‘Schiff and his Committee ran roughshod over the rule of law in pursuit of the abusive impeachment …’
(Ben Sellers, Liberty Headlines) House Intelligence Chair Adam Schiff‘s abuse of his authority to coerce telecommunications companies and solicit the phone records of his political adversaries now faces its own legal scrutiny.
Judicial Watch sued the California Democrat under open-records laws to uncover what basis he cited for issuing the phone-records subpoenas while overseeing House Democrats’ impeachment effort against President Donald Trump .
“Adam Schiff abused his power to secretly subpoena and then publish the private phone records, in potential violation of law, of innocent Americans,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “What else is Mr. Schiff hiding?”
Among those whose metadata he disclosed through in the committee’s secretive dragnet operations were the committee’s own minority member—Rep. Devin Nunes, R-Calif.—as well as journalist John Solomon and several of Trump’s personal attorneys—including Rudy Giuliani.
Schiff claimed that he was exposing collusion between the president’s leading defenders. However, since not even the House’s eventual articles of impeachment accused Trump of any violations of the law, there would appear to be no underlying misconduct supporting the claim.
Rather, Schiff’s own violations of ethical and legal norms—including privacy laws and attorney–client privilege—would seem to closely mirror the exact accusations made against Trump, that he abused his power by pressuring the Ukrainian president to publicly investigate former Vice President Joe Biden for no other reason than his own political gain.
Many have criticized Schiff’s frequent leaks of privileged and private conversations, as well as classified information, for their potentially chilling effect on the justice system.
It comes amid the backdrop of another damning report that partisan Democrats within the FBI—many of whom have their own ties to Schiff—flouted the system of safeguards needed to prevent abuse of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act while seeking permission to eavesdrop on Trump campaign advisers.
It also is not the first time Schiff has used the false pretense of investigating Trump for his political advantage: He publicly declared during the Mueller Investigation that he had evidence of impeachable conduct by the president. However, his evidence never materialized and the report debunked his accusations.
“Schiff and his Committee ran roughshod over the rule of law in pursuit of the abusive impeachment of President Trump,” Fitton said. “This lawsuit serves as a reminder that Congressman Schiff and Congress are not above the law.”