OPINION: This article contains commentary which reflects the author's opinion
House Democrats plan a wave of investigations into the Trump administration.
Several leading committee chairs have sent a letter to more than 50 agencies warning that all documents and texts, even on private phones, from the Trump administration should be preserved until told otherwise.
“This preservation request should be construed as an instruction to preserve all documents, communications, and other information, including electronic information and metadata, that is or may be potentially responsive to a congressional inquiry, request, investigation, or subpoena that was initiated, continued, or otherwise undertaken during the 116th Congress,” said the 173-page package sent out.
For good measure, it included a jail threat.
“Any employee who conceals, destroys, or attempts to conceal or destroy a federal record may be subject to fine and imprisonment for up to three years,” said the letter to 53 agencies.
It is already the law that documents be preserved.
White Houses store their documents, texts, and photos, typically in a presidential library.
But the memo is a signal that there are potentially many more investigations coming targeting the Trump administration by House Democrats, and possibly a reinvestigation of past inquires.
The letter, for example, uses the words “potentially responsive” and “potentially relevant” five times.
It also puts former administration employees and contractors on notice and requests deleted information to be recovered.
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said thousands of National Guard troops at the U.S. Capitol should remain “as long as they are needed,” indicating there’s no end in sight for how long they will stay in Washington, D.C.
During her weekly press conference, Pelosi said Capitol Police requested that they stay in place for another two months to essentially occupy the building.
“We have to have what we need when we need it, and in the numbers that we need,” the California Democrat told reporters. “But that’s a security decision.”
Thousands of troops remain in and around the Capitol since the Jan. 6 chaos.
Capitol officials also erected 7-foot, nonscalable fencing topped with barbed wire around the perimeter of the campus.
Pelosi told reporters she’s waiting for a briefing on a security plan proposal for the Capitol that could come as early as next week.
“Hopefully, next week, we will be able to have presentations,” Pelosi said. “The issue of the National Guard is one that will be made by the Capitol Police and the [U.S. Capitol] Police Board, and the rest.”
Pelosi said the move was “just as a convenience” to accommodate the GOP Conference issues retreat scheduled for Thursday afternoon, but she also said it “made sense” to have fewer people in the Capitol “if, in fact, there were any troublemakers around.”
Earlier this week, a bombshell report reveals that more than a dozen Michigan National Guard troops deployed to Washington, D.C., have been sickened, with some hospitalized, after repeatedly being served raw, undercooked meat and meals.
A whistleblower told WXYZ-TV reporter Brian Abel that nearly 75 meals were thrown out Sunday after metal shavings were found, other meals showed up undercooked making soldiers sick.
But wait, it gets even worse.
WXYZ-TV also reported that the anonymous sergeant said the troops are being forced to pay for their own food until officials get the situation under control.
The sergeant told the news outlet: “Now after the raw meat yesterday for dinner they have told us not to eat the meals for the next two days and are giving us MRE’s instead. Soldiers are now paying for all their meals for the next two days in order to get real food.”