The House Judiciary Committee launched a wide-ranging investigation Monday into President Trump, his businesses and his allies, as lawmakers probe possible obstruction of justice, corruption and other crimes and abuses of power. The committee requested documents from at least 81 people or groups, who now have a March 18 deadline to respond. The list includes his sons Donald Trump Jr. and Eric Trump, his son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner, WikiLeaks, AMI chief David Pecker, the Department of Justice, the FBI, Trump’s charities and the founder of private security firm Blackwater, Erik Prince — who is also the brother of Education Secretary Betsy DeVos. We speak with Rep. Pramila Jayapal, who serves on the House Judiciary Committee.
JUAN GONZÁLEZ: Congressmember, on another topic, you’re a member of the House Judiciary Committee. The chairman, Jerrold Nadler, has requested, of more than 80 people connected to President Trump, documents looking at potential violations of the law. Some people are criticizing this as a wide net, an overreach by the committee. Your response?
REP. PRAMILA JAYAPAL: Well, you know, we submitted — Chairman Nadler submitted document requests for 81 agencies and individuals and the White House, and these are documents that have already been developed and provided to other investigations, like the Southern District of New York investigation. These are already-prepared documents. There’s nothing onerous about this request. But for two years, Republicans have blocked Democrats from doing our job on the Judiciary Committee, which is to look into obstruction of justice, public corruption and abuses of power. Those are the three areas. Judiciary Committee has wide breadth over those three areas. They’re our constitutional responsibility. These documents go to the core of those three issues.
And so, I hope that the White House does not start blocking all of our requests for these documents, because then we’re going to have to start…