House Oversight Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) has issued another subpoena to Department of Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, requesting records from Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).
The subpoena follows the GOP-led House’s impeachment of Mayorkas last month and marks the third such request sent to the DHS chief in recent months. In December, Jordan issued a subpoena seeking documents pertaining to “violent” illegal aliens, followed by another in February regarding border security in Texas, The Daily Wire reported.
The Ohio Republican has also been seeking information on the illegal immigrant suspected of killing University of Georgia nursing student Laken Riley, the Daily Wire reported.
“As a part of its oversight efforts, we conducted transcribed interviews with several Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials. During these transcribed interviews, the ICE witnesses were unable to answer certain questions about data, documents, and communications related to the Biden Administration’s immigration policies,” Jordan wrote in a cover letter accompanying his latest subpoena.
“On November 2, 2023, the Committee requested that the Department provide the information that the ICE witnesses could not provide during their transcribed interviews. To date, the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) has failed to fully comply with our requests,” the GOP lawmaker added.
#BREAKING: Chairman @Jim_Jordan subpoenas DHS Secretary Mayorkas for @ICEgov data, documents, and communications.
America faces a migrant crisis at the southern border and DHS failed to fully comply with the Committee's requests for over four months.
Unacceptable. pic.twitter.com/maMf5LHr8q
— House Judiciary GOP (@JudiciaryGOP) March 13, 2024
Jordan mentioned that committee staff made several attempts to inquire about the status of the requested information in the months following DHS’s missed deadline. On two occasions, the agency’s staff initially provided “only a partial answer” and subsequently shared links to some public data and information that did not meet the panel’s requirements, the chairman elaborated.
“Although we appreciate that DHS has provided some limited data, your failure to produce all the requested documents and information prevents the Committee from fulfilling its constitutional oversight obligations,” Jordan wrote.
A DHS spokesperson pushed back on Jordan’s claims, however.
“Instead of working cooperatively, as DHS has repeatedly sought to do, the House Judiciary Committee continues to waste time with unnecessary subpoenas that serve no purpose beyond political posturing,” said DHS press secretary Mia Ehrenberg. “In this Administration, DHS has produced thousands of pages of documents, provided countless briefings, and sent dozens of witnesses to appear for hearings. On this request alone, DHS already provided the vast majority of the information requested by the committee and made clear that our efforts remain ongoing.”
She added: “DHS will continue cooperating with Congressional oversight requests, all while faithfully working to protect our nation from terrorism and targeted violence, secure our borders, respond to natural disasters, defend against cyberattacks, and more.”
