House withdraws subpoena for top Bolton aide - POLITICO

House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff. | Drew Angerer/Getty Images

House impeachment investigators have withdrawn a subpoena for a top aide to former national security adviser John Bolton, signaling that their effort to force his testimony, and possibly Bolton’s, has ended.

The move suggests that Democrats intend to move forward with impeachment proceedings, even without securing testimony from Bolton, who was a central witness to events underlying allegations that President Donald Trump pressured Ukraine to investigate former Vice President Joe Biden. Bolton and the aide in question, Charles Kupperman, share the same attorneys.

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“The House’s impeachment inquiry will not countenance … further efforts by witnesses or the White House to delay or otherwise obstruct the committees’ vital investigatory work,” the three lawmakers leading the inquiry, including Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.), the chairman of the House Intelligence Committee, wrote in a letter to Kupperman and Bolton’s lawyers.

Rather than attempt to enforce the subpoena, Schiff and the other lawmakers urged Kupperman to voluntarily comply with the House’s demands.

They said he and his lawyers should, at a minimum, abide by an impending decision in a court case that involved former White House counsel Don McGahn, who has resisted a House subpoena to testify by claiming that he is “absolutely immune” from congressional demands because of his proximity to Trump.

The White House has claimed that Kupperman, too, is “absolutely immune” from testifying in the impeachment inquiry.

House lawyers indicated that they expected Kupperman and his lawyers to respond to the withdrawal of the subpoena imminently, and urged him to dismiss his demand for a judge to weigh in on the House’s demand for his testimony.

At issue for Democrats is the tight time frame that Democrats envision for the impeachment process, which top lawmakers have hoped will be completed before the end of the year. The judge in the Kupperman matter, Richard Leon, had agreed to an expedited schedule, but one that would still probably stretch deep into December or even January.

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House withdraws subpoena for top Bolton aide - POLITICO
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