WASHINGTON—Donald Trump’s status as a Washington outsider fuels his fiery populism and also is helping to shield him from the scrutiny House Republicans are devoting to Hillary Clinton, a former U.S. senator and secretary of state.
The GOP-led, subpoena-wielding Oversight and Government Reform Committee isn’t investigating Trump’s business dealings, his charitable foundation or his campaign’s ties to pro-Kremlin elements in Russia and Ukraine — all areas ripe for examination, according to Democrats, who’ve accused Republicans of targeting Clinton in a partisan attempt to influence the outcome of the election.
“Where is our investigation of Donald Trump?” Rep. Elijah Cummings, the oversight committee’s top Democrat, asked at a hearing this past week. “The answer is obvious. The Republican frenzy is focused exclusively and obsessively on Secretary Clinton. And that is for political reasons.”
But senior Republicans on the panel said Trump has never held a government job or been elected to public office. Any alleged improprieties are the jurisdiction of state or federal agencies, not Congress.
The Oversight Committee operates in a “target-rich environment with lots of different investigative possibilities,” Chairman Jason Chaffetz, R-Utah, acknowledged. Yet he said he’s unaware of anything Trump is alleged to have done that would trigger a probe by his panel.
“We'll know it when we see it,” Chaffetz told The Associated Press. “Thus far, I don’t think there’s anything in that realm that has this clear federal nexus that would really compel us to pursue it.”
Chaffetz said an improper $25,000 check sent from Trump’s personal foundation to a political committee supporting Florida Attorney General Pam Bondi is a matter for state authorities.
Other allegations swirling around Trump and his campaign, such his refusal to release his tax returns and disclose his foreign business investments, are matters for the American voters to decide, according to Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C., who heads the Oversight Committee’s government operations panel.
“When we’re looking at government oversight, it really has to do with previous government actions,” according to Meadows. Trump, he said, “wouldn’t qualify for that.”
The hands-off approach to Trump is in contrast to the Oversight Committee’s focus on Clinton, who served as President Barack Obama’s secretary of state from 2009 to 2013.
The FBI in July closed the agency’s yearlong investigation into whether Clinton and her top aides mishandled classified information that flowed through the private email server she used. FBI Director James Comey called Clinton’s actions “extremely careless,” but said his agents found no evidence to support criminal charges.
