Two weeks after Senate Sergeant-at-Arms Bill Pickle released a report documenting GOP staffers stealing thousands of Dems documents for 18 months, the matter is poised to go the DoJ for a criminal probe.
The matter bounced around the Judiciary Committee members themselves last week, in the hopes that a bi-partisan approach could be identified. When senators couldn’t reach a resolution — only three Republicans were willing to endorse the Dems’ call for an independent investigator — committee chairman Orrin Hatch left it to Pickle’s discretion. Apparently, he’s made a decision.
Senate Sergeant at Arms Bill Pickle said Tuesday that he would give his report on how Republican aides obtained internal Democratic Judiciary Committee memos to the Justice Department for a possible criminal prosecution.
Pickle told The Hill he would act this week, perhaps as soon as today.
At a minimum, Pickle seems to believe there are grounds for prosecution.
“We’ve obviously highlighted some potential criminal [violations],” he added. “It is up to the Department of Justice as the experts to decide if they want to review it.”
It makes sense to send this to Justice. Pickle’s investigation drew a series of important conclusions — most notably that the GOP aides violated the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act and that Frist aide Manuel Miranda could be prosecuted for making false statements to investigators.
But given the power of the Senate Sergeant-at-Arms’ office, there was no subpoena power and no way of expanding the probe to know who else received and/or took advantage of the leaked Dem documents. We’ll see what happens.