WASHINGTON – The House Intelligence Committee will likely issue subpoenas as soon as this week for information from former national security adviser Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn and his companies, according to the panel’s top Democrat, after Flynn failed to voluntarily provide documents they had requested for their probe into alleged Russian meddling in the 2016 elections.
Rep. Adam Schiff, Calif., the ranking Democrat on the committee, said the panel “would explore whatever compulsory process that we would need to use,” to compel information from Flynn, including subpoenas and, if those are rejected, the option of citing Flynn for contempt. He made those comments during a breakfast with reporters sponsored by the Christian Science Monitor.
The Senate Intelligence Committee has been grappling with such options this week, after Flynn’s lawyers informed that panel that he would not comply with a subpoena for documents relating to his contacts with Russian officials between June 16, 2015 and Jan. 20, arguing that Flynn had a Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.
The Senate panel responded to that letter Tuesday by issuing two new subpoenas for information from Flynn’s companies, arguing, as vice chairman Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., put it, “a business does not have the right to take the Fifth.”
