We have been discussing the deepening scandal over former Special Counsel Jack Smith securing the phone records of members of Congress, including former Speaker of the House of Representatives Kevin McCarthy. Now, Fox News is reporting that the Justice Department subpoenaed the personal phone records of House Judiciary Committee chairman Jim Jordan in 2022 for a two-year period. The report may be the most serious disclosure in the controversy, given the direct oversight exercised by Jordan’s committee over Smith and the Justice Department.
Jordan has long been one of the most dogged investigators of abuse at the Justice Department and an outspoken critic of Smith.
The subpoena ordered Verizon to hand over the phone data reaching back to Jan. 1, 2020. Notably, Smith did not begin work as special counsel for another seven months after the subpoena was issued. However, the prosecutor would later work with Smith on the investigation.
The subpoena appears part of the Arctic Frost probe, which swept up the records of top Republican members in a move that many of us have criticized as an unwarranted and dangerous intrusion into the communications of the legislative branch.
Despite the efforts of members like Rep. Dan Goldman (D, NY) to downplay the gravity of such demands, they represent a serious intrusion into the confidentiality of legislators’ communications, including the potential disclosure of journalists, whistleblowers, and others. The records show who Jordan communicated with and when those calls were made. Since this was a personal number, it could also reveal embarrassing information on a member who has directed oversight functions over the Justice Department.
Other members have shown the institutional integrity and identification that others, such as Goldman, lack. Both Republican and Democratic members raised alarm over the disclosures.
Sen. Chris Coons (D-Del.) stated, “On the surface of it, it would strike me as a significant invasion of the right of Senators to conduct their jobs, so this is something that needs urgent follow-up.”
The subpoena sought records for multiple phone numbers and included a one-year gag order signed by a D.C. magistrate judge.
As someone who has worked closely with Congress for decades and represented the House in court, I regularly receive calls from both Democratic and Republican members. I keep these calls strictly confidential, and I am sure these members believe that they are not subject to such searches. Smith and the Justice Department shattered that belief.
The demand for these records shows a reckless disregard for long-standing rules of engagement between the branches. It shows a sense of dangerous impunity at the Justice Department that should be thoroughly and aggressively investigated by Congress.
I’d like to meet Jim and discuss a law suit over a cup of Italian coffee:
1 spoon of Star buck instant coffee
3 oz of boiling water
1 oz of Galliano L’Autentico
2 scoops of Colombian coffee ice cream
Donald J. Trump boasted on Thursday that his funeral will draw a “much bigger crowd” than former Vice President Dick Cheney’s.
“Dick Cheney, who was a loser and a terrible person, will be lucky to get a thousand people at his funeral,” Trump posted on Truth Social. “My funeral will draw MILLIONS!”
Remarking that “nobody cares” about Cheney’s funeral, Trump said he expects the turnout at his funeral to set records, noting, “Every day, people say to me, ‘Sir, I can’t wait for that day to come.’”
Yawn…
Bored already. Go watch paint dry then.
The Justice Department should have been investigating the phone records of the rich and powerful in the Epstein files along with these Trump enablers.
But they didn’t have the files or the permission to investigate.
I really enjoy Professor Turley’s writings. The majority of the comments are thoughtful and raise additional issues to think about. The only thing I wish, as I have mentioned before, is that I could enjoy them without several participants. I know that the administrator is strict on free speech, however why can’t I ignore someone easily. This may be achieved by an ignore button, better avatar’s that identify or as I will do if required, actual initials or names. As an aside, Longgreyhair actually describes me as other users names do as well.
@longgreyhair – While I stand with your CONCEPT of at least identifying the authors of fake news and who use bigotry to personally attack others in these comments by categorizing their targets as bigots of one nature or the other – and allowing us to “block” (that means don’t show it to ME, not don’t allow them to speak I believe).
The problem is anyone who posts opinions here could be “PIP’d” from their work or shot through the neck for “putting themselves in that situation” – a position justifying as an attack provoking “position” – as supported almost unanimously from the progressive propagandists(see stated positions of Kimmel, Couric, Jeffries, Crockett, Green, Schumer, Schiff, AOC, . . . for examples). Examples of not using your own identity should be compared to those who have used them for protection (e.g., Patrick Henry, Charles Dickens, Ben Franklin, John Adams, Edward Gibbons) and allowed for safety sake.
Unfortunately, the right to speak at this time is more likely to result in martyrdom than provide enlightenment and intellectual engagement.
Being somewhat naive I did not think about the bad things that could happen if names were required. I was thinking more along the lines that if out in public you can ignore until you decide to leave a conversation. Or in a social gathering you can leave until you see the group gathered without the offending person. The other thought is that in a group of gathering the offending person is ignored until he goes away. Being able to see the face or characteristics of the offender enable you to that. What I was hoping for was the anonymous posters being more clearly identified. Perhaps based on date joined. That way you can just ignore the nasties and move on easier like I do with X.
longgreyhair wrote: “the bad things that could happen if names were required…”
You don’t need to worry about that here, since there has been what would appear to be a concerted effort of several months duration to **prevent** some of us who lack WordPress accounts to positively identify our comments. Now, I do not know *who* is making that effort: Turley’s administration staff, or WordPress itself (through changes made via version upgrades). I do know that until a few months ago, those posting comments who lack an account to log into were able to fill in a user name in a field on the reply form (obviously, it was up to the poster to keep that name consistent). Then that field disappeared from the comment form, never to return. I do not have a WordPress account for two reasons: WP seems to assume that anyone with an account wants to have a blog presence of their own, and I do not; more importantly, WP appears to prevent account registration by anyone using a VPN. I use ProtonVPN 100% of the time I am on-line, for privacy and security reasons, and I refuse to compromise on that practice. I would add that, even if the change eliminating the user name field resulted from a WordPress change, Turley’s admin team does not give a damn about it, because I have posted this information here at least a half-dozen times over the past few months, with no reply or rebuttal from those folks. Furthermore, there has never been any response from the regular posters here who regularly complain about those posting anonymously, so the sincerity of those complaints is subject to considerable doubt. In conclusion, if you are looking to find who is most at fault for the proliferation of unaccountable commenters here, I think I have given you all the evidence required. Caveat: I use a recent version of the Firefox browser from Linux and from Windows, so all of the previous behavior was noted in that environment. However, FF remains a quite popular browser, so even if some of the behavior was specific to it, my conclusion does not change one bit.
there was a time when espionage was punishable by death especially when spies pretended to be Americans.
Still is in Idaho (Firing Squads), trick is getting the Capitol Judgement Order past the Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.
I believe its very probable Jack Smith violated the civil rights of the Senators and Representatives by acting under color of law. I spent 25 years as a Law Enforcement officer and had many subpoenas issued but only when imvestigating a crime. What crime was comitted by Jordsn on Jan 1, 2020 that would require a subpoena?
What crime was comitted by Jordsn? … well that’s the point, the judge had a plausible reason to issue it.
Unfortunately, probable cause as we understand it probably had nothing to do with the Judge’s decision.
Anonymous 9:13am-Well some judges are more plausible then others in their rulings.
How would you know, you never were a judge. But why don’t you write a 500 word comment about that. Might be Pulitzer Prize stuff.
You leave out some qualifiers. BIDEN DOJ. And DEMOCRAT Jack Smith. THE BLAME MUST BE LAYED AT THE CORRECT FEET
Yes and No:
Yes – Our Legislatures need to be under surveillance with proper NOTICE, so that a Bad Actor cannot make off with the Publics Money or use their position for wrongful gain (10% for the Big Guy). Ect. some sort of reasonable surveillance-tags placed upon the Officials of which they can be held ACCOUNTABLE.
No – The surveillance itself need to be surveilled so it is not used in a; criminal, political, or overt way. Re: Who is watching the watcher? – like in what just happened in the FBI, CIA, DNI, DHS, SS, ect… The Media is no Watch Dog, neither are Special Interest Groups and Watch Groups.
We need to keep a check on Our Checks & Balances of the [K] system.
A few tangential questions:
What if devices like phones, tablets, laptops etc… were designed to be secure and untappable?
What if the customer could decide what to do with their personal communications data after the bill for each month of service was paid?
What if communications providers were prohibited from duplicating or selling customers’ data?
My law: if technology can be abused, it will be abused, and is probably being abused as we speak.
Let’s not get started by the vile use of technology in modern vehicles…
A few tangential questions:….. Those certainly are tangential and have no bearing on the issue of THE subpoena.
Are you trying to lure (get it?) the stupid commenters (you know who you are) into a tangential argument?
Tangential as I used it means adjacent or connected at a point, not irrelevant.
If the Republican Senators’ phone data for the period in question did not exist except, possibly, in their personal, secure possession it would have been far more difficult for a biased judge and corrupt DOJ to access in secret.
You sound like a fed. Try thinking like a citizen of a “free” nation.
You sound like a fed. Try thinking like a citizen of a “free” nation….. You sound like a nut job. Try getting some help.
OldFish write: “What if devices like phones, tablets, laptops etc… were designed to be secure and untappable?”
I assume you already now the answer to that. The Deep State interests (who largely remain embedded in FedGov in spite of Trumps’ alleged animosity, although they seem to be keeping a slightly lower profile lately) would never permit such devices to be sold to US citizens. They would take whatever steps necessary; create whatever pretext possible, to justify preventing those devices from reaching the market. The way such things work, most Americans would never even know the device existed, or if they did, they would be convinced by those DS interests and their MSM collaborators that owning one would be a horrible idea.
I agree this needs a thorough investigation.
One question I have about the non-disclosure order: These were third-party records that were maintained by the phone company that provided the phone service. The records were not in possession of Rep Jordan, or any of the other Congresspeople investigated. Therefore, those being investigated wouldn’t have been able to destroy the records, as Smith said he feared. Even if they wiped their devices to factory settings, the records would have still been in possession of the phone company.
So why the non-disclosure order?
The records were not in possession … his phone stores call, text etc records. If it was his official phone, could he delete? Personal phone, could he delete?
Phone companies have different records storage policies. Verizon , I think, 18 months, AT&T 24 months.
Non disclose order? Guessing, so not to spread the fact that he was under investigation thereby tipping off the public.
Remind me again: just who are the fascists and the “threats to democracy”?
The MAGA mob
Yet you offer zero proof.
Nice try
No one asked for proof. Gosh, you’re deep.
Even more worrisome is the judicial gag orders where the carriers were forbidden to tell their customers that they were handing over the communication records.. It sort of tied up the victim of this judical and DOJ overreach so the targets could not even legitimately contest the subpoena or other actions being conducted against them. Seems to be counter to the spirit and intent of having a constitution.
Sounds like overreach to me if not an outright Star Chamber. Those federal district court judges certainly were highly protective of illegal aliens and criminal illegal allies but they appeared to not care about extending those same protections to congressman and senators.
I would also like to know which judges ok’d these subpoenas and which president appointed them. I already know about Boasberg. Who were the others?
judicial gag orders…. happens all the time. You and your comrades think it’s the first time in the history of the USA that judges used gag orders on citizens.
If you knew who the judges were appointed by, what difference would that make? You BDS (Biden Derangement Syndrome) types are just so desperate to know tidbits that you now all see conspiracies everywhere.
The gag order was put on the telephone service providers, who went along with Biden’s Minions.
Citizen or corporation. Interchangeable.
You Democrat police state fascists hope normal Americans agree with you that Judge Boasberg allowing Obama’s Attorney Generals and FBI Directors to repeatedly perjure themselves in his FISA court while fraudulently introducing the felonious Russia Dossier as verified evidence is just normal judicial procedure.
Just as Boasberg later allowed these fraudulent warrants of sitting Senators and their official communications – along with gag orders to hide both the prosecutors and his actions from Congressional oversight is supposedly just normal judicial procedure.
All of you Democrat police state fascists would have felt so much more at home back in the days of Stalin and Laverentiy Beria’s judicial system.
And it would be interesting to hear the opinion of Chief Justice Roberts on the issue of lower court judges permitting DOJ requests for subpoenas for the phone records of members of Congress.
And it would be interesting to hear the opinion of Chief Justice Roberts
Roberts is the one who appointed Boasberg to run Washington’s FISA courts and hearings. Roberts has known for years now that Boasberg allowed Obama to send his Attorney Generals and FBI Directors (along with their lesser STASI ) to repeatedly perjure themselves under oath in Boasberg’s FISA courtrooms, and to do so while introducing the fraudulent Russia Dossier as their evidence to obtain their lawless spy warrants.
Roberts watched after the perjury and uttering of false documents to the court could no longer be hidden. While the warrants were finally declared illegitimate years later, after they were no longer being criminally used to deprive Americans of their 1st and 4th Amendment rights by color of law, Roberts watched while Judge Boasberg never demanded that any of Obama’s crew return to his FISA courtrooms to at least face sentencing for contempt of court.
Justice Roberts did nothing about Boasberg after watching all of that. You already have your answer to what he thinks about this.
“Justice Roberts did nothing about Boasberg after watching all of that. You already have your answer to what he thinks about this.”
Exactly. I’d might be interested in Thomas’ take on this, or that of one of the other Justices who, unlike Roberts, appears to have more regard for the Constitution than for his or her popular on the DC cocktail party circuit.
“popularity”
anyone in jail…we have known these crimes for 8 years
Uh, the criminals own and operate the system that would ostensibly mete out justice. So, yeah, enjoy.
LoL 🤣 – I’m sorry man but NO.
You have a better chance at winning the Lotto.
Perhaps the most shocking thing about this information is how unsurprising it is. The “Biden” administration was conceived in lawlessness with the theft of the 2020 elections and continued their full-on assault on this country and her laws and institutions in utter impunity.
What was the “theft” in regards to the 2020 election? If you’re still pretending several million fraudulent votes were cast without detection by anyone responsible for county election integrity, you deserve to be mocked as a gullible pinhead.
However, if the cheat was vested in waging deceitful infowarfare with professional CIA assistance, and advanced by sympathetic media, you’d be standing with the majority in questioning whether an election can be “free and fair” if the candidates are allowed to “opinion-shape” (i.e. dupe) the electorate.
Why didn’t Trump frame his loss as the result of Hunter-laptop cover-up? Because, the way the law stood back then (and still now), lying to help win votes is perfectly legal (it’s euphemistically classified as “opinion”) — it’s not grounds for overturning the election. He chose his big whopper about massive vote fraud because legally that could be used to try to overturn the result.
End result: we don’t cite the real defect with our election system (public frauds waged for political advantage), and are no closer to correcting this problem. It will come back to bite us again and again until we acknowledge how the 2020 election was defective — truthfully, specifically, and pointing to actionable reform. It starts with accepting the ugly truth, and rejecting comforting lies.
What was the “theft” in regards to the 2020 election? You flew here on your broom to try this schtick to deflect because your police state fascists in the DNC are being further exposed?
Tell us about the REAL defect that allowed people who weren’t the elected representatives in those states to work with the DNC’s unindicted felon, Marc Elias, to change the voting regulations in those states, Democrat pbinca? You cosplay as a constitutional expert, so that should be an easy one for you.
Why is pbinca’s Big Lie regularly popping up to try and convince us it was the most transparent election in history
And tell us why you want young adult Americans stripped of their Second Amendment rights, constitutional hero that you are?
Your commie face is showing, pbinca. Stick around and defend your commie fascism.
Jefferson characterized the Adams Administration as “the reign of witches.” After all these revelations, the Biden’s Administration, particularly Garland’s DOJ, appears to have said “hold my beer”
This blatant disregard of the Civil Rights of Legislators and who they communicate with via phone, is another in a long line of events where the Courts of the United States have been the conduit to a Judicial Tyranny and possible Seditious Activity of the DOJ, FBI and the Federal Judiciary………. Prove me wrong.
Prove you wrong? First off, you got no facts that prove whatever it is your trying us to disprove.
He has more pretext than the DOJ had to spy on these congressmen. It would be interesting to see the documents and evidence submitted to the judge to obtain these warrants. Watergate pales in comparison to the broad weaponization of government against Republicans that has occurred in the last several years. This behavior occurs when there is no expectation of accountability.
interesting to see the documents and evidence submitted to the judge … okay, but what’s the point? The subpoena was issues, they got the records.
Perhaps we should start by getting a comprehensive list of any other “requests” for phone information made by Jack Smith. To this non-attorney, it seems like he has engaged in a stunning abuse of power to infringe on the privacy rights of individuals, including key Representatives and Senators. So maybe, instead of suing the government (aka taxpayers), prosecution may be a more appropriate remedy.
Prove you wrong? First off, you got no facts that prove whatever it is your trying us to disprove.
That’s pretty feeble sauce for you Democrat police state fascists to attempt. Particularly when you know the judge who issued these warrants – COMPLETE WITH GAG ORDERS – is the same Judge Boasberg who repeatedly allowed Obama’s Attorney Generals and FBI Directors to perjure themselves and introduce the felonious Russia Dossier into his FISA courts. Never dragged a single one of them back into his FISA courts to sentence them for contempt of court when they couldn’t hide their felonies in his courtroom any further.
Oh? You didn’t know that – so you didn’t have the beginnings of knowledge to base your feeble attempt at a rebuttal on.
Guess what, the Biden regime is not the first. Think of all those politicians J. Edgar Hoover to tracked.
Two wrongs don’t make a right.
Hoover didn’t do his spying while working hand in glove with judges of the day like Judge Boasberg today.
Democrats pretend to be fighting fascism, when all they need to do to find fascists is look in the mirror. Shame on these authoritarian fascists.
Authoritarianism and fascism are synonymous.
Sounds like a dem-o-rat
Oh oh ole jerkoff is at it again. he’s the one with a “collage” degree.
(2) of them.
LOL Just a few years apart.
DustOff,
He has to bring up the whole “collage” thing, thinking it is some kind of great insult to you. Reality is, anyone with a degree of common senses knows full well either you fat fingered the “e” in college and mistakenly hit the “a” key, or you are on a mobile device and it autocorrected to “collage.” In which you did not catch it and hit the reply or post button not knowing your error.
It was so obvious, even this UN-educated farmer could use a degree of common sense, critical thinking, logic to figure that one out.
Upstate.
Yep I hit the wrong key….
But ready most of the post on this blog. Many miss-spell by accident.
I can’t say for others, but I get in, make a comment then leave.
“but I get in, make a comment then leave.”
Yep. I either fat finger comments here, or decide to reword one and fail to complete that process, often. If the error is harmful to understanding my point I may make a quick reply to the original comment with a word correction, but otherwise what’s done is done…
It troubles me that the instinctive response from many Democrats is to defend what happened instead of being outraged by it.
If you truly believe in checks and balances, the first reaction should be alarm, followed by investigation to prove it’s not as bad as it looks — not defense, investigation, and the discovery that it’s actually worse.
If your first impulse is to protect the abuse of power rather than question it, you’re not defending a party anymore — you’re erasing the very tools meant to restrain it.
Our Democracy ™.
Turley: A prosecutor obtaining phone records of a participant in an attempted coup is bad, the attempted coup is ok.
Not what he said dude.
You’re drinking the Koolaid, man.
Koolaid huh? What, yoo like from the 50’s or sumptin?
The Resident Idiot wrote: “Koolaid huh? What, yoo like from the 50’s or sumptin?”
Late 70s, you ignorant buffoon:
Why Did Hundreds of Americans ‘Drink the Kool-Aid’ at Jonestown?
https://history.howstuffworks.com/historical-events/jonestown.htm
“Back in November 1978, Americans were shocked by newspaper headlines about the deaths of more than 900 people in the South American nation of Guyana, in what appeared to be a combination of mass murder and suicide by poison. The carnage took place at a jungle camp known as Jonestown. Its founder was a charismatic American religious leader, the Rev. Jim Jones, who had led many of the cult followers of his former San Francisco-based Peoples Temple sect there.”
There was no attempted coup. Everyone knows that, except the most addled TDS mental patient. No one has been arrested, charged, and tried for any such thing. As we saw with the former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy phone records, Smith tried to find something, anything on Jordan and found nothing.
Smith tried to find something, anything on Jordan and found nothing…. Really? Now how would you know that? Judge issued the subpoena, it was specific as to what was being subpoenaed – telephone records.
Did any of these folks go to jail or court.
Marty: I’m a commie Democrat, so when we engage in felonious police state fascism in 2016 under Obama and then again when Biden is in office – it’s all okay. Stalin and Lavarentiy Beria are our standard!
Obtained? That’s right, they had a subpoena. And of course, with no facts Turley writes: “appears part of the Arctic Frost probe”. APPEARS.
Don’t you wonder what smith provided as a basis for his subpoena? Remember how they repeatedly knowingly misled the FISA court?
But the FISA court had nothing to with this case.
Wonder? No. The judge had all he needed to grant it. If you knew, what could you or anyone do about it.
BTW, who is “they” please?
What good Anonymous is saying is that if they will lie to the FISA court they will obviously lie to any court. I know it looks like you are too obtuse to pick up on this point, but you are also a contrarian weirdo and so you have this insane need to argue the most idiotic and indefensible positions possible.
Just imagine if Trump had Jeffries and Schumer’s phones tapped because shutting down the government is seditious. You and your cohorts on the View would be apoplectic.
HullBobby,
Great comment and spot on!!
Meanwhile, there are six Democrats who are calling on the military and the intelligence community to disobey Trump’s orders.
JUST IN: Stephen Miller TRUTH NUKES Democrat Senators for demanding the troops and CIA officers commit insurrection against President Trump
“There is nothing graver that you could possibly say as a United States Senator than encouraging, URGING, DIRECTING members of the Armed… pic.twitter.com/V5oeiRbe9w
— Eric Daugherty (@EricLDaugh) November 19, 2025
Calling? So what. Its called free speech.
FISA had nothing to do with the investigation into Jim Jordan.
Same people—Democrats—did both. There is a pattern here.
What pattern? Explain it.
But their phones we not tapped. Keep imaging …
Whose phones were not taped? Mine wasn’t. Yours?
But the FISA court had nothing to with this case. WRONG. Judge Boasberg was the judge that issued Obama’s unindicted felon Attorney Generals and FBI Directors those spy warrants for their felonious Russia Dossier. Same Judge Boasberg who did much the same with these warrants – with gag orders attached to conceal the prosecutors and himself from Congressional oversight.
You hoping you can hide from the similarities in Judge Boasberg’s FISA courts then and Judge Boasberg’s courts with Arctic Frost and Jack Smith? Not going to work.
I realize that it is hard for you to understand how a group gains power. They lie and steal. They weaponize government and neutralize the news.
That is what happened under Biden. If you are unable to see that it isn’t because it doesn’t exist. It’s because you purposely blind yourself so you can’t see how the Democrat Party of today is autocratic and desires complete control.
Great point!