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Kline. and the trump administration has just blanket resisting any effort by congress to look into this process because their claiming that it's entirely an executive branch function. congress does not have any answers about how jared kushner got his clearance, who intervened. the president was saying he didn't have anything to do with it, even though we have reporting that contradicts that. it's still an open question and it's one of those areas where the trump administration is resisting congressional oversight, guys. >> thank you for your reporting on this. ken dilanian for us in washington...

And there are subpoenas and information requests and they don't cite a single piece of legislation they are pursuing. not only that, they are taking over an executive branch function. they are afraid to call this impeachment hearing. this is oversight. you don't issue hundreds of subpoenas. >> laura: are you saying that if this were actually in impeachment proceedings then you wouldn't have a problem with these? >> they have to generate their own information. they can't be just redoing that and if they were in good faith they would read through the mueller report and they would say we now have...

Don't cite a single piece of legislation they are pursuing. not only that, they are taking over an executive branch function. they are afraid to call this impeachment hearing. this is oversight. you don't issue hundreds of subpoenas. >> laura: are you saying that if this were actually in impeachment proceedings then you wouldn't have a problem with these? >> they have to generate their own information. they can't be just redoing that and if they were in good faith they would read through the mueller report and they would t say we now have all this information. we have ten more questions or 15 ...

The white house has issued a letter, a white house lawyer, essentially saying to elijah cummings, you have asked us for all this information about security clearances, which are an inherently executive branch function. you, the congress, have no right to inquire into this. you certainly don't have a right to know what the fbi and cia determined about jared kushner's fitness for a security clearance. and elijah cummings has responded this hour saying, well, in fact, there's plenty of press dependent for congre precedent for congress obtaining informing about fbi background checks. it may be in ...

To do what was described. >> he has the right, but is what he did right? what is the risk? sir? >> well, i was amused by, you know, her statement that the white house doesn't discuss security clearances. well, they sure discussed it a lot when they were threatening to take away clearances of certain critics. but she is right. the whole clearance process from identifying people that need access to background investigations, to adjudication, to granting a clearance, is a purely executive branch function. the president is head of the executive branch, does have the prerogative to grant a clearanc...