Lawyers for House impeachment investigators dropped their subpoena to compel a former National Security Council official to testify before Congress.
House Democrats said in a new court filing Wednesday they had dropped their subpoena of former deputy national security adviser Charles Kupperman on Tuesday and did not intend to reissue it. They requested that the lawsuit that Kupperman filed to compel the courts to determine whether he should appear for impeachment testimony be dropped.
The case was meant to serve as a control test to determine whether the House can enforce a subpoena for the testimony of a former White House official in its impeachment inquiry.
Kupperman was subpoenaed in late October, but he did not appear for testimony because he wanted to wait for the courts to determine whether he had to comply. President Trump directed Kupperman to not appear citing testimonial immunity for his closest advisers.
In the filing, Democrats’ lawyers urged Kupperman to comply with whatever ruling comes of the Don McGahn case determining whether the former White House counsel has immunity from cooperating with congressional subpoenas, as Trump claimed at the time. McGahn was subpoenaed as part of the House’s followup probe of special counsel Robert Mueller’s Russia investigation.
House Democrats called the suit an attempt to delay impeachment proceedings and House Intelligence Committee Chair Adam Schiff (D-CA) threatened to hold Kupperman in contempt.
It’s unclear why Democrats dropped the Kupperman subpoena, but most speculate that it’s a sign that Democrats don’t want to prolong proceedings with court battles and likely have enough evidence to more forward with their inquiry.
Read the filing below
Checkmate?
Did they think the court was going to say that congress does not have any power of subpoena even during a impeachment inquiry? Confused to why they did this.
humm … do you suppose that before long, all the cool kids are going to want to testify -
so as to be on the record as NOT being part of the gang that broke the school windows?
Only fight the fights you need to fight.
Don’t leave anything to chance or delay.
Agreed - not sure I understand what just happened and how it impacts moving the ball forward.