Barr should testify at oversight hearing of the House Judiciary Committee
On Thursday, Attorney General William Barr is scheduled to testify before an oversight hearing of the House Judiciary Committee. He is threatening to refuse to testify.
The Trump administration’s escalating resistance to oversight needs a reality check.
In 1975, the Supreme Court explained that congressional oversight authority “is as penetrating and far-reaching as the potential power to enact and appropriate under the Constitution.”
Basically, if Congress can write a law or dedicate tax dollars, the American people must have their questions answered.
Whether demanding the Attorney General defend preexisting conditions protections, shining light on the detention of children ensnared in our broken immigration system, or asking Barr about misleading spin he put on the Mueller report, Congress and the American people have the right to know.
Special Counsel Robert Mueller wrote that, “The protection of the criminal justice system from corrupt acts by any person accords with the fundamental principle of our government that ‘no person in this country is so high that he is above the law.’ ”
To defend that principle, Congress must be able to carry out oversight.
That is why the attorney general must show up, and the American people must have the opportunity to hear his answers.
U.S. Rep. Ted Deutch (FL-22)
U.S. Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell (FL-26)
This story was originally published May 1, 2019 at 12:38 AM.