Page 771 - Contempt News Today

House counsel don mcgahn to share information related to the mueller report after weeks of vowing to hold them in contempt. one more time nbc news heidi przybyla is here with more on that. >> according to the "new york times" a resolution unveiled yesterday by the house rules committee would authorize congress to petition a federal court to enforce its requests, but without mentioning contempt. it leaves rooms to reach a deal with the justice department while still allowing lawmakers to go on th...

Power. there is a process we have to file and we will hold them in contempt that authorizes the civil action brought in court and the court will order them to comply with the subpoena and when they dont, if they dont, the court will enforce it by taking them into custody and imposing fines and taking other action. this is civil contempt. >> i want to stop you there. what would happen if they are people who dont pay traffic tickets. what happens if they say we dont care if you hold us in contempt...

Up the evidence gathered by congress. >> but what about a contempt vote? elliot, lets turn to you because the deadline has passed for attorney general william barr and secretary wilbur ross to produce documents requested by the house oversight committee. and chairman elijah cummings has indicated a contempt vote for both will come next week. a move the doj is calling premature. but elliot, is it -- is it premature? >> no because, look, the president from -- this goes back to january 3rd, the fir...

Thrown around. >> thats the problem. thats why the house leadership is trying to bundle these votes. they appreciate they have so many different fires going on here. this is not just about russia at this point. were talking about defiance of lawfully issued subpoenas, request for documents when it has to do with census or immigration, or the saudi transfer of nuclear technology. all of these things are being blanket rejected by this white house. >> heidi, as the house moves closer to holding the...

Itself can impose directly penalties or even you have heard perhaps tales of hidden jail somewhere on capitol hill to detain someone. we are talking about civil contempt here and one of the tools that congress can use and does it have teeth? thats the real question. would there be any real penalty? but for people in public life, being held in contempt of congress is a blemish on the reputations. what we are talking about here is the attorney general and the commerce secretary and efforts made by...

How things will unfold next week when there will be some very high stakes votes. the house plans to hold a vote of contempt, civil contempt against the attorney general and former white house council don mcgahn. in part the reasons include what the house democrats call stone walling, failure to produce documents, failure to appear and provide testimony. now, this resolution sort of sets up a legal process and brings together the powers of the different committees so they can work together and ha...

Meeting that pelosi had on tuesday with four chairs of her committee. and it comes at such a critical time for her as a speaker. she is, as weve been discussing over the last days and weeks, been facing increasing pressure from members of her own party. now 59 democrats within the house have called for her to formally open an impeachment inquiry. and shes been working hard behind the scenes and really in front of the tv cameras expressing her strategy saying -- trying essentially to keep that re...

Folks associated with this administration have always done, withives to dodge, lie, to protect this president. at the same time, i want to tell people that we want to make sure that we follow all this evidence, forward all this evidence to the logical conclusion. if its obstruction, then were going to bring it out. and we want to make sure that this is read out loud in public and make sure that everybody understands whats going on. >> we have some brand-new information. i want to get your though...

Democrats plan to do next week to try to stop all of the stonewalling from the administration. what is their plan? >> reporter: yeah, significant ratcheting up of powers to congressional committees to go directly to court, to hold people in contempt if they are not complying with their subpoenas. the house will vote in a resolution next week that will hold bill barr in contempt as well as don mcgahn, the former white house counsel. that same resolution will also include a provision allowing this...

>> ah, i think thats nonsense. we have been working on this issue for a number of months. we have been really questioning the fact on what motivated the census bureau, what motivated the department of commerce to add the citizenship question. theyre not giving us the information. since theyre not giving us the information, if we need it, we issued a subpoena. if they dont respond we will issue the contempt. thats way weigh have to go. >> they are releasing statement, this letter, if you go ahead...