U.S. President Donald Trump gets to talk about the administration’s coronavirus disease testing plan (COVID-19) at the White House Rose Garden in Washington on September 28, 2020.
Carlos Barria | Reuters
A federal appeals court on Wednesday began a legal battle over President Donald Trump’s financial statements to a lower court, delaying House Democrats’ efforts to obtain years of the president’s personal and business record.
In its ruling, a group of three U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals judges overturned a district court ruling and aligned itself with a Supreme Court ruling over the summer of order the lower courts to consider more carefully the questions of the separation of powers in the case.
Two of these appellate judges were appointed by Democratic presidents and one by Trump.
In 2019, the House Oversight and Reform Committee issued a subpoena of Trump’s eight-year records by accounting firm Mazars USA. The committee’s Democratic majority said it sought records as part of its legislative and oversight functions and as part of ongoing investigations.
Trump’s lawyers have tried to block the release of the records, arguing that Congress was involved in a fishing expedition to hurt him politically.
A U.S. district court judge and a federal appeals court upheld the subpoena. But in July the Supreme Court raised concerns about the separation of powers between the government’s legislative and executive powers.
In their brief ruling on Wednesday, the appellate judges noted that “they do not express any opinion on whether this case will become debatable when the subpoena expires or on the merits of the parties’ arguments.”
The oversight group said President Carolyn Maloney, DN.Y., intends to reissue the citation to Mazars at the start of the next Congress.
“It remains vital that the Oversight Committee (and the House in general) be able to ensure the immediate application of the summons without the risk of investigating subjects thwarting their efforts due to a judicial delay,” he said. councilor of the committee in the court of appeals in early December.
A committee and White House spokeswoman did not immediately respond to CNBC’s request to comment on the appellate court’s ruling.