Letter to the Hon. Jeff Sessions, Attorney General - Requesting Responses to Unanswered Oversight Letters Sent During Obama Administration

Letter

Dear Attorney General Sessions,

As you know, you lead a Department over which the House Judiciary Committee has primary oversight jurisdiction. Throughout the Obama Administration, the Judiciary Committee sent letters to your predecessors as Attorney General, and to individual DOJ components, requesting answers to a multitude of questions concerning various issues of interest stemming from Judiciary hearings and oversight responsibilities. Many of the inquiries remain unanswered, with some outstanding requests approaching two years overdue.

Congressional oversight is not a responsibility that we take lightly, and our ability to provide this service for the American people is most effective when we work in cooperation with the Administration. Considering that the Obama Administration failed to respond to a host of requests over the years, we write now asking you to rectify this situation, by helping the Judiciary Committee obtain answers to outstanding oversight questions. To that end, we have attached a list of letters and/or questions that remain either unanswered or inadequately addressed by the previous Administration. Please review the attached list, and provide us with answers at your earliest convenience.

Thank you for giving this request priority. We know that we share the common goals of identifying instances of waste, fraud, and abuse, rooting out such conduct, and implementing solutions necessary to help ensure they do not happen again in the future. I look forward to working with you on this effort.