Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) on Thursday said on Thursday that the "biggest tool we have is to shame" the Obama administration, but insisted that was not what he was trying to do with his investigations into the alleged IRS targeting of tea party groups.
During an interview with Fox News, host Brian Kilmeade asked the chairman of the House Oversight Committee what he could do to force the administration to hand over former IRS official Lois Lerner's emails after they said it would take "years" to produce all of them.
The California Republican said that he "ordered" that 12 years of his emails be put on a thumb drive in less than an hour. So, the IRS should be able to do the same for Lerner.
"You need some type of threat of retribution," Kilmeade noted. "But it doesn't seem as though you have it."
"Our tools in Congress are limited," Issa agreed. "Sometimes the biggest tool we have is to shame the administration."
"That's not our goal," he added. "Our goal with Louis Lerner was to get her to tell... She doesn't seem to be willing to answer questions to Congress, who simple want to get to the truth."
Kilmeade recalled Issa's recent dispute with Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-MD), after the chairman cut abruptly end a hearing and cut off the microphones as the democratic ranking member was calling the investigation a sham. The Fox News host wondered if Issa expected Cummings to get behind his effort to force the IRS to hand over Lerner's emails.
"You know, so far, we've had very little cooperation at all from Elijah Cummings on any investigation," Issa explained. "He seems to think they are either are phony or they need to end in about a week to a month."
Watch the video below from Fox News' Fox & Friends, broadcast March 27, 2014.
