Oversight or Witch Hunt? What Congress Can Make Trump Do, and What It Can’t

A new Congress meets a sitting President in January. Here is what a congressional subpoena can demand, what the President can refuse, and how the Framers set the rules.

Maria keeps the books for a small heating-and-air company in Chesterfield. One Tuesday, a deputy walks in and hands her an envelope. Inside is a subpoena. A court wants her to appear and bring the company’s records.

Maria has done nothing wrong. It doesn’t matter. A subpoena is an order, not a request. She can challenge it in court. But if she ignores a valid subpoena without a lawful excuse, a judge can hold her in contempt. That can mean a fine, or even jail.

Now suppose the records point to her boss. A prosecutor takes them to a grand jury. These are ordinary citizens who decide one thing: is there enough evidence to charge him? If they say yes, he is indicted. If the case goes to a jury trial, a different jury decides whether he is guilty.

Hold onto those steps: demand the evidence, bring the charge, hold the trial. On January 3, the new Congress begins its term. Congress also has powers to demand evidence, bring charges, and try them. But those powers follow different rules.

We want to hear from you. If we got a fact wrong, tell us in the comments. If you see it differently, tell us that too.

What Tuesday’s Election Set Up

On November 3, voters gave Democrats control of both the House and the Senate, according to news projections. The President’s party will run neither chamber.

Hakeem Jeffries, the current House Minority Leader, is expected to become Speaker. But it isn’t automatic. Article I says the House “shall chuse their Speaker,” so it takes a vote.

What will the new majority do? The day after the election, Jeffries said Americans “don’t want us to get even, they want us to get things done on their behalf.” On impeachment, he told ABC in September, “No, we haven’t ruled anything in and we haven’t ruled anything out in terms of impeachment.”

One impeachment push is already waiting. On September 15, Rep. Thomas Massie, a Republican, gave the House notice of a resolution to impeach Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth. In Massie’s own words: “By engaging in hostilities in Iran for more than 90 days without congressional authorization, Secretary Hegseth is breaking the law and must be held accountable.” That is Massie’s charge, not a finding.

So the question for every citizen is simple. When Congress comes knocking, what must the President answer? And what may he refuse?

Scripture gives us the reason the question matters. “The one who states his case first seems right, until the other comes and examines him” (Proverbs 18:17). The proverb warns us to hear the other side before deciding. That is true of Maria’s boss. It is true of a President. It is true of Congress, too.

A Charge Is Not a Conviction

The Framers adapted an older process from England. There, the House of Commons brought charges and the House of Lords held the trial. Our Constitution follows the same pattern. Think of the House as the accuser and the Senate as the trial court.

• The House brings the charge. It has “the sole Power of Impeachment.” Impeachment is a charge, not a conviction. The House votes by simple majority, as it does on most questions.
• The Senate holds the trial. It has “the sole Power to try all Impeachments.” When a President is on trial, the Chief Justice presides. Conviction takes two-thirds of the senators present.
• The penalty is the job, not prison. Conviction means removal from office. The Senate may also bar the person from future office. But the official “shall nevertheless be liable and subject to Indictment, Trial, Judgment and Punishment, according to Law.” The ordinary courts stay open.

Alexander Hamilton explained the design in Federalist 65. He called the House “the inquisitors for the nation.” The people’s own representatives bring the charges.

Then, in Federalist 69, he drew the line that matters most. The King of England was “sacred and inviolable.” The President, by contrast, “would afterwards be liable to prosecution and punishment in the ordinary course of law.” The President is not above the law. As we’ll see, though, his office carries some protections Maria’s job doesn’t.

High Crimes, Not Bad Management

The Framers also chose their words with care. On September 8, 1787, George Mason proposed that a President could be removed for “maladministration.” That simply means bad management. James Madison objected: “So vague a term will be equivalent to a tenure during pleasure of the Senate.” In plain English, the Senate could remove a President whenever it wished. So Mason withdrew “maladministration” and substituted language about high crimes and misdemeanors against the state.

The bar was set high on purpose. Hamilton described impeachable offenses as “the abuse or violation of some public trust.” A President isn’t to be removed simply because Congress dislikes his policies.

Long before Philadelphia, Moses told Israel’s future king to keep his own copy of God’s law and read it all his life, “that his heart may not be lifted up above his brothers” (Deuteronomy 17:20). The ruler lives under the law, not over it. That biblical principle still helps Christians judge rulers today.

The Congressional Subpoena: A Power Written Nowhere

Here is a surprise. The word “subpoena” isn’t in the Constitution. Congress’s power to investigate is implied, not stated.

The Supreme Court spelled it out in McGrain v. Daugherty (1927). The case grew out of the Senate’s investigation of Attorney General Harry Daugherty’s Justice Department. The Court said “the power of inquiry — with process to enforce it — is an essential and appropriate auxiliary to the legislative function.” Congress can’t write good laws if it can’t find out what’s going on.

This practice is as old as the republic. In 1792, the House investigated a disastrous Army defeat under Gen. Arthur St. Clair. President Washington and his cabinet agreed the House could ask for papers. They also agreed the President should refuse any paper whose release would injure the public. In that case, they decided the papers could be turned over. Congress may ask, but the President may weigh the public good. That is still the argument, 234 years later.

The power has limits. In Watkins v. United States (1957), the Court said, “There is no general authority to expose the private affairs of individuals without justification in terms of the functions of the Congress.” Congress may investigate to make laws and to carry out its other duties, such as impeachment. It may not investigate just to expose or punish.

When a congressional subpoena seeks the President’s personal records, the bar goes higher. In Trump v. Mazars (2020), the Court listed four considerations, among others:

• Does Congress really need the President’s papers, or can it get the facts elsewhere?
• Is the subpoena “no broader than reasonably necessary”?
• How strong is the evidence of a real lawmaking purpose?
• How heavy is the burden on the President?

The Shield Against a Congressional Subpoena: Executive Privilege

Maria has shields too. She may refuse to give answers that would incriminate her. Her confidential talks with a lawyer for legal advice may also be protected. The President’s shield is called executive privilege. It protects some of the advice he receives.

Like the subpoena, executive privilege is not named in the Constitution. The Supreme Court recognized a constitutional basis for it in United States v. Nixon (1974). Then it ruled against Nixon, 8–0. Neither the separation of powers nor the need for secrecy, the Court said, “without more, can sustain an absolute, unqualified Presidential privilege of immunity from judicial process under all circumstances.” In plain English, the President does not get to block every court demand for evidence.

The Court ordered Nixon to produce the tapes. Sixteen days after the ruling, on August 9, 1974, he resigned.

In Trump v. Vance (2020), a case about a state criminal subpoena for private records, the Court used words Maria would understand: “no citizen, not even the President, is categorically above the common duty to produce evidence when called upon in a criminal proceeding.” The Court traced that rule back to 1807. That year, Chief Justice John Marshall subpoenaed President Thomas Jefferson for papers in Aaron Burr’s treason trial.

But the President is not exactly like Maria. In Trump v. United States (2024), the Court held that a President is immune from criminal prosecution for acts within his core constitutional powers. For his other official acts, he has at least presumed immunity. That means courts start by treating him as immune, though prosecutors can try to overcome it. For unofficial acts, there is no immunity. That case was about criminal charges, not congressional subpoenas. Still, it shows the Court treats the office as different from the citizen.

Contempt: Who Enforces a Congressional Subpoena?

There is one more twist. If a witness ignores a congressional subpoena, the House can vote to hold him in contempt. Willful defiance of a lawful congressional subpoena can be a federal crime. But the case goes to the Justice Department, which is part of the executive branch.

The House held Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt in 2012, Attorney General Bill Barr in 2019, and Attorney General Merrick Garland in 2024. Each time, the Justice Department declined to prosecute. Under administrations of both parties, the Department has declined to prosecute officials who withheld materials at the sitting President’s direction, citing executive privilege.

Former White House advisers Steve Bannon and Peter Navarro were a different case. Neither was a sitting official acting at the sitting President’s direction. Both were prosecuted, convicted, and sentenced to four months.

Some of these fights reach court. Many more are settled through negotiation between the branches. Court fights can take months or years.

What the Election Changes, and What It Doesn’t

In 1952, President Truman seized the nation’s steel mills during the Korean War. The Supreme Court struck it down in Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer. Justice Robert Jackson’s concurring opinion sorted presidential power into three zones. It is still the most useful map we have.

• Zone 1: Congress has authorized the act. “[H]is authority is at its maximum.”
• Zone 2: Congress has neither granted nor denied it. The President works in “a zone of twilight.”
• Zone 3: Congress has forbidden it. “[H]is power is at its lowest ebb.”

Here is the key point. Jackson’s zones depend on what Congress has authorized or forbidden in law, not on which party holds the seats. An opposition Congress may bring more investigations and sharper disputes. It can attach conditions to spending bills the President needs. And where Congress does say no in law, the President’s power sinks to its lowest ebb.

But that raises a harder question. Who is right when the two branches collide?

The Strongest Case for Congress

Congress’s defenders say oversight is the people’s check on power. Hamilton called the House the nation’s inquisitors for a reason. A Congress that can’t ask questions legislates blind.

They also point to the Framers’ design. The Framers rejected a chief executive who could claim the king’s personal immunity from legal accountability. If no citizen is above the duty to give evidence, they argue, the President’s staff isn’t either.

The Strongest Case for the President

The President’s defenders start with the text. Article II says, “The executive Power shall be vested in a President.” One person, not a committee.

Hamilton defended that choice in Federalist 70: “Energy in the Executive is a leading character in the definition of good government.” One man in charge means voters know whom to blame. The President’s defenders add that a President buried in subpoenas can’t govern. Advisers won’t give honest advice if every word can be dragged before a committee.

Madison also warned of legislative overreach. In Federalist 48, he wrote that the legislature “is everywhere extending the sphere of its activity, and drawing all power into its impetuous vortex.”

Hamilton saw the danger of partisan impeachment, too. “In many cases,” he wrote in Federalist 65, impeachment “will connect itself with the pre-existing factions.” Since 2025, House members have filed several resolutions to impeach this President. Some were sent to committee. Others reached the floor and were set aside by votes to table. The President’s defenders say that history illustrates their concern.

Both sides quote the Founders. Both sides have a point.

The Third Way: Ambition Against Ambition

Madison gave the answer in Federalist 51: “Ambition must be made to counteract ambition.” The Framers expected this collision. In fact, they built it.

Congress has a duty to conduct lawful oversight. The President may defend legitimate constitutional interests. This fight is not the crisis. The crisis would be one branch swallowing the other. That could be a Congress that impeaches over policy differences, or a President who treats every question as an attack.

God’s law sets the standard for both sides. “You shall not be partial to the poor or defer to the great, but in righteousness shall you judge your neighbor” (Leviticus 19:15). Do not favor someone because he is poor, or defer to someone because he is powerful. Apply the same standard of justice to both. The standard is evidence. “Only on the evidence of two witnesses or of three witnesses shall a charge be established” (Deuteronomy 19:15).

These disputes raise three different questions. Is a congressional subpoena seeking facts for a legitimate purpose, or exposure for its own sake? Is the President guarding real confidences, or hiding wrongdoing? Does a charge allege a serious abuse of public trust, or is it “maladministration” in disguise?

What the Citizen Does

Three Things You Can Do This Week

Pray for both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue. Paul urged prayer “for kings and all who are in high positions, that we may lead a peaceful and quiet life, godly and dignified in every way” (1 Timothy 2:1–2). Pray for the President by name. Pray for the new Speaker and your own representative by name. Pray that both seek truth over victory.

Make one two-minute call. Call your representative’s office and say: “I’m a constituent. Before Rep. [name] votes on any subpoena or impeachment, what standard will he or she use?” Then listen to the answer. You’ll learn a lot.

Share the questions. The next time a headline screams “showdown,” ask the three questions in the box. Then look up the text yourself. For background, see our earlier pieces on who the President can fire, on what a President may rename and what he may not rewrite, and on the Senate filibuster and the Third Way.

God sent the prophet Nathan to confront King David with his sin. Nathan said four words no king wanted to hear: “You are the man!” (2 Samuel 12:7). David confessed, “I have sinned against the LORD.” No vote and no ruling can change a human heart. Only the Spirit of God can. But the God who brought David to repentance can still raise up honest men and women at both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue.

Coming in Part 2: But what about the federal agencies that write regulations? Who controls them, and who pays for them?

Sources

• U.S. Constitution, Article I, Sections 2–3 (impeachment and trial)
• Madison’s Notes, September 8, 1787 (the “maladministration” debate)
• Federalist 65, 69, 70, 48, and 51
• Founders Online: the 1792 St. Clair inquiry
• United States v. Nixon (1974); Trump v. Mazars (2020); Trump v. Vance (2020); Trump v. United States (2024)
• Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Sawyer (1952)
• Congressional Research Service: Presidential Claims of Executive Privilege

Unless otherwise noted, Scripture quotations are from the English Standard Version (ESV).