Dem
51
GOP
49
Yesterday the House voted 216-207, largely along party lines, to hold AG Merrick Garland in Contempt of Congress. Only one Republican, Rep. David Joyce (R-OH), voted with the Democrats.
What the motion does is request a U.S. attorney to prosecute Garland for refusing to hand over audio of a former special counsel's interview with Joe Biden when he was investigating Biden's mishandling of classified documents. Garland refused the request to avoid having DoJ investigations become politicized. If this had worked, future Congresses could subpoena documents to interfere in any ongoing case of interest to them. Garland wanted to head this off at the pass. Also, Biden has asserted executive privilege over the recording, setting up a fight between the Executive and Legislative Branches that could take years before it gets to the Supreme Court.
House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) knows very well that this will be a very long battle with a small chance of success. The U.S. attorney in question, Matthew Graves, knows that if he prosecutes Garland, henceforth any time the House is not controlled by the president's party, the AG is going to be subpoenaed constantly and the administration of justice will grind to a halt. For Jordan, this would be a victory.
After the vote, Garland said: "It is deeply disappointing that this House of Representatives has turned a serious congressional authority into a partisan weapon. Today's vote disregards the constitutional separation of powers, the Justice Department's need to protect its investigations, and the substantial amount of information we have provided to the Committees."
If Graves doesn't move quickly, Rep. Anna Paulina Luna (R-FL) has said she will move to have the House sergeant-at-arms arrest Garland and bring him to the House to testify. There might just be a couple of separation-of-powers issues here and many Republicans in tight races might not want to vote for it. After all, if Jordan can arbitrarily arrest Garland, can Garland arbitrarily arrest Jordan? Of course, Garland (and Luna) know that Garland would never do that, so they can try to pull off their part without fear of reprisals—except, perhaps, at the ballot box if Republicans in swing districts vote for it. (V)