House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Michael McCaul (R-TX) said he “fully” intends to exercise his subpoena power if President Joe Biden‘s administration continues “stonewalling” congressional inquiries.
McCaul explained that his committee is seeking information about why the withdrawal from Afghanistan went awry and is set on getting to the bottom of the mishandling of classified documents.
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“With respect to Afghanistan, there are a lot of questions unanswered there,” McCaul said on Fox News’s Sunday Morning Futures. “I’m doing it for America, and our veterans who served so bravely, and our Gold Star Mothers who deserve answers as to why this went so badly — jeopardizing Americans and leaving behind so many.”
During the State of the Union address, McCaul invited former Afghanistan Ambassador to the United States Roya Rahmani as his guest. He has already sent a letter to Secretary of State Antony Blinken demanding documents be preserved for his inquiry.
One document McCaul is particularly keen on getting is a diplomatic cable that reportedly warned of dire consequences ahead of the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan.
“It’s important because it’s a very extraordinary measure of relief to have an emergency cable sent from Kabul to Washington to the Secretary of State and the White House,” McCaul said. “If they do refuse, I do have the subpoena power. I fully intend to exercise. I also want to know why the Taliban was put in charge of the entire evacuation.”
McCaul is also eager to learn about possible ties between China and the Biden think tank, where files marked classified were found last November.
“I’m very interested in what was going on at the Biden center. $30 million in Chinese money going into the University of Pennsylvania,” he said. “I sent a letter asking questions about what were in those documents, what … officials visit[ed] the center and a whole host of other requests.”
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Ultimately, McCaul hopes to acquire the documents in a “cooperative way” but will lean on subpoena power if he needs to. The House Foreign Affairs chief also excoriated Biden’s recent handling of the suspected Chinese spy balloon that took nearly a week to shoot down.
“It’s betraying the nation,” McCaul said. “I think the Chinese Communist Party had this air flight pattern already set forth prior to its flight.
