Chairman Jordan subpoenas Citibank
Rep. Jim Jordan
WASHINGTON, D.C. – House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) this week subpoenaed Citibank for documents and communications related to the Judiciary Committee's and Weaponization Select Subcommittee's investigation into major banks sharing Americans’ private financial data with the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) without legal process for transactions made in the Washington, D.C., area around Jan. 6, 2021.
On June 12, 2023, the Committee wrote to financial institutions, including Citibank, requesting voluntary cooperation to determine the extent to which banks illegally supplied the FBI with Americans’ financial data. According to testimony from current and former FBI officials and documents recently obtained by the Committee and Select Subcommittee, Bank of America (BoA) provided the FBI—voluntarily and without any legal process—with a list of individuals who made transactions in the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area with a BoA credit or debit card between January 5 and January 7, 2021.
Additionally, the Committee and Select Subcommittee have recently obtained documents that raise new concerns regarding the extent to which financial institutions, including Citibank, may have shared customer information with federal law enforcement despite the lack of an individualized nexus to criminal conduct. These documents indicate that a Citibank representative was included on emails and Zoom discussions organized by the FBI and the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) focused on “identifying the best approach to information sharing, both strategic and operational,” in the wake of the events of January 6. These documents suggest that the executive branch was brainstorming informal methods—outside of legal process—for obtaining private customer information from financial institutions.
The Committee and Select Subcommittee are authorized to conduct oversight of matters involving civil liberties and criminal law to inform potential legislative reforms, and to date, Citibank has failed to comply with the Committee’s request voluntarily.
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Jordan requests transcribed interviews from Yoel Roth and Chris Krebs
WASHINGTON, D.C. – House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) just sent letters to Yoel Roth, former Head of Trust & Safety at Twitter, and Chris Krebs, former Director of the Department of Homeland Security’s Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), requesting transcribed interviews related to the Committee’s ongoing censorship investigation.
Excerpts of the letter to Yoel Roth:
“The Committee on the Judiciary is conducting oversight of how and to what extent the Executive Branch has coerced and colluded with companies and other intermediaries to censor speech. We believe that you are uniquely positioned to aid the Committee’s oversight, as you served as Twitter’s Head of Trust & Safety until 2022. Accordingly, as part of the Committee’s constitutional oversight obligations, we write to request that you appear for a transcribed interview with the Committee.
“The Committee’s investigation, along with other public reporting, and publicized discovery in an ongoing federal court case, Missouri v. Biden, have exposed how the federal government has pressured and colluded with Big Tech and other intermediaries to censor certain viewpoints on social and other media in ways that undermine First Amendment principles. As has been well-documented, during your tenure as Head of Trust & Safety, you met with various federal agencies on numerous occasions regarding issues that are relevant to the Committee’s investigation.”
Excerpts of the letter to Chris Krebs:
“The Committee on the Judiciary is conducting oversight of how and to what extent the Executive Branch has coerced and colluded with companies and other intermediaries to censor speech. We believe that you are uniquely positioned to aid the Committee’s oversight, as you served as the director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), which, under your leadership, participated in efforts to unconstitutionally monitor and censor Americans’ speech on social media platforms. Accordingly, we request that you appear for a transcribed interview with Committee staff.”