A number of readers have written in taking umbrage or exception at my suggestion that there really are no constitutional issues raised by the FBI raid on the office of Rep. Bill Jefferson (D-LA).
A number of those emails, candidly, have been a lot of rhetoric and huffing and puffing without much solid argument.
Others make a different argument. We shouldn’t see this incident in isolation but rather in the broader context of the White House’s disregard for the role of law and repeated assertions of constitutionally dobious executive power. This strikes me as a stronger argument. But it’s not clear to me that the decision to mount this raid or seek the court approval for it came out of the White House, let alone from the president. (Since I’ve been away for a week, I’m at a bit of a disadvantage. Did I miss some evidence or reporting that pointed in that direction.) At least from a distance, the impetus for this appears to come out of the much more aggressive tactics of the Public Integrity section of the Justice Department — something that’s caused the White House a lot of grief. And all that aside, this still leaves unaddressed what specific constitutional impediment there is to executing a search warrant.
Yet another argument is the novelty of the case. In almost 220 years of American history there’s never been a law enforcement raid on a congressional office. That certainly raises some questions. But I think part of the answer may come from looking at how many bribery investigations and/or indictments there have been of sitting members of Congress. If anyone has an exact or even a rough number I’d be obliged if you could send it along. But I suspect it’s quite small. And a good part of the reason may be the degree to which Jefferson has resisted cooperating with the investigation. On this last point I’d like to hear more. But I remain unconvinced.
So again, any good arguments on this one? And is anyone prepared to make a specific and serious argument that this raid may have been unconstitutional on separation of powers grounds?
