Attorney General Todd Blanche said Thursday that the Justice Department has no active criminal investigations into Democratic lawmakers’ remarks about their plans to scrutinize the Trump administration, days after he said lawmakers attempting to open partisan investigations against the administration could be “a crime.”
“There’s no ongoing investigations, criminal investigations into words that that incoming senators or congressmen have said,” Blanche told reporters. Asked what a Democrat had said that crossed a criminal line, he replied, “I’d never said that that point has been crossed.”
In a CNN interview that aired Sunday, Blanche said “there could be” a crime to investigate if Democrats’ rhetoric turned threatening. But in his more recent remarks on Thursday, Blanche clarified whether lawmakers’ warnings that Trump officials could face scrutiny could on their own warrant any criminal investigation.
“That is not a crime to say that,” Blanche said. “Nobody’s saying that’s a crime.”
One day before Blanche’s remarks, Aaron Reitz, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Texas, directed Sen. Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) to preserve records from his inquiry into private donors to the White House ballroom. Reitz accused Blumenthal of threatening “citizens for associating themselves with the President and other public officials” and warned of “significant legal consequences” if the senator failed to comply.
Reitz cited federal statutes on conspiracy against rights and deprivation of rights under color of law. In response to Reitz’s post, acting Deputy Attorney General Trent McCotter wrote on X, “The First Amendment expressly prohibits Congress from infringing the speech and association rights of Americans.” He added, “DOJ will defend against threats to those rights, period.”
Asked why a Texas prosecutor sent the letter and whether the DOJ headquarters approved it, Blanche said “any office could investigate that” and that department leaders work with U.S. attorneys, including Reitz, “on ongoing investigations.” He did not say whether headquarters approved the letter or whether Blumenthal was under investigation.
Rep. Robert Garcia (D-CA), who is in line to chair the House Oversight Committee in January, has warned Trump officials to “lawyer up.” White House counsel Will Scharf wrote to Garcia this week that threats aimed at deterring officials from public service “may cross the line into blatant criminality.”
Scharf cited the Supreme Court’s 1957 decision in Watkins v. United States, which overturned a contempt of Congress conviction. He quoted the court’s warning that investigations conducted “solely for the personal aggrandizement of the investigators” are “indefensible.” Scharf wrote that congressional investigations “must further a legitimate legislative task” and that Congress “cannot employ them to exercise powers of criminal prosecution assigned to the Executive and the Judiciary.”
Blumenthal, the top Democrat on the Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, wrote last month to people identified by the Washington Post as ballroom donors. Speaking to reporters on Capitol Hill on Tuesday, before Reitz sent his letter, Blumenthal said his inquiries would extend to “the corporations and individuals who have donated to his vanity project.” He argued that those donors had “no executive privilege whatsoever.”
BLUMENTHAL ‘WILL NOT BE INTIMIDATED’ BY DOJ OVER TRUMP BALLROOM INVESTIGATION
Blumenthal said Wednesday he “will not be intimidated” and sent Reitz a preservation demand of his own, asking him to retain communications with the White House and senior DOJ officials about the decision to write and post the letter.
Blanche was answering questions following a DOJ press conference announcing the results of Operation TorNado, a 14-country crackdown on dark web drug trafficking. Authorities arrested 354 vendors and buyers worldwide and seized 5 metric tons of drugs and more than 210 million euros in criminal assets.