'Literal Trump card': Ex-president gave Biden tools needed to fight impeachment

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) announced a formal impeachment investigation into President Joe Biden on Tuesday, based on allegations of overseas business dealings with his son that Republicans haven't found any evidence for as of now, and former President Donald Trump is strategizing with GOP leadership on the matter.

But ironically, POLITICO reports that an opinion issued by the Justice Department under the Trump administration in 2020, during the former president's first impeachment, could be used by the Biden administration now to make impeachment a headache for McCarthy.

"In January 2020, the Donald Trump-led Justice Department formally declared that impeachment inquiries by the House are invalid unless the chamber takes formal votes to authorize them," reported Kyle Cheney and Josh Gerstein. "That opinion — issued by the Justice Department’s Office of Legal Counsel — came in response to then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s decision to launch an impeachment inquiry into Trump without initially holding a vote for it. Not only is it still on the books, it is binding on the current administration as it responds to Tuesday’s announcement by Speaker Kevin McCarthy to authorize an impeachment inquiry into Biden, again without a vote."

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“[W]e conclude that the House must expressly authorize a committee to conduct an impeachment investigation and to use compulsory process in that investigation before the committee may compel the production of documents or testimony,” wrote then-DOJ Office of Legal Counsel director Steven Engel.

According to the report, this opinion would give Biden grounds to assert executive privilege over a broad swath of documents that House Republicans would otherwise be able to request, creating a mess of legal battles for the GOP that slows down their investigation.

McCarthy himself has previously claimed that impeachment inquiries cannot proceed without a full vote of the House. Now, however, he is claiming that former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) changed the precedent and gave him the opening to do so.

Politico's Kyle Cheney posted the article and wrote the following: "The Biden administration has a literal Trump card to play against the House GOP impeachment inquiry: In 2020, Trump’s DOJ issued a binding legal opinion that impeachment inquiries are invalid without an official vote of the House."