House panel questions

Commerce Dept. ordered ex-official not to answer House panel questions

By ANDREW DESIDERIO

A former senior Commerce Department official refused to answer more than 100 questions during an interview with the House Oversight and Reform Committee that centered on the Trump administration’s controversial decision to add a citizenship question to the 2020 census, according to a transcript released Tuesday.

Commerce Department lawyers instructed James Uthmeier, who served as senior adviser and counsel to Secretary Wilbur Ross, not to answer the committee’s questions about his contacts with the White House and his conversations with Ross.

Uthmeier was also directed not to discuss the contents of a memo he wrote to a senior Justice Department official, John Gore, that purportedly outlines legal arguments surrounding the addition of a citizenship question to the census. On several occasions, Uthmeier was also blocked from disclosing details about his own conversations with Gore.

The Trump administration has sought to block several witnesses from cooperating with House Democrats’ investigations, including the Oversight Committee’s investigation of the census and the Judiciary Committee’s investigation into whether President Donald Trump obstructed justice. In both cases, the Trump administration has asserted that current and former officials are immune from testifying about their conversations with the president and their tenure in the administration.

Earlier this month, the Oversight Committee voted to hold Ross and Attorney General William Barr in contempt of Congress for refusing to turn over subpoenaed documents about the citizenship question and the Justice and Commerce departments’ coordination in creating it. The vote came after Trump asserted executive privilege over all of the documents.

Late Monday night, the committee officially filed its contempt report.

Uthmeier, who worked at a law firm that counted Trump’s presidential campaign as a client, told the committee during his June 11 interview that he “spoke with White House personnel” about the citizenship question, but Commerce Department lawyers blocked him from stating the names of those White House officials. Uthmeier also acquiesced to the department’s demands that he refuse to answer questions about his conversations with Ross.

But Uthmeier did tell the committee that both Ross and Earl Comstock, Ross’ policy chief, asked him to look into the legal arguments about a citizenship question in early 2017. Commerce Department lawyers objected to every follow-up question seeking more details about those conversations, but Democrats said Uthmeier’s response showed that Ross lied to Congress about the true origins of the citizenship question when he said it was added to the census “solely” at the request of the Justice Department.

Uthmeier delivered his memo analyzing those legal questions to Gore, who then formally asked the Commerce Department to add a citizenship question.

Administration officials have said that the citizenship question was added to the 2020 census in order to better enforce the Voting Rights Act, but Democrats have been skeptical of that claim. Uthmeier did not answer a question about whether the memo he wrote for Gore discusses the Voting Rights Act.

When asked why he wrote the memo, Uthmeier said: “In my research, the Voting Rights Act came up, and I am not very familiar with the Voting Rights Act and all of its nuances, and thus, I was hoping John [Gore] would provide legal advice that dealt with the memo and the topics that I was investigating.” Uthmeier did not answer follow-up questions.

Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), the chairman of the committee, said in a statement: “Official after official appearing before the committee have refused to answer questions about the real reasons behind their effort, but the mounting evidence points to a partisan and discriminatory effort to harm the interests of Democrats and non-whites. The census is the foundation of our democracy, and our committee will continue doing everything in its power to ensure that it counts every single person in the United States.”

The committee has made the census probe — and the reasons a citizenship question was added — a central focus in its various investigations, which are also targeting Trump’s personal finances and the White House security clearance process.

Democrats say they’ve uncovered evidence supporting their claim that the Trump administration added the citizenship question in order to boost Republicans in future elections. Excluding noncitizens from the official census count, they say, would lead to redrawn congressional districts that favor Republicans.

Their investigation has revealed that administration officials spoke with immigration hard-liners known for their views on the citizenship question, including former Kansas Secretary of State Kris Kobach, now-deceased GOP operative Thomas Hofeller, and John Baker, a law professor.

The White House blocked Kobach from answering the committee’s questions about his conversations with Trump and other senior officials, arguing that they are privileged. Hofeller opined frequently about how Republicans would benefit from a citizenship question. And Uthmeier told the committee that Baker, who espoused similar views, was a “long-time mentor.”