WASHINGTON — A provision tucked into the funding bill that reopened the government would allow Sen. Tommy Tuberville and other GOP senators to sue over the seizure of their phone records, but an effort to repeal it is expected next week in the U.S. House.
Tuberville and seven other senators could sue the government for $500,000 and legal fees over the search of their phone records by special counsel Jack Smith during the investigation into the Jan. 6, 2021 Capitol riot. The contents of the phone calls were not accessed in the search.
On Thursday, Tuberville said on social media that he would sue if Judge James Boasberg, who signed off on the subpoenas, was not impeached and if Jack Smith was not disbarred and “THROWN IN JAIL.”
“If they aren’t, I will sue the living hell out of every Biden official involved in this to make sure this NEVER happens to a conservative again,” he said on X.
The bill allows senators to sue if their data is accessed or subpoenaed without notification, except if they are subjects of a criminal investigation. It’s retroactive to 2022, which would include the Jan. 6 probe.
The Senate’s provision sparked bipartisan outrage across the Capitol. Speaker Mike Johnson, R-LA, vowed to repeal the language in a floor vote next week. Johnson expressed deep frustration with it and said he called Senate Majority Leader Thune, R-SD, when he learned about the provision.
“I did not appreciate that, nor did most of the House members,” Johnson said Wednesday. “Many of them are very angry about that. So, we will be bringing that up.”
The speaker added that putting the provision into the measure was “way out of line.”
Republican Rep. Greg Steube of Florida voted against the funding bill to reopen the government because of the issue.
“I could not in good conscience support a resolution that creates a self-indulgent legal provision for certain senators to enrich themselves by suing the Justice Department using taxpayer dollars,” Steube said in a post on X.
Rep. Jamie Raskin, D-MD, the top Democrat on the House Judiciary Committee, said the Senate “tucked one of the most blatantly corrupt provisions for political self-dealing and the plunder of public resources ever proposed in Congress into this spending bill.”
The other Republican senators whose phone records were searched include Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, Bill Hagerty and Marsha Blackburn of Tennessee, Josh Hawley of Missouri, Dan Sullivan of Alaska, Ron Johnson of Wisconsin and Cynthia Lummis of Wyoming.
The bill’s language only applies to senators, so it wouldn’t allow Rep. Mike Kelly, R-PA, to sue even though his records were also searched in the probe.
Last month, the Senate Judiciary Committee revealed that the FBI obtained data from eight senators and one House member’s personal cell phones from Jan. 4 to Jan. 7, 2021. The investigators could see when and to whom a phone call was made, the duration and the location of the call.
“It’s just shocking to me, shocking and alarming that every freedom loving American should look and say, a United States senator, they’ll also come after me, if they’ll do that,” Tuberville told reporters on a call in October.
At the time of the Judiciary Committee’s announcement, Sen. Katie Britt, R-Ala., said it was “indefensible.”
If the measure to repeal the provision passes the House, it will then move to the Senate, where it’s unclear if Thune will bring it to the floor for a vote.