Prosecutors call Trump’s Jan. 6 committee subpoena efforts a fishing expedition

Prosecutors in Donald Trump’s federal election interference case are opposing the former president’s attempts to subpoena House records in connection with a congressional investigation into the Jan. 6 riot.

In a filing Wednesday night, attorneys for special counsel Jack Smith’s office called Trump’s subpoena effort a “fishing expedition” and asked the court to deny his motion seeking archived materials from the probe from various people and entities.

“The defendant’s motion is wholly unnecessary: the Government already provided the defendant in discovery the Select Committee records that he identifies with any specificity,” federal prosecutors wrote.

An attorney for Trump declined to comment Wednesday night on the filing.

Trump’s attorneys said this month that they wanted to subpoena the Committee on House Administration, which was tasked with archiving and preserving records transferred by the former House Jan. 6 committee, and other entities involved with handling the investigative materials.

In their filing this month, Trump’s attorneys proposed seven subpoenas, whose recipients included former House Jan. 6 committee chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., arguing that there are “certain missing records” that could be relevant to the former president’s defense in the election interference case that’s scheduled to go to trial in March.