Gym Jordan
Palmer Report commented last week on Jim Jordan’s abject failure to do the job that he was sent to Congress to do by opening yet another investigation into a district attorney who has indicted Donald Trump. Jordan is determined to interfere in all investigations of Donald Trump, which is not his job. Norman Eisen, former impeachment counsel; Josh Stanton, Counsel at Perry Law; and Fred Wertheimer, founder/president of Democracy 21, agree and penned a piece for MSNBC and suggest that Fulton County DA Family Willis “call his bluff.” What do they mean?
Technically, the Constitution makes no allowance for Congress to investigate or engage with law enforcement in any way. While the Constitution might suggest such powers, limits have been placed on those powers, most recently by Donald Trump and Jim Jordan, who called Congress’ attempts to get Trump’s tax records “an unprecedented abuse of the committee’s subpoena authority.” Now that he’s the one asking, Jordan has conveniently forgotten, but he tends to do that. He also recently loudly proclaimed that potential witnesses could not ignore Congressional subpoenas, though that is precisely what he did when the House Select Committee subpoenaed him. Jordan is a “do as I say and not as I do” kind of guy, which merely makes him a bully and not a very bright bully at that. In the case of Trump’s tax returns, the Supreme Court ruled that congressional subpoenas are enforceable only if they “relate to, and in furtherance of, a legitimate task of Congress.” Jordan’s continued efforts to involve himself in state criminal investigations fail to meet that burden. No legitimate Congressional task is involved in harassing state prosecutors, and that’s all this is: harassment.
Eisen, Stanton, and Wertheimer closely examined Jordan’s letter to Willis, which asked for confidential information relating to strategy, witness information, deliberations, contacts with Special Counsel Jack Smith, and communications with other prosecutors or governmental officials. He also asked for any “federal funding stream,” which is also not related to Willis’ indictment of Trump and his co-conspirators. He is not entitled to any of this information and is overstepping his bounds. Jordan also tried to make use of the alleged indictment that was filed before the grand jury voted, intimating something untoward, but that document has been debunked as a test of Fulton County’s electronic filing system and was merely a “dummy indictment” filed to gauge the ability of the system to withstand an onslaught.
As things stand right now, Jordan has merely written Willis a letter and has not issued any subpoenas, not that it matters. Atlanta Journal-Constitution political reporter Greg Bluestein knows Jordan’s campaign against Willis isn’t going anywhere. Appearing on MSNBC recently, Bluestein mentioned state Republicans efforts to oust Willis “isn’t going anywhere,” and neither is Jim Jordan’s sham “investigation.” Jordan cannot derail a legitimate investigation, and the case in Georgia is based on legitimacy. Again, we must ask: if Trump did nothing wrong, why not just go to trial and secure acquittal? We all know the answer, and so does Jim Jordan. He is merely trying to save Trump’s hide.
Shirley is a former entertainment writer and has worked in the legal field for over 25 years