House Judiciary Committee is voting that Our public should not be confused: 6e is not the issue. The Committee knows that it must get with the Courts in order to obtain grand jury information — the Committee is prepared to do that. Ordinarily the Attorney General would go with the Committee to do that but the other 3 things the OSC report redacts, withholds information, are ongoing matters, they don’t say ongoing investigations nor do they say ongoing prosecutions, but the refusals to un-redact and to testify to Congress claims to withhold information on matters, by which they mean: national security, sources and methods, and peripheral parties. The Committee and Congress can deal with those three matters. Embarrassment of peripheral parties are concerns about which negotiations can resolve. Bluntly put, Trump refuses to do so and that is what this Contempt Proceeding is all about.
A key Amendment offered by Chairman Nadler “supplements the Contempt Report to address the Barr’s statement last night and later this morning that he is exerting Executive Privilege over the redacted portions of the (Office of Special Counsel, OSC) report and all underlying materials as well as offering explanations of many reasons why we (the Judiciary Committee) believe that assertion of Privilege lacks any valid basis”. — — — Representative Madeleine Dean [PA-04] then read the Barr letter signed as Attorney General, not as Personal Attorney to Trump, dated this morning, May 8th that Rep. Dean received in her hand at 10AM this morning as the Judiciary Committee gaveled in and she contrasted it to the January 29th 2018 (~16 months ago!) letter written by John Dowd (Trump’s Personal Attorney) addressing SC Robert Mueller in response to Mueller asking Trump to discuss with the OSC a list of 15 areas of concern. John Dowd in this long letter said all of the answers to the inquiries of concern are contained in exhibits and testimony from White House witnesses already acquired by OSC and the President Waived Executive Privilege. That key Amendment passed on recorded 20—12 vote.
House Judiciary Committee is voting out to the House Floor a 27 page contempt report (available here subject to revision to conform in language) for Attorney General William Barr’s failure to comply with a duly issued subpoena to provide Congress with the full, un-redacted version of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report along with underlying evidence.
Committee Members debate continues and might approve a resolution and a supporting report. The contempt report provides an explanation of the Committee’s urgent need for the Special Counsel’s report and underlying evidence, and the history of the Committee’s efforts to negotiate with the Attorney General, among other details.
We do not have 400 days to wait until we are assured that we have protection in the 2020 election.