When he leaves office, he should also exercise his privileges: trump sues Congress on the investigat

Original title: exercise privileges after leaving office: trump sues Congress on the investigation of the riots on Capitol Hill
Source: Vision China
Reporter Wang Pinda
On October 18, former U.S. President Donald Trump sued Congress and the National Archives in a court in Washington, D.C., asking for the exercise of the president's administrative privileges to prevent the special committee for investigating the January 6 Capitol Hill riots of the house of representatives from accessing Trump's archives during his term of office from the national archives.
The indictment states that trump will continue to have the president's "administrative privilege" even if he has stepped down as president, and has the right to request that the relevant archives be kept secret when the current President Biden refuses to exercise the administrative privilege.
Trump put forward three main reasons for litigation: the materials requested by the special committee of the house of representatives have nothing to do with the legislative duties of Congress; The activities of the special committee violated Trump's administrative privileges as a former president; Nor did the Committee give the trump team sufficient time to process requests for access to information.
"The committee's request is an unreasonable and illegal investigation, which has been publicly supported by Biden. Its purpose is to illegally investigate president trump and his government," the indictment wrote. The Committee has not commented or responded to trump's lawsuit.
The lawsuit is Trump's latest attempt to obstruct the investigation into the riots on Capitol Hill on January 6. On the same day, when Congress officially certified the results of the 2020 presidential election, trump supporters rushed into Congress, which suspended the certification of election results and forced the Congress to evacuate.
Earlier in the day, trump called on his supporters to go to Congress to "show strength" and crack down more fiercely on "bad guys". Therefore, many people believe that trump should take some responsibility for the riots.
On January 12, shortly after the riots broke out, trump began to deny that he was responsible for the riots. In June this year, under the influence of trump, Senate Republicans rejected the proposal to establish an independent committee to investigate the causes and consequences of the riots, resulting in House Democrats having to set up a separate special committee to investigate.
Trump recently instructed his subordinates as president not to accept congressional subpoenas, provide information to special committees or cooperate in any form. On September 23, the Committee issued a summons to trump's ally Stephen K. Bannon, who refused to pay attention. The committee will vote this week to decide whether Bannon is guilty of contempt of Congress.
The materials the Committee hopes to access from the National Archives include Trump's agenda and list of people attending the event, Trump's communication records with Bannon, Flynn, Giuliani and other allies, the communication records between the White House and conspiracy theorists in the 2020 election, and the records of extreme right-wing extremist organizations going to Congress on the day of the riots on January 6.
Many legal experts believe that Trump's lawsuit this time is only a means for him to obstruct investigation and evade responsibility. Stephen Gillers, a professor at New York University Law School, believes that Trump's lawsuit is a "naked means of procrastination", trying to delay the congressional investigation of the riots until after the 2022 mid-term elections. Once the Republicans recapture the house of representatives in the mid-term elections, they can dissolve the special committee and let the investigation go.
Lawrence H. tribe, a famous constitutional expert at Harvard University, also believes that Trump's reasons for litigation are untenable. "Trump is crazy to think that there is no legal reason for Congress to access information. What better reason than to protect the country from political change?" chuber said.
In addition to being directly related to the progress of the investigation into the Capitol Hill riots, this case may also provide a legal precedent for the administrative privileges of the former president and the separation of powers of the U.S. government.
The so-called "administrative privilege" refers to the president's right not to disclose some discussions with his subordinates and high-level government activities. Although the United States Constitution does not expressly provide for administrative privileges, the precedent of the Supreme Court recognizes administrative privileges. The purpose of setting administrative privileges is to give a certain degree of privacy to the president's discussions and activities, so that these discussions and activities can be carried out frankly, and there is no need to be secretive because of fear of future exposure, which will affect the effective decision-making of the government.
However, the Supreme Court has not yet made a clear decision on whether the former president still has administrative privileges, especially the status of the former president's administrative privileges when the current president disagrees. In 1977, the Supreme Court held in a case that former President Nixon still had certain administrative privileges after leaving office, but it did not clarify the boundary of the administrative privilege, nor did it explain how to deal with the current president when he did not agree to exercise the administrative privilege.
In fact, the Supreme Court has not talked much about the boundary of administrative privileges and the boundary of Congress's investigative power over the president. This is because such problems are often solved through consultation between the president and Congress in history, and rarely bring a lawsuit to the court.
However, whether in office or after leaving office, trump has taken a resolute attitude of obstructing the investigation power of Congress, either refusing to execute congressional subpoenas, or constantly filing lawsuits to prevent Congress from accessing documents.
The Supreme Court had previously ruled that trump must hand over his tax bill. In a related case decided in July 2020, Supreme Court Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr) is deeply troubled by such cases. "For more than two centuries, Congress and the executive have been able to resolve relevant disputes without the intervention of this court," Roberts wrote.
Trump's latest lawsuit is likely to open a new round of long legal proceedings around Trump's relevant documents. The political calendar of the United States is very compact. At present, there is only one year left before the mid-term election, and the election campaign will begin soon. The investigation into the riots on Capitol Hill on January 6 is also likely to become a hot topic before the mid-term election.