Congress can seek eight years of President Donald Trump’s business records from his accounting firm, a federal appeals court in Washington, D.C., ruled Friday in one of several legal battles over access to the president’s financial data.
In a 2-1 ruling, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit upheld Congress’ broad investigative powers and rejected the president’s bid to block lawmakers from subpoenaing the documents.
The case is one of several clashes between the Democrat-controlled House and the Republican president over Trump’s data that is expected to reach the Supreme Court. In this case, the judges ruled that Trump’s arguments – that the subpoenas were invalid because Congress lacked a “legitimate legislative purpose” for its subpoenas – were incorrect.
“Contrary to the President’s arguments, the Committee possesses authority under both the House Rules and the Constitution to issue the subpoena, and Mazars must comply,” Judges David Tatel and Patricia Millett wrote for the court. Both were appointed by Democratic presidents.
The president was appealing a lower court’s decision that allowed a House Oversight Committee to move forward with its request for financial statements and audits prepared for Trump and his companies by the accounting firm Mazars USA.
The House sought these records months before the beginning of its recent impeachment inquiry, related to Trump’s alleged efforts to pressure Ukraine to investigate Democrat Joe Biden.
This case, instead, was prompted by testimony from Trump’s former “fixer,” attorney Michael Cohen, that Trump had exaggerated his wealth in order to seek loans.
In her dissent, Judge Neomi Rao – appointed by Trump – said if the House wants to investigate possible wrongdoing by the president it should do so by invoking its constitutional impeachment powers not its regular oversight powers.
“Throughout our history, Congress, the President, and the courts have insisted upon maintaining the separation between the legislative and impeachment powers of the House and recognized the gravity and accountability that follow impeachment,” Rao said. “Allowing the Committee to issue this subpoena for legislative purposes would turn Congress into a roving inquisition over a co-equal branch of government.”
It is unclear what will happen next in this case, but Trump seems likely to appeal – either to the full D.C. Circuit, or to the Supreme Court.
As part of the appeals process, House Democrats agreed with the president’s private legal team to suspend deadlines set by the subpoena for turning over the records while the court case is pending. The timeline allows the case to move swiftly by court standards and could set up a potential ruling from the Supreme Court in the midst of the presidential campaign.
Mazars has said it will “respect the legal process and fully comply with its legal obligations.”
Attorneys for both the House and Trump did not immediately respond to a request for comment Friday morning. Neither did Mazars.
In a separate case in New York, the president is trying to block Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance, D, from subpoenaing Trump’s tax records from the accounting firm. Vance is investigating hush-money payments made just before the 2016 election to two women who said they had affairs with Trump.
At the appeals court in Washington, Trump’s lawyers argued in July that the subpoena was invalid without specific authorization from the full House and an unconstitutional attempt to harass the president because it lacked a legitimate legislative purpose. The Justice Department echoed those arguments in a separate filing urging the court to stop the subpoena.
Douglas Letter, the House’s general counsel, had said in court that Congress has a legitimate interest in investigating the president’s possible conflicts of interest and potential misconduct. He noted that the House subpoena followed committee testimony from Trump’s former personal lawyer Michael Cohen that the president intentionally inflated and deflated the value of his assets to bankers and insurers for personal gain.
The appeals court was reviewing an expedited decision from U.S. District Judge Amit Mehta who pointed to decades of legal precedent upholding Congress’ right to investigate. The circuit panel heard arguments in a rare July session, keeping the case on a fast track.
“It is simply not fathomable,” Mehta wrote, “that a Constitution that grants Congress the power to remove a President for reasons including criminal behavior would deny Congress the power to investigate him for unlawful conduct – past or present – even without formally opening an impeachment inquiry.”
In a separate case on appeal in New York in August, the president and his family are also trying to stop one of their largest lenders from complying with a congressional subpoena. The president has appealed a ruling in that case and contends Deutsche Bank and Capital One should be barred from turning over years of financial records.
(c) 2019, The Washington Post · Ann E. Marimow, Spencer S. Hsu, David A. Fahrenthold ·
{Matzav.com}
