On Friday afternoon House Judiciary Chairman Jerrold Nadler (D-NY) filed a petition to obtain secret grand jury information currently redacted from the Mueller Report. With articles of impeachment under consideration, this informational probe is “in effect” the same as an impeachment inquiry, according to Nadler, who also called the information “critically important.” Next week Nadler is also expected to file a lawsuit to attempt to enforce a subpoena against former
White House counsel Donald McGahn. But how significant are Nadler’s moves now that special counsel Robert Mueller’s testimony on Capitol Hill is widely acknowledged to have fizzled, left-wing activists such as billionaire and
Democratic presidential candidate Tom Steyer are turning their attention back to climate change—and
Congress is heading toward a six-week-long recess?Fred Wertheimer, a veteran ethics activist and president of Democracy 21, believes Nadler’s move is only a cosmetic change to reflect changing party sentiments. “That’s what they’ve been doing since March. When they announced they would investigate three areas regarding the president: obstruction of justice, public corruption, and abuses of power. They have had articles of impeachment pending referred to the committee months and months ago . . . the investigation they have been conducting since March is the equivalent of an inquiry into whether they should consider impeachment,” he told the National Interest.