The House Oversight and Reform Committee has sued Attorney General William Barr and Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross for refusing to comply with a subpoena to turn over documents related to President Donald Trump’s attempt to add a citizenship question to the 2020 Census, Politico reported Tuesday.
The suit was filed in federal court on Tuesday by committee Chairwoman Carolyn Maloney (D-NY). “I am filing this enforcement action today because the Trump Administration’s brazen obstruction of Congress must not stand,” Maloney said. “President Trump and his aides are not above the law.”
The decision to file the suit is thought to be related to a court victory one day earlier in which former White House counsel Don McGahn was ordered by a federal judge to provide testimony to Congress. McGahn had ignored a congressional subpoena to testify in Robert Mueller’s probe, and the Justice Department had agreed that his testimony was privileged and could not be compelled.
The White House is appealing the ruling on McGahn, but House Democrats seemed to be emboldened by the decision.
Trump’s intentions under scrutiny
Democrats are using the suit against Barr and Ross to get access to memos and correspondence that would shed light on Trump’s intentions for adding the citizenship question to the 2020 U.S. Census. The Supreme Court ruled that there wasn’t a legitimate reason given for adding the question, according to Politico.
For his part, Trump insists that he wanted to add the question to enforce the Voting Rights Act, but his political opponents are convinced that he had political motives in mind — namely, suppressing minority votes.
A Commerce Department spokesman said in a statement that the lawsuit “lacks merit” and claimed that the department did cooperate with “overzealous” House Democrats.
Trump backed off from pursuing his goal of adding the citizenship question after the Supreme Court ruling because any further litigation would have interfered with deadlines for printing materials and administering the census.
Another fishing expedition
While the Wall Street Journal reports that House Democrats claim they want to determine whether they need to pass legislation or put safeguards in place to protect the 2020 count, the lawsuit is really just another attempt at a fishing expedition to see if they can catch Trump doing something wrong.
Democrats got what they wanted: no citizenship question on the census. Now, we won’t know how many people living in our country or in a particular state or municipality are illegal immigrants.
One of the reasons Democrats were so opposed to a citizenship question is that it would affect a state or municipality’s funding if a high number of illegal immigrants live there. People in the U.S. illegally are not supposed to get any federal funding or be able to participate in federal programs like food stamps or Medicaid, but when citizenship status is hidden, illegal immigrants can often access the programs anyway.
Once again, Trump is trying to follow the laws of this country, while Democrats are doing everything they can to circumvent them. What a shame.
No comments: