New Panel to Probe ‘Weaponization’ of Government Is Short-Term Solution, Will Not Restore Constitutional Rule: Expert

Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) nominates House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) for Speaker of the House of the 118th Congress during a speech in the House Chamber of the U.S. Capitol Building on Jan. 3, 2023 in Washington. (Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

News Analysis

The vote by the new GOP House majority on Jan. 10 to establish a select subcommittee, with broad subpoena powers, for the purpose of scrutinizing actions by the executive branch and the “weaponization” of the government for political ends is a welcome development, but may not go far enough toward restoring and preserving constitutional government in the United States, analysts and legal experts have told The Epoch Times.

Operating under the auspices of the House Judiciary Committee, and sharing the same chair, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), the new panel is explicitly modeled on the Church Committee established in the U.S. Senate in the 1970s to look into the work and activities of intelligence agencies.

Rep. Tom Cole (R-Okla.), the current chair of the House Rules Committee, has praised the Church Committee for having “uncovered and exposed a wide variety of abuses” that American citizens suffered at the hands of law enforcement agencies that overstepped the bounds of their legal authority.

The new subcommittee has authority to probe the federal government’s expansive role in investigations on U.S. citizens, including in ongoing criminal investigations. The panel also has the power to probe how federal agencies communicate with private companies to collect information on Americans, according to the text of the resolution.

Jordan, during a speech on the House floor on Tuesday, emphasized that the panel was established to protect First Amendment rights.

The Long Game

While the new panel may help get to the bottom of government actions that lawmakers feel pose a threat to free speech, and may play a role in thwarting such unconstitutional moves, it is not a permanent solution in an environment where the federal government’s powers vastly exceed its legal and constitutional mandate and respect for the explicit language of the Constitution is a thing of the past.

That’s the view of Vance Ginn, a political analyst who until recently served as chief economist at the Texas Public Policy Foundation. In Ginn’s view, the spending undertaken by the Biden administration—which is nearly unprecedented in history and has led some economists to issue dire warnings about what may happen to the U.S. economy in 2023—is a symptom of a government that has simply dispensed with former notions of its legitimate functions and reach.

“While investigating and shedding light on the excessive influence that the government has in our lives and economy and prosecuting illegal actions, Congress and the American people must not lose sight of the fact that the best way to end the weaponization of government is to shrink it by cutting spending,” Ginn told The Epoch Times.

“Until the government is rightfully put back into its limited constitutional roles, we will continue to have government failures across society which will leave us worse off in the process. We need the government to get out of the way to best let people prosper,” Ginn added.

In this situation, it would be a mistake to grow overly optimistic about the prospects for constitutional rule just because a new committee has been formed, Ginn believes.

Impartiality

Another danger is that, given the composition of the new panel, the circumstances of its formation, and the focus of its inquiries, people may view it as a partisan entity at the beck and call of the GOP majority in the House of Representatives, and its impact will be blunted.

That’s the view of James Moore, a professor and director of political outreach at the Tom McCall Center for Civic Engagement at Pacific Oregon University.

“The committee idea is not a surprise. It was a promise by several people running for Congress among the Republicans,” Moore told The Epoch Times.

“However, to make it go beyond just partisan tit-for-tat, the committee needs to actually look at political weaponization on all fronts,” Moore added.

This would mean making inquiries into questions of interest to people of either major political party, Moore believes. A fair-minded committee would seek answers about who made the decision to cut off negotiations with former President Donald Trump about the recovery of documents in his Mar-a-Lago residence, and to initiate a raid. It would also look into the question of why the former president’s year-end taxes were not audited, Moore said.

While the danger runs high that the committee may come to be viewed as just one more excrescence of the partisanship and polarization running high in Washington and throughout the country, Moore sees hope for a spirit of bipartisanship that can inspire faith in the new panel and earn respect for it among the populace.

“There is an interesting bipartisan movement growing right now to get rid of newly elected Congressman George Santos. If some of this truth-seeking and action can be a model for the committee, it might have some future,” Moore said.

“Without that type of framework, I fear the committee will get headlines for a while, but then fade away. It has to take an objective look at the problem, not a Democrat-accusatory look,” he added.

The Epoch Times has reached out to Jordan’s office for comment.