How dare they demand that the King's friends answer questions! What do they think this is, a democratic republic or something? House Judiciary Committee Chairman John Conyers (D-Mich.) rejected claims by a lawyer to former White House counsel Harriet Miers that his client was not legally bound to appear before the panel after President Bush invoked executive privelege to prevent her testimony.
"The subcommittee [on administrative and commercial law] overruled Ms. Miers' claims of immunity and privelege," Conyers said in a statement. "Her failure to comply with our subpoena is a serious affront to this committee and our constitutional system of checks and balances. We are carefully planning our next steps."
That next step could include a vote to hold Miers in contempt of Congress, but her lawyer quoted previous Justice Department rulings "that criminal contempt of Congress statute does not apply to executive officials who assert claims of executive privelege at the direction of the President." So, according to this guy's logic, anybody who worked for the King at one time or another could claim executive privelege if the King gave it to them? That's some pretty fancy truth-stretching even in Washington.
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