FBI Director Christopher Wray will face charges of contempt of Congress if he only allows House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, R-Ky., and not the entire committee, to see a document that alleges a bribery scheme between President Joe Biden, during his years as vice president, and a foreign national, House Speaker Kevin McCarthy said Sunday.
“We have a responsibility of oversight,” the California Republican told Fox News’s “Sunday Morning Futures” host Maria Bartiromo. “If they do not comply and allow every person on oversight, Republican or Democrat — that’s their responsibility to the members of Congress — to see this document, I will move contempt charges against the director.”
The FBI is to brief Comer Monday about the document and he will be allowed to review it, but McCarthy said that only happened after he, as speaker, threatened Wray with contempt.
“When we realized there was a document, we sent a subpoena,” said Comer. “He did not want to comply with the subpoena. I called the director and told him I needed this subpoena, that we have a responsibility to oversee the FBI, a constitutional responsibility…he then changed his mind [and said] he would let the chairman and the rankers see the document and bring it to the House. That is not good enough.”
Meanwhile, the FBI wants a new headquarters, spending about $4 billion to start said McCarthy, but he doesn’t think “that’s the best use of our money.”
“I also wonder, do we need one big, large FBI building, and does it need to be back in Virginia, or should it be in Maryland or should it be in Texas if you’re doing cybersecurity or other [things]?” said McCarthy. “The president himself is fighting a bill I passed to bring federal workers back to work, as 50% of federal workers are not coming in. I think it’s responsible that they come in and do their job. But if that’s the argument, wouldn’t it be better if we had smaller offices across the country where FBI agents could help local law enforcement to solve human trafficking, to solve cybersecurity?”
His comments come after House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan last month threatened that Republicans will have to use the “power of the purse” against the FBI and the Department of Justice to limit how they’ve been treating the American people.
Jordan’s comments come after an often-contentious weaponization subcommittee hearing last month, with testimony presented by three suspended FBI agents who testified that they’ve been targeted for being whistleblowers who went to Congress over concerns on the Jan. 6, 2021 protest investigations and other issues.