One of House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan’s favorite hobbies is launching investigations into investigations, though one specific probe appears to be the Ohio Republican’s personal favorite.
Shortly after Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis indicted Donald Trump, among several others, in August, Jordan started demanding answers about the prosecutor’s election-related case. Specifically, the Judiciary Committee chair seems to think that the Justice Department might have secretly conspired with Willis’ office as part of a nefarious plot against the former president.
Jordan has literally no evidence to suggest Main Justice has anything to do with the Fulton County case, and Willis has written to the GOP congressman on several occasions in recent months, reminding him that he doesn’t appear to have any idea what he’s talking about.
It was against this backdrop that Jordan decided this week to go after Willis’ case in a slightly different way. NBC News reported:
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan and a subcommittee chairman on the House Administration Committee announced Tuesday that they would be investigating any “cooperation” between Fulton County, Georgia, District Attorney Fani Willis and the former House Jan. 6 committee.
Evidently, Willis sent a letter two years ago to Democratic Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, who chaired the now-defunct Jan. 6 committee. Jordan now believes this is worthy of closer inspection by the Judiciary Committee: He asked Willis to turn over communications between her office and the bipartisan select panel that wrapped up its work last year.
What’s more, it’s not just Jordan. Republican Rep. Barry Loudermilk of Georgia, who’s spent quite a bit of time investigating the Jan. 6 committee’s investigation, sent a separate letter to Thompson this week, seeking related documents.
So far, Willis hasn’t commented, while the Jan. 6 committee’s former chairman issued a statement complaining of the “significant factual errors” in Loudermilk’s request.
Time will tell what becomes of this — I’d recommend keeping expectations low — and it’s probably inevitable that Jordan and his cohorts will soon find some other investigation to investigate.
But what strikes me as especially odd about this line of inquiry is the apparent irrelevance of the underlying claim. At least when Jordan pressed Willis for answers over the summer, it was clear what he hoped to prove: The Ohio Republican had concocted a baseless conspiracy theory involving the Justice Department, and he pursued the matter accordingly.
This new thread is more peculiar. Let’s say, hypothetically, that Fulton County’s district attorney’s office really was in close contact with the bipartisan Jan. 6 committee. Let’s also say, as part of this same hypothetical, that Willis relied on information collected by congressional investigators as part of her prosecutions.
Why would that matter? What difference would it make if the Jan. 6 committee’s research proved useful to law enforcement? Jordan and Loudermilk appear to be seeking an answer to an irrelevant question.
