There will be a delay until at least next week in the House Judiciary Committee’s effort to obtain testimony from Mark Pomerantz, the former prosecutor who ran the Manhattan District Attorney’s Trump investigation before quitting last year.
As I’ve explained, after a hearing on Wednesday, Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil, a Trump appointee to the federal district court in Manhattan, rejected a lawsuit brought by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg, an elected progressive Democrat, by which the DA sought to block a congressional investigation of Bragg’s prosecution of former President Donald Trump. The investigation is spearheaded by House Judiciary Chairman Jim Jordan, an Ohio Republican and Trump ally.
As part of that investigation, Jordan had subpoenaed Pomerantz, who was slated to testify yesterday (Thursday). Bragg and Pomerantz immediately appealed to the Second Circuit (the federal appellate court, which sits in Manhattan) and sought to enjoin the committee’s deposition of Pomerantz while the appeal is being decided.
The appellate court put a temporary hold on the Pomerantz deposition. It further ordered the parties to file briefs immediately. I understand the parties have done so, with the committee filing a responsive brief this afternoon, though I believe its deadline was not until noon tomorrow (Saturday).
There is no deadline by which the Second Circuit must act. Given the tight schedule it imposed on the parties, we should assume the court will rule quickly, though perhaps not as quickly as this weekend. So we’ll be watching this one, too.
UPDATE: Politico’s Josh Gerstein reports that the Second Circuit has scheduled oral argument in the lawsuit by Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg against House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan at 2 p.m. next Tuesday, April 25. The argument will undoubtedly center on whether the House Committee may obtain testimony from Mark Pomerantz, the former prosecutor who, until last year, ran the Trump investigation at the DA’s office.