The House Judiciary Committee said Tuesday it was preparing subpoenas of President Donald Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner and former attorney general Jeff Sessions as it probes Trump’s alleged obstruction of the Russia investigation.
The Democrat-led committee said it intends to authorize subpoenas of up to 12 current and former administration officials if they don’t readily agree to testify in its investigation.
The officials also include former national security advisor Mike Flynn, former White House chief of staff John Kelly, former deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein, and former White House deputy chief of staff Rick Dearborn.
Committee chairman Jerry Nadler said they wanted to question the individuals on Trump’s actions to interfere with Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s Russian election meddling investigation, as well as about the administration’s policy of separating families who arrive in the country as undocumented immigrants.
The committee wants to question them “as part of our ongoing investigation into obstruction, corruption and abuse of power by the president and his associates,” Nadler said in a statement.
The committee recently interviewed two top sources for Mueller’s investigation, former senior White House officials Hope Hicks and Annie Donaldson.
Both provided Mueller significant information supporting his depiction of a number of alleged acts of obstruction by Trump.
But in closed-door interviews with the committee, both refused to answer numerous questions on the same subject, saying the White House had directed them not to reply based on a claim of Executive Branch “confidentiality interests.”