCA) January 29, 2023
“We’re not going to sit here and just issue press releases all day.” As members of an oversight committee, they take their obligations seriously. They have seen too much crucial information leaking over to the Iranian and Chinese sides to let anyone slide.
That means that Mike Pence will be under the same oversight scrutiny as Trump and Biden. The Clintons and Barack Obama could end up with FBI agents tossing their closets some day.
Mike Pence is a nice, quiet, polite guy but the senators want to know what he had tucked away in his safe. “We’ve not really focused as much on the Pence documents, but who knows what additional shoes may fall.“