Republicans proved to be all but useless in their oversight of the Trump administration, but one area where they excelled beyond belief was in breaking through the barricades shielding the Justice Department's most valuable information from the public. Of course, Donald Trump's GOP henchmen punctured the DOJ barrier in search of documents they hoped would discredit the special counsel's investigation. But Democrats now hope to use the same tactics to make certain key aspects of the Russia probe are released to the public.
“I view the Mueller report as a bare minimum," House Intelligence Chair Adam Schiff told NBC News, adding that Democrats might also seek to track down other leads that emerge as a result of Robert Mueller's report. “We may very well have to fight for everything we want to learn beyond that. But I think the Department of Justice has established now a firm policy that they’re going to have to live with.”
That policy included making hundreds of pages of sensitive information available to lawmakers, parts of which Republicans almost inevitably released if they thought they could use them to impugn the integrity of the Mueller probe. Republicans also practically goaded law enforcement agencies into publicly announcing their every move in the investigation of whether Hillary Clinton mishandled classified information.
Many Democrats raised red flags along the way, warning that the Justice Department and the FBI were setting new precedents they would have to abide by in the future. Now, in anticipation of the eventual release of the Mueller report, the shoe is on the other foot. Schiff and a handful of other committee chairs have already sent a letter to Attorney General William Barr laying down the markers for the information they expect him to release once the Mueller report is finalized.
Part of the rub here is the DOJ policy that a sitting president can't be indicted. If the agency holds to that, then the only way to hold Trump accountable for his misdeeds would be through an impeachment process informed, at least in part, by the Mueller report. “To withhold evidence of wrongdoing from Congress because the president will not be charged is to convert department policy into the means for a cover-up,” Democrats wrote in their letter to Barr.
Democratic tactics could include everything from subpoenaing documents to threatening impeachment if Barr withholds any or all of the Mueller report, or even other information Democrats deem essential to their own investigations.