Days after House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) announced an impeachment inquiry into President Biden, tensions escalated between Republicans on the House Judiciary Committee and the Justice Department, which is the subject of various committee investigations.
A top GOP House investigator threatened to call Capitol Police to remove an FBI lawyer from a House office building Friday morning because he was unhappy that a senior FBI agent who appeared for a closed-door interview with the committee was accompanied by both a personal lawyer and an FBI lawyer, according to multiple people familiar with the exchange.
Republicans have alleged that the agent, Elvis Chan, was involved with a Justice Department effort to censor conservative voices on social media.
Larry Berger, the personal lawyer representing Chan, said the committee insisted Chan could be accompanied by either an FBI lawyer or his personal lawyer, but not both. Berger, a lawyer who has long represented federal agents, said the demand was unusual and not a common practice of congressional committees.
