ohnson plans to subpoena Ciaramella, Adam Schiff, Joe and Hunter Biden
Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee Chairman Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) opened the door on Thursday to subpoenaing a cadre of top Republican targets as part of his panel’s oversight work.
Pressed if he would issue subpoenas for House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), former Vice President Biden or his son Hunter Biden or the whistleblower at the center of the impeachment inquiry, Johnson stressed that he was still trying to collect information.
“I don’t really want to make news on your program because I’m working with Senator Grassley’s staff, but we’re having meetings in terms of what our next steps are,” Johnson told WSAU, a Wisconsin radio station on Thursday.
“I’m not going to get out ahead of my skis here. …In order to bring in witnesses for questioning you want to lay the groundwork,” Johnson continued. “[A] subpoena is the last step in the process, you go through a multiple step process.”
Asked by the talk radio host if he was willing to say that the Bidens, the whistleblower and Schiff would be subpoenaed “once he got to the bottom of all this,” Johnson added “unless they cooperate willingly, and that may happen.”
“If not, yeah I have that subpoena power and I’m not afraid to use it,” he said.
Asked if he was willing to say he would use it, Johnson added: “I will use it.”
Johnson and Senate Finance Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-Iowa) have fired off a flurry of oversight letters, including requesting any State Department records involving Hunter Biden or Ukraine gas company Burisma.
House Republicans tried to call the whistleblower, who filed a complaint that helped guide the investigation, as well as Hunter Biden as witnesses in the public impeachment inquiry hearings. But Democrats rejected their request.