Speaker 1: The attorney's general of New York and Massachusetts are investigating
Speaker 1: whether ex On Mobile hid knowledge of the human impact
Speaker 1: on climate change for decades, but Republicans in the House
Speaker 1: of Representatives want to stop them. Last year, the House
Speaker 1: Committee on Science Based and Technology subpoenaed both New York
Speaker 1: Attorney General Eric Sniderman in Massachusetts Attorney General Moura Healey
Speaker 1: seeking detailed information about their investigations, and both Schneiderman and
Speaker 1: Hilly ignored the subpoenas. But now the committee has reissued
Speaker 1: the subpoenas, claiming that the ages are acting in bad
Speaker 1: faith in these investigations, and Schneiderman and Hilly show no
Speaker 1: signs of giving in. Here to talk to us about
Speaker 1: this federal state legal fight is Jeff Kramer, a former
Speaker 1: federal and local prosecutor who is now a managing director
Speaker 1: at the Berkeley Research Group. Jeff, the federal government. Congress
Speaker 1: has subpoena power. They can investigate a whole host of things.
Speaker 1: They can uh look at stuff all over the country.
Speaker 1: This is a science issue. It's the Committee on Science.
Speaker 1: Why are the attorney generals refusing to comply with subpoenas
Speaker 1: that Congress has issued? You're right at that first blush.
Speaker 1: Does seem like Congresses within their purview the the the
Speaker 1: interesting thing here in the issue here is just scratching
Speaker 1: a little bit below the surface. UM. I don't know
Speaker 1: if this is unprecedented, but certainly unusual for Congress to
Speaker 1: be looking not so much at the target of an
Speaker 1: investigation here it would be Exxon, but rather the prosecutors,
Speaker 1: the state prosecutors, and they're looking for everything. They're basically
Speaker 1: looking for the entire case file. They're looking for internal emails,
Speaker 1: other sorts of documentation. UM. So that's very unusual. That
Speaker 1: was my question, Jeff, because it seems to me as
Speaker 1: if the attorneys general haven't even completed their investigation. The
Speaker 1: bad faith that Republicans were talking about was that they
Speaker 1: had they had reached their conclusions before the investigation started
Speaker 1: after meeting with environmentalists, but there's no proof of that
Speaker 1: at all. They just did meet with environmentalists. So it
Speaker 1: seems as if it's there's a little tin cheer of
Speaker 1: self interest on the Republican side. But absolutely, UM, you know,
Speaker 1: you can you can argue, I think pretty forcefully that
Speaker 1: everyone has an ulterior motive here. UM. And whether or not.
Speaker 1: This is not an uncommon argument for the defense to
Speaker 1: make a high profile case that uh, prosecution or an
Speaker 1: investigation is politically motivated and conclusions were reached before they
Speaker 1: dotted all their eyes and crossed the teas. You hear
Speaker 1: that in court, it usually fails because the evidence is
Speaker 1: what it is, and it's presented to a grand jury,
Speaker 1: and if it gets that far, it's presented to a
Speaker 1: to a jury at trial. UM. So these arguments usually
Speaker 1: don't work. So I think you can say, even if Congress,
Speaker 1: you know, maybe onto something, let's say the Attorney's General
Speaker 1: did reach a conclusion quickly or had a preconceived notion
Speaker 1: that's going to play out in state court, I don't
Speaker 1: think it's within the purview necessarily of of a congressional
Speaker 1: hearing and an investigation, because if they if the attorneys
Speaker 1: general do comply with a subpoena, and obviously, as indicated
Speaker 1: they did not before, it's basically giving discovery to to
Speaker 1: the defense and the subjects and potential targets that aren't
Speaker 1: even known. Uh. That can certainly stop an investigation in
Speaker 1: its tracks. Jeff. So the attorneys general clearly don't think
Speaker 1: that Congress has jurisdiction over their investigations, and so they
Speaker 1: think this is improper. Um, what happens if they again
Speaker 1: refuse to comply as appears likely, and they're saying they're
Speaker 1: going to do? What options does Congress have in terms
Speaker 1: of trying to enforce these subpoenas well? They've got pretty
Speaker 1: broad options and some pretty severe ones, which is why
Speaker 1: this is unusual. It's never been tested before. If if
Speaker 1: you're subpoena or anyone who is subpoenaed to go before
Speaker 1: Congress and present themselves or documents and they just refuse,
Speaker 1: which is basically what's happened here, that's UH, that's contempt
Speaker 1: of Congress, and you can have contempt proceedings. Congress can
Speaker 1: can file a suit. Um. The remedies for Congress are
Speaker 1: pretty pretty broad and pretty severe. However, that's going to
Speaker 1: come to a head quickly. Um if the a G
Speaker 1: s H deny it, I think. But what will bring
Speaker 1: to the forefront there is both the Attorney's General New
Speaker 1: York and Massachusetts, UH and Congress are kind of using
Speaker 1: a specious argument to get what they wanted specifically, And
Speaker 1: I see the Attorney's General arguing that the reason they're
Speaker 1: even doing this is because it implicated investors and acts
Speaker 1: on Mobile and perhaps others weren't giving h information that
Speaker 1: should have been given for investors. And that's a proper
Speaker 1: purview of the attorneys general other prosecutors as well, but
Speaker 1: certainly attorneys general Congress and the corollary and this subcommittee
Speaker 1: is using. I think it's an odd argument that it's
Speaker 1: a First Amendment argument, that basically these investigations are chilling
Speaker 1: the First Amendment rights of scientists who questioned climate change.
Speaker 1: That's that's a tougher argument. So I'm not sure Congresses
Speaker 1: is situated well in their jurisdiction, but a courtmand up
Speaker 1: looking at that some point. Our thanks to Jeff Kramer,
Speaker 1: Managing director at the Berkeley Research Group, we're talking to
Speaker 1: us about what is obviously very unusual fight between a
Speaker 1: Congressional committee and state attorneys general over a subpoena issued
Speaker 1: by Congress coming up on Bloomberg law. Do parents have
Speaker 1: an obligation to pay their children's college tuition? Well, a
Speaker 1: lot of us would think they do. Maybe some of
Speaker 1: us would think they don't. But a lot of bankruptcy
Speaker 1: courts are looking at to the issue because credit debtors
Speaker 1: are looking to get clawback payments from colleges where people
Speaker 1: declare bankruptcy after having paid their child's college tuition. What's
Speaker 1: happening in those cases? Coming up straight ahead on Bloomberg Law.
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