Drop subpoena talk, learn from GOP
Let Trump investigations speak for themselves
“I want seven hearings a week, times 40 weeks.”
Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., my former boss, famously said that after Republicans won the House majority in 2010, as he prepared to become chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform.
Internally, it was a cringe-worthy moment. Why? Because, we were unnecessarily setting up impossible-tomeet expectations for ourselves.
The combination of our own enthusiasm for finding ourselves in the majority, the news media hype (which we stoked) and the hyper politicization of just about everything during the campaign had created an environment in which the only way we could be successful was if we “got the goods” on our targets right away. Anything short of immediate success would enable our detractors to claim that our lack of success was proof we were all talk — that our investigations were nothing but political witch hunts and there was no “there” there to discover.
This really was a case of us not knowing what we didn’t know. In retrospect, we’d have been so much better off if we had just said nothing and let the process naturally take its course.
As House Democrats find themselves in the same position we were in eight years ago, they should learn from our mistakes. On Monday, Axios reported that a “senior Democratic source” said the new majority was preparing a “subpoena cannon” to unleash on the Trump administration.
On one hand I chuckled, because this was the kind of rhetorical bombast I was very fond of using back in the day. On the other hand, I winced, because it usually set us up for failure.
Here’s the reality about investigations: When done right, they take time. The bulk of things Democrats want to investigate will not yield immediate or tangible results. In fact, Democrats won’t be issuing many subpoenas until at least February. The one exception may be to compel Acting Attorney General Matthew Whitaker to testify before the House Judiciary Committee.
When House Democrats officially take control in January, they will spend the first few weeks organizing their committees. Then the oversight work begins. The first thing they’ll do is send a “document request” to the White House and relevant agencies for material they tried and failed to get under Republican majority rule.
This is a voluntary request, not a subpoena. What happens next is up to the White House.
The Trump administration and specifically the new White House counsel, Pat Cipollone, will have to choose between two options: appearance of cooperation, or obstruction. Blatant obstruction forcing a showdown with Congress is the fastest mechanism to unleash a tsunami of subpoenas.
Appearance of cooperation would slow things down significantly. The White House would try to narrow the scope of the request and make acts of good faith by voluntarily producing some documents and making some people available for interviews. This process alone could take weeks.
At some point, committee investigators will either decide they have what they need and close the investigation, or make another voluntary request for additional information, witnesses and documents. The administration could decide that it has cooperated enough and produce nothing. Then, and only then, should a congressional subpoena come into play.
Congressional Democrats would be wise to adopt the tone of Maryland Rep. Elijah Cummings, incoming chairman of the oversight committee. “I take subpoenas very seriously ... and if I have to use them, they will be used in a very, in a methodical way, and it must be in the public interest (as a) method of last resort,” he said on ABC’s “This Week.”
Anyone talking about a flurry of investigations and subpoenas is falling into the Issa-trap instead of taking a smart, strategic step back. Ultimately, if done right, the results of the investigations will speak for themselves. Those results will have much more impact if they are presented without the partisan, political rhetorical preamble.
Kurt Bardella, a member of USA TODAY’s Board of Contributors, is a former spokesperson and senior adviser for the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee. He left the GOP last year to become a Democrat.