House panel plans contempt vote next week after Clintons skip out on closed-door testimony

Former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton defied a congressional subpoena on Wednesday, failing to show up for a closed-door deposition about her relationship with convicted sex offender and accused sex trafficker Jeffrey Epstein.

Mrs. Clinton’s absence was expected following former President Bill Clinton’s refusal to show up on Capitol Hill for his own deposition on Tuesday before the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, which is investigating Epstein’s connection to the powerful, wealthy and influential. 

The GOP-led panel will vote Jan. 21 on whether to hold the former first couple in contempt of Congress, Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer, Kentucky Republican, told reporters after Mrs. Clinton failed to appear.

“We will mark up criminal contempt of Congress charges for both Clintons for defying a legal subpoena. Once it passes the committee, then it will go to the full House floor for a vote,” Mr. Comer said. 

The Clintons on Tuesday published a letter they delivered to Mr. Comer condemning his pursuit of their closed-door testimony and clobbering the GOP and President Trump over their agenda, which they said failed to lower health care prices and led to the death of a single mother, Renee Good, at the hands of an ICE agent in Minnesota.

“Everyone has to decide when they have seen or had enough and are ready to fight for this country, its principles, its people, no matter the consequences. For us, now is that time,” the Clintons wrote to Mr. Comer.

The couple said their legal team determined their subpoenas to be “legally invalid.”

The Clintons’ lawyer, David Kendall, has sent three letters to Mr. Comer asserting the former first couple should be able to provide written statements to the panel instead of appearing personally to testify. 

Former presidents have rarely testified before Congress. The last to do so, according to congressional historians, was former President Gerald Ford, who testified before the Senate Judiciary Subcommittee on the Constitution in March 1983. His testimony concerned the upcoming bicentennial of the Constitution. 

No former president or first lady has been held in contempt of Congress.

Mr. Comer pointed out the subpoenas were approved by Democrats and Republicans on the panel. Two Trump administration officials — former Attorney General William Barr and former Labor Secretary Alex Acosta — appeared for testimony in response to their subpoenas, the committee chairman said. 

The Clintons, he said, have been employing stalling tactics by negotiating times to appear only to cancel at the last minute. 

“Bill Clinton is trying to play the victim card,” Mr. Comer said. 

Records show Epstein visited the White House 17 times during Mr. Clinton’s presidency.

The two remained friends for years after Mr. Clinton’s presidency, and he was a frequent guest on Epstein’s private jet. Mr. Clinton denies visiting Epstein’s private island in the Caribbean, where many of the sex crimes took place, although other witnesses said he was there. 

In federal investigatory files recently made public by the Justice Department, Mr. Clinton appears in undated Epstein photos that appear to be from the 2000s. One of them shows a young woman, purportedly an Epstein sex trafficking victim, on Epstein’s jet sitting on Mr. Clinton’s lap. Another shows the ex-president in a hot tub alongside an unidentified young woman. 

Mr. Clinton denies any wrongdoing and has called for the release of all the Epstein files. 

Those docs have become a focal point for the Democrats, who helped force Mr. Trump to sign legislation requiring the Justice Department to make all of the files public. Tens of thousands of pages have been released, but many more have yet to be published amid concerns over protecting victim identities. 

Democrats have framed the Epstein file fight as an effort by the president to conceal damning information about himself. Mr. Trump socialized with Epstein decades ago but eventually banned Epstein from his Mar-a-Lago club. Mr. Trump said Epstein was luring away his female spa employees, among them sex trafficking victim Virginia Giuffre, who later helped expose the sex trafficking scheme. 

The Oversight panel has been publishing thousands of pages of files it has obtained from the Justice Department and Epstein’s estate.

Epstein committed suicide in a New York City jail in 2019 as he awaited federal prosecution on sex trafficking charges. 

His associate, Ghislaine Maxwell, is serving a 20-year prison sentence for helping him procure underage girls. 

Mr. Comer said he plans to depose Maxwell as part of his panel’s investigation. 

The panel subpoenaed Mrs. Clinton, Mr. Comer said, because it believes she could “offer some information on Maxwell,” who attended daughter Chelsea Clinton’s wedding.

The panel also sought to question Mrs. Clinton about reports that Mr. Epstein, a wealthy investor and philanthropist, helped raise funds for the Clinton Foundation.