By Dominic Taylor-
Peter Navarro, a top White House adviser to Donald Trump, has been ordered to testify before a federal grand jury and produce to prosecutors any records concerning January 6, including communications with the former president.
The grand jury subpoena to Navarro, which he said was served by two FBI agents last week, legally forces him to produce documents to the US attorney for the District of Columbia and could indicate widening justice department action ensnaring senior Trump administration officials.
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Navarro was referred to the justice department for criminal contempt of Congress by the full House of Representatives in April, following a vote, after he ignored a subpoena issued to him in February demanding that he produce documents and appear for a deposition.
Navarro’s disclosure about the subpoena came in a 88-page filing that seeks a federal court to declare the House select committee investigating the Capitol attack unlawful in a desperate move to stop a potential contempt of Congress indictment for defying the panel’s subpoena.
He said the courts must intervene to protect the separation of powers, and ensure that lawmakers were not getting into matters of justice.
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‘Repeated abuses by partisans and political score settlers like those on the Committee have institutionalized a partisan weaponization of Congress’ investigatory powers that now threatens the delicate balance and separation of powers between the legislative, judicial, and executive branches of our government,’ he says in a filing to be lodged at the District of Columbia district court
The filing is seeking the court to rule that the select committee is not properly constituted and therefore illegal, because the House speaker, Nancy Pelosi, refused last year to appoint some Republican members put forward by the House minority leader, Kevin McCarthy.
The panel subpoenaed him for testimony about a plan called the “Green Bay Sweep” to delay certification of President Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 election. Navarro described the plan in his book “In Trump Time” as the “last, best chance to snatch a stolen election from the Democrats’ jaws of deceit.”
Navarro, who is representing himself in the lawsuit, called the Green Bay Sweep strategy legal and constitutional under the 1887 Electoral Count Act. He is fighting the subpoena by arguing the committee is illegitimate and partisan.
And Navarro invoked executive privilege to keep communications with the president confidential. He joined a handful of Republican members lawmakers defying the committee and more than a dozen Trump aides and advisers who have filed lawsuits challenging committee subpoenas in court.
“Each of the issues raised in the lawsuit – which took several months to prepare – are ripe for the judiciary to address; I find it my duty to raise these issues now rather than submit to the coercion of a kangaroo committee,” Navarro told USA TODAY in an attempt to defend his position.
This case ultimately is about whether partisans in Congress are free to weaponize their investigatory powers – I think not – as well as the critical role that executive privilege and testimonial immunity play in ensuring effective presidential decision-making.
The suit argues that the panel lacks a Republican minority, rendering its subpoenas unenforceable, the suit argues, making his non-compliance with his subpoena is immaterial .
The filing also asks the court to grant an injunction preventing the US attorney for the District of Columbia, Matthew Graves, from enforcing a 28 May 2022 grand jury subpoena compelling him to produce documents requested in the select committee subpoena.
“Since the subpoena of the Committee is ultra vires, unlawful, and unenforceable, the US Attorney’s Grand Jury Subpoena is likewise ultra vires, unlawful, and unenforceable and the US Attorney must be enjoined from any actions to enforce this subpoena,” Navarro wrote.
The argument that the select committee is not properly constituted has been a common charge levelled by some of Trump’s allies against the congressional investigation into January 6, as they seek to find any way to avoid having to cooperate with the sprawling investigation.
As Navarro repeats the claim echoed by prominent Republican members of Congress challenging their subpoenas from the panel, he may find his suit an uphill battle given that multiple federal courts have repeatedly rejected that argument as meritless.
Judge Timothy Kelly, a Trump appointee to the DC district court, most recently ruled this month that the panel was not illegitimate when the Republican National Committee mounted a legal challenge to block a subpoena demanding records from its email vendor, Salesforce.
In the opinion that declined to grant Trump an injunction to stop the National Archives turning over White House documents to the inquiry, the supreme court ruled that although Trump had some ability to assert executive privilege, it did not overcome Biden’s waiver.
The broad investigation into the January 6 Capitol Hill riot continues to gather real drama in its momentum, raising curiosity as to how and when it will all come to n end with clear outcomes.
Navarro is known to have been in touch with Trump’s legal team led by Rudy Giuliani and operatives working from a Trump “war room” at the Willard hotel in Washington to stop Biden’s election certification from taking place on January 6 – a plan he christened the “Green Bay Sweep”
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