“The Committee’s request amounts to nothing less than a vexatious, illegal fishing expedition openly endorsed by Biden and designed to unconstitutionally investigate President Trump and his administration,” his lawyer claims.
Former President Donald Trump asked a federal court late Monday to block the release of White House documents related to the Jan.6 attack on the U.S. Capitol. The documents in question are being sought by congressional investigators from the Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol. In the lawsuit, Trump’s attorney accuses the committee of deciding to “harass” the former president and his aides while characterizing the document requests as “illegal, unfounded, and overbroad.” Committee Chair Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) filed a series of requests for relevant documents in late August with David Ferriero, who runs the National Archives. Thompson, the committee, Ferriero and the National Archives are all named defendants in the lawsuit. “The Committee’s requests are unprecedented in their breadth and scope and are untethered from any legitimate legislative purpose,” Trump’s lawsuit argues. “The Committee’s boundless requests included over fifty individual requests for documents and information, and mentioned more than thirty individuals, including those working inside and outside government during the unreasonably overbroad time period covered by the request. Aside from being overly broad and seeking records protected by numerous legal privileges, these requests are also unduly burdensome because of the substantial time required to conduct an adequate review of the voluminous records.
