A Trump-era Justice Department opinion could hinder the House GOP in their impeachment inquiry unless Speaker Kevin McCarthy puts it up for a vote. 

A 2020 opinion for the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) Office of Legal Counsel stipulated that impeachment inquiries are invalid without the vote of the full House chamber. 

McCarthy has long insisted he would use the inquiry to give greater weight to subpoenas in the House GOP’s investigation into the Biden family business dealings, but with the DOJ opinion still on the books the Biden administration could use it to refuse to comply until the House puts the inquiry to a vote. 

McCarthy reversed course on Tuesday and announced the impeachment inquiry into President Biden was formally open – less than two weeks after saying a vote would be necessary to launch proceedings.

A Trump-era Justice Department opinion could hinder the House GOP in their impeachment inquiry unless Speaker Kevin McCarthy puts it up for a vote

His argument was that former Speaker Nancy Pelosi had changed the precedent by launching an inquiry into Donald Trump without a vote. 

‘[W]e conclude that the House must expressly authorize a committee to conduct an impeachment investigation and to use compulsory process in that investigation before the committee may compel the production of documents or testimony,’ wrote Steven Engel, then the head of DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel, supporting Trump’s rejection of subpoenas by Democratic investigators. 

Pelosi unilaterally declared an impeachment inquiry in September 2019 and conducted the investigation for five weeks before taking it to a full House vote to set up standardized rules and procedures.

Then-White House Counsel Pat Cipollone tore into the House probe and hinted Trump would not comply with subpoenas because there had been no formal vote. Pelosi passed a formal resolution to begin impeachment at the end of October. 

‘In the history of our Nation, the House of Representatives has never attempted to launch an impeachment inquiry against the President without a majority of the House taking political accountability for that decision by voting to authorize such a dramatic constitutional step,’ Cipollone wrote on Oct. 8, 2019. 

McCarthy unilaterally announced an inquiry into President Biden on Tuesday 

Engel concluded that any subpoenas issued before the vote on October 31, 2019 were invalid. 

‘The Constitution vests the ‘sole Power of Impeachment’ in the House of Representatives … For precisely that reason, the House itself must authorize an impeachment inquiry, as it has done in virtually every prior impeachment investigation in our Nation’s history, including every one involving a President,’ he wrote. 

The impeachment is expected to scrutinize the actions of the Justice Department, FBI and IRS in investigating Hunter Biden and his formal business dealings, in addition to the Biden family.  All three agencies would be bound by the OLC opinion. 

McCarthy told Breitbart in an interview published early September an impeachment probe would ‘occur through a vote on the floor of the People’s House and not through a declaration by one person.’ 

But Tuesday when he abruptly changed course, no one on the Republican side seemed to mind. 

‘She changed that,’ McCarthy said as he laid blame on Pelosi for the about-face. ‘This is how you do it. So, I warned her not to do it that way in the process, and that’s what she did so that’s what we do.’ 

The speaker was likely trying to spare moderate Republicans from districts Biden won in 2020 from a contentious vote. 

‘I’ve spent my career as an NYPD Detective and know the value of seeking the truth through finding the facts, and I am eager to find out exactly what the truth is behind the allegations surrounding President Biden,’ said GOP Rep. Anthony D’Esposito, who comes from a battleground district in New York. 

‘I think there ought to be a vote, but I’m prepared to get on with it,’ said Rep. Dan Bishop, R-N.C., a frequent McCarthy critic who approves of his impeachment moves. 

‘It’s all made possible because the precedent has been set, and people can thank Nancy Pelosi for that. So the impeachment Inquiry is launched and I’m happy with that,’ Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, R-Ga., told DailyMail.com. 

GOP Rep. James Comer, chair of the Oversight Committee,  said the next steps would be to subpoena more bank records from the Biden family. None of the evidence yet uncovered has tied any payments directly to President Biden.