House targets migrant family separations in first Trump subpoena

Republican Jim Jordan of Ohio, left, and Democrat Elijah Cummings of Maryland of the House Oversight and Reform Committee. Photo / AP

A House committee voted today to subpoena Trump Administration officials over family separations at the southern border.

It's the first subpoena issued in the new Congress as Democrats have promised to hold the Administration aggressively to count.

The decision by the Oversight Committee will compel the heads of Justice, Homeland Security and Health and Human Services to deliver documents to lawmakers.

Committee chairman, congressman Elijah Cummings of Maryland, has pledged to press the Administration for documents and testimony on a wide swath of issues, but family separation was among his first priorities.

"I believe this is a true national emergency," Cummings said. "When our own government rips children from the arms of their mothers and fathers with no plans to reunite them - that is government-sponsored child abuse."

Cummings said committee members have been seeking the documents for seven months.

The Oversight Committee is seeking details on the children separated, location and facilities where they were held, details on their parents, information on efforts to restore children to their parents and whether parents were deported.

A Homeland Security spokesman said the department had already sent over 2600 pages in response to the request.

"Today's unnecessary subpoena vote was a political stunt and contrary to the constitutionally mandated accommodation process," said spokesman Tyler Houlton.

"We have worked with congressional committees in good faith and will continue to do so. We hope they will return the favour and respect the process and the men and women of DHS."

Congressman Jim Jordan of Ohio, the committee's ranking Republican, sent Cummings a letter arguing that the subpoenas would not be necessary, and that the Administration had produced hundreds of pages of documents in response to earlier requests for information.

"We should not rush to compel documents from the departments, especially when they have sought to comply with your request voluntarily," Jordan wrote.

- AP