9 Times The Obama Administration Fought Subpoenas or Blocked Officials from Testifying Before Congress
By Matt Margolis
After the long and thorough, and, of course, incredibly expensive Mueller investigation, Democrats were left distraught over a lack of any crime to justify going forward with impeachment. In the wake of the Mueller report, they’ve since promised new investigations in the hopes of finding some crime to justify putting the country through a process that most don’t want us to go through just because Democrats haven’t gotten over the 2016 election. In recent weeks, stories about subpoenas being challenged and Trump officials being instructed not testify have been saturating the news and being presented as evidence of further obstruction. Most notably, Attorney General Barr faces a forthcoming vote of contempt in the House for not wanting to be a part of the Democrats’ witch hunt.
It seems as good a time as any to remind Democrats that we know their outrage is phony and that we know this is just pandering to their base, who wants to see them “resist, resist, resist” at all costs. So, I’ve compiled nine examples of fights over subpoenas or testimony during the Obama years. The point here is that fights between the executive branch and the legislative branch over executive privilege are nothing new. Despite the rhetoric that the Trump administration’s fighting back against Democrat witchhunts being unprecedented, Barack Obama spent eight years fighting with Congress over their exercising their rights to oversight.
9. Fighting subpoenas in the New Black Panther Party voter intimidation investigation
When the Obama administration inexplicably dropped a voter intimidation case against the New Black Panther Party (NBPP) in Philadelphia, many questions were asked as to why. The NBPP had dressed in paramilitary uniforms outside of polling places in Philadelphia on Election Day 2008, and the case against them, which was started by the Bush administration, and the Obama administration won the case by default when the NBPP didn’t show up in court to defend themselves, but the DOJ decided to dismiss the charges. Former Justice Department attorney (and current PJ Media contributor J. Christian Adams) quit his position in the Justice Department to protest the Obama administration’s handling of the case and confirmed the racial motivation behind the decision to drop the case against them.
Of course, an investigation was launched, which the Obama administration fought rigorously. The investigation was stonewalled, subpoenas were fought, and key players were instructed not to testify.
8. Refusing to let the White House social secretary testify on party crashers scandal
In 2009, two party crashers successfully got by the Secret Service during a state dinner, succeeding in meeting and shaking hands with Barack Obama. Congress investigated the breach in security, but when White House Social Secretary Desirée Rogers was asked to testify before Congress, the White House refused to let her testify. Obama’s press secretary explained during a press briefing that “…based on separation of powers, staff here don’t go to testify in front of Congress.” That explanation was questioned by legal scholars. “I’d completely fall out of my chair if they invoked Executive privilege with regards to a social secretary arranging a party,” explained Mark J. Rozell, a public-policy professor at George Mason and expert on executive privilege. For what was arguably a very nonpartisan investigation (and led by Democrats) it certainly makes you wonder what the Obama White House was hiding.