The Department of Justice is moving more quickly to give Congress documents related to how it handled the Hillary Clinton email investigation, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Bob Goodlatte said Sunday.
Tensions flared earlier this year when several lawmakers, including House Freedom Caucus chairman Mark Meadows of North Carolina, said the Department wasn’t moving fast enough to fulfill these requests. House Speaker Paul Ryan of Wisconsin and House Oversight Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy of South Carolina were among those that pushed the agency to accelerate its pace.
Goodlatte, R-Va., previously subpoenaed the agency for information on how the department dealt with the Clinton case related to her use of a private email server.
“They have been scrambling because there is a lot of pressure on them from members of Congress about the non-responsiveness,” Goodlatte said Sunday morning on Fox News.
Goodlatte said there is a reading room at the Justice Department where lawmakers can go to access nearly one million documents.
“We can examine all of those documents unredacted, identify the ones that we want to have produced, and they are producing them,” he said.
Goodlatte’s panel this week is set to interview Peter Strzok, a DOJ official who is facing scrutiny over texts sent suggesting he would try to stop Trump’s presidential victory. The first hearing will be held in private, but Goodlatte said Strzok will soon participate in an open discussion.
“He has a lot of information. It’s important he share with the American people,” Goodlatte said.
Deputy attorney general Rod Rosenstein could also appear before the panel this week to answer questions on, among other things, why document requests have been delayed.
