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Oversight Committee Democrats dished to Rolling Stone about their accountability wish list if the party retakes control of Congress
Earlier this year, House Speaker Mike Johnson warned a room of Christian conservatives that if Democrats manage to retake Congress in the midterm elections, “impeachment is not even the big concern.”
“They will turn every committee of Congress into an investigative body, and they’ll go after the president’s family, the Cabinet, his donors and friends,” he warned, a shadow of hysteria creeping into his voice. “Half of you in this room will be targeted. I run the protection program. I’ll take care of you,” he added.
Just weeks before the November midterms, voters seem poised to rebuke the first two years of unified Republican governance under Donald Trump. Polls — and private Republican murmurings — indicate the party will likely lose the House of Representatives, and could even see their narrow Senate majority slip into the hands of the opposition.
Democrats in Congress are chomping at the bit to deliver on Johnson’s warning. As the minority party in both chambers, their ability to legislate, conduct investigations, block administration priorities, and exert oversight powers is structurally limited. Should they gain majorities, they’re prepared to zero in on the ways in which the president and his administration have repeatedly exceeded their authority and usurped the Constitution, as well as the rampant corruption self-dealing within the extended Trump universe.
“Obviously there’s enough corruption to go around,” Rep. Robert Garcia (D-Calif.), ranking member of the House Oversight Committee, tells Rolling Stone. Preemptive preparations for a potential Democratic takeover of the key committee are already in the works. “We put together a great team where we’re all doing that work,” he says, adding that much of his senior team has joined him in California for a few days during the recess to begin “mapping and planning this all out.”
As the ranking member of the influential House Oversight Committee, Garcia has already made a name for himself as one of the leading voices in the Democratic push against the administration’s efforts to bury the Epstein files. Garcia managed to secure the release of tens of thousands of evidentiary documents through subpoenas to Jeffery Epstein’s estate, and was instrumental in advancing legislation forcing the DOJ to release government material pertaining to the case.
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Rolling Stone reached out to prominent Democratic lawmakers — many of them on the House Oversight Committee — about what investigative and oversight priorities they would pursue should they regain congressional control. Their responses varied widely, demonstrating the overwhelming wealth of concern into the Trump administration potentially unconstitutional actions — and potential criminality — among lawmakers and the American public.
“We know the center of all this is the Trump crime family — it starts there,” Garcia says, noting that the committee intends to hone in on four “out the gate” areas of focus they believe will encompass the most urgent priorities for the party: Trump family corruption, DHS and ICE, corporate corruption, and a refocus on the administration’s handling of the Epstein Scandal.
Garcia notes specific individuals Democrats are interested in bringing before the committee, including Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, former DHS Secretary Kristi Noem, and her close adviser (and alleged affair partner) Corey Lewandowski.
Dallas area Rep. Christian Menefee (D-Texas), the newest member of the Oversight Committee, said in an email that the next Congress will be a “reckoning.”
“The Republican-controlled Congress has spent the last two years watching the Trump administration hand out federal contracts to political allies, allow the Trump family to profit off the presidency, give preferential treatment to corporations that give to his campaign coffers, and weaponize law enforcement against people they don’t like,” he added. “Democrats haven’t had the power to do much about it. That changes in January when we take back the House.
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Menefee described the first half of Trump’s administration as “a criminal enterprise with a presidential seal on it,” adding that he would focus on “federal contracts [being] steered to donors and insiders, how tariff exemptions went to donors and political allies while families paid higher prices at the store, the administration’s use of government resources for the personal benefit of the Trump family, and the systematic stripping of federal programs that communities like mine in Houston have relied on for decades.”
Rep. Greg Casar (D-Texas), chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus and a member of the Oversight Committee, expressed an interest in digging into the Trump administration’s demands that states redistrict their maps to produce more favorable outcomes for Republicans. “Every day, Trump gives Congress something new to investigate. The corruption comes first: he made $2.2 billion in his first year back in office while working families paid more for everything,” Casar wrote in an email. “That same lawlessness runs through his administration, from ICE covering up the killing of a U.S. citizen in San Antonio to a Justice Department weaponized to rig maps in states like Texas. Meanwhile, the CEOs of AI companies are risking our jobs and our safety without ever answering to Congress under oath. Democrats need to be ready to dig into any and all of it on day one.”
Rep. Ayanna Pressley (D-Mass.), also on the Oversight Committee, wants to look into the administration’s efforts to eliminate diversity and civil rights policies protecting Black Americans and other minorities. Accountability “means restoring essential pillars of diversity, equity, inclusion, and accessibility across our public and private sectors, educational institutions, and museums and legislating a pro-Black agenda against Trump’s campaign of anti-Blackness,” she wrote. Pressley also hinted at the pillars outlined by Garcia, noting she was also interested in pursuing justice for “survivors of sexual assault” and “accountability of perpetrators.”
Rep, Maxwell Frost (D-Fla.) responded that his oversight priorities as a member of the committee would “include investigating corrupt and abusive actions within the Department of Homeland Security, including the conduct and operations of ICE,” as well as the Epstein scandal, financial profiteering by the administration and the Trump family, and corporate corruption in relation to the affordability crisis.
Frost and Menefee both expressed support for potential impeachment proceedings against Trump and members of his Cabinet. The House impeached Trump twice for actions during his first term — once in 2019 for pressuring Ukraine to investigate his political enemies, and a second time in 2021 for his role inciting the riot at the Capitol. The Senate acquitted him both times. Given the rampant corruption of Trump’s first two years back in office, many believe it’s incumbent on Congress to consider impeaching him a third time.
“Congress has a constitutional duty to look into all of it,” Menefee wrote. “Public reporting has documented corruption, self-dealing, abuses by federal law enforcement, and in the case of ICE, the killing of innocent civilians in American streets. We need to investigate every corner of it. And if that evidence leads to impeachment proceedings, I’ll be there.”
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Regardless of whether Democrats move to remove Trump from office, they certainly intend to use the power of Congress to investigate the administration, should they win next month.
Republicans are in a mad scramble to shore up as many supposedly safe seats as they can and mitigate their potential Election Day losses. In the spring, Trump directed Republican governors to move forward with off-cycle redistricting efforts in order to create more GOP-controlled seats in Congress. The administration is also pursuing ways to interfere with voting rights, including to restrict mail-in voting. Ultimately, Republicans know that the walls are closing in, and Democrats will not need to go on a fishing expedition to find evidence of unlawful and unconstitutional wrongdoing. The Trump administration has already provided them with plenty of material.