On Tuesday (May 2), President Joe Biden’s administration ignored the congressional subpoena for documents related to the failed U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan for the third time.
Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Republican Rep. Mike McCaul (Texas), filed the challenge as Secretary of State Tony Blinken missed the original deadline for the documents in March, then again in April when McCaul rejected the deadline.
McCaul drew the final line in the sand on May 1, when Blinken refused to produce the documents again.
McCaul’s subpoena requests a dissent cable from the United States embassy in Kabul; the document they’re requesting would contain officials’ concerns about Biden’s plans to leave.
Instead of complying with the subpoena, the State Department offered to give McCaul and the House Foreign Affairs Committee a briefing on the contents of the documents.
In April, McCaul accepted the suggestion of a briefing but clarified that it did not constitute compliance with a subpoena.
Despite the briefing, McCaul and other Republicans on the committee said they still have unanswered questions that can only be answered by seeing the document itself.
On Monday (May 1), the principal deputy spokesperson for the State Department Minister stressed to reporters that DOS believes it has done nothing wrong.
Patel explained that the Department had given the Committee “an offer that [they] believe is sufficient for them” to carry out their proper oversight duties.
Patel listed that the documents they provided included a written summary of the dissent at the Kabul embassy and other disagreements that arose. Patel added that the documents included closed secret briefings.
At a hearing in March, Blinken argued that the State Department would never release the dissent cable, arguing that doing so would undermine the authenticity of future cables.
