House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, who infamously refused to honor a lawful subpoena from the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack requiring his testimony last year, on Friday issued a letter to FBI Director Chris Wray demanding 16 FBI agents testify before his committee or face subpoenas to do so.
The letter is officially from the Judiciary Committee but was tweeted out by the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, which is also chaired by Jordan. That new subcommittee has been the subject of scrutiny and mockery over the past 24 hours after Jordan claimed he had three FBI “whistleblowers” who Democrats in a damning 300-page report say have no first-hand knowledge of any wrongdoing.
Democrats are demanding Jordan make the three agents testify in public “about the so-called ‘weaponization’ of the law enforcement agency,” Raw Story reported.
“A series of reports have shown that Jim Jordan’s new ‘weaponization subcommittee’ is based on lies,” says MSNBC executive producer Kyle Griffin. “Witnesses who appeared at hearings have spread conspiracies about Jan. 6, some have zero firsthand knowledge of any FBI wrongdoing, and some have been paid by Trump allies.”
The New York Times reported at least two of the so-called whistleblowers were compensated by a top Trump ally, Kash Patel.
“Nick Akerman, former assistant special Watergate prosecutor and former assistant U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, told Newsweek on Friday that Jordan and the Republicans are relying on ‘three nutcases’ to provide evidence of a ‘Deep State conspiracy’ about COVID-19, January 6, 2021, Capitol riot or the 2020 presidential election being stolen,” Newsweek reports.
Chairman Jordan’s three-page Friday letter to the FBI Director appeared at the far-right wing website Breitbart as an “exclusive,” and was posted to Twitter by Jordan’s committee, which also retweeted the Breitbart story. The Judiciary Committee also quickly republished the Breitbart story to the Committee’s website.
The letter begins, “The Committee on the Judiciary is conducting oversight of the programs and operations of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). As part of our constitutional oversight responsibilities, we require testimony from employees of the FBI about the matters we are examining. We expect your cooperation in this process.”
It does not state what the investigation is about, nor does it offer Wray any information on what the 16 agents would be testifying about. It does, however, make clear the threat of subpoenas: “Please be aware that the committee will resort to compulsory process to obtain the required testimony.”
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It appears Jordan or someone on his subcommittee may have given Breitbart information from their investigation.
“Jordan named in the letter 16 individuals, all of whom are current or recent FBI employees and had been named by the three witnesses in the closed-door interviews, according to interview transcriptions and notes reviewed by Breitbart News.”
Late last year the U.S. House Select Committee on the January 6 Attack found that Rep. Jordan had violated congressional ethics when he refused to honor their lawful subpoena.
“Ohio GOP Congressman Jim Jordan was unanimously referred to the bipartisan House Ethics Committee,” WSYX reported, “for refusing to share what he knows about former President Donald Trump’s role in the U.S. Capitol insurrection nearly two years ago.”
See Jordan’s letter to Director Wray below or at this link:
Image by Gage Skidmore via Flickr and a CC license