Mike Lee Presses Merrick Garland Over Failure To Arrest Anyone Demonstrating At Justices' Homes

After Senator Lee asks, we're going to take a brief intermission. Senator Lee? Thank you, Attorney General Garland. I want to echo briefly what Senator Klobuchar described. I hope you'll look at our letter and investigate thoroughly those issues. As you know, I've long respected you and I've long respected your department. I have become concerned recently that notwithstanding the great men and women who serve and have served for generations in the Department of Justice, there are some things that lead me to wonder whether some actions are being politicized within the department. One example of this relates to 18 USC, Section 1507.

Ever since the leak of the Dobs' opinion and then the issuance of the Dobs' opinion by the Supreme Court last summer, we've had protesters who have been showing up the homes of Supreme Court justices, carrying signs, picketing, shouting. It's very clear that they're trying to influence in one way or another those serving on the United States Supreme Court, trying to influence jurisprudence. And yet not one person, to my knowledge, has been prosecuted for such things under 18 USC, Section 1507. About two weeks ago, this committee invited some officials from the Department of Justice to brief committee staff on protests at the justices' homes and ask about any arrests that have been made or might be made for people engaged in that behavior. The briefers came to the briefing and informed staff that they hadn't read Section 1507. I assume you've read it, of course. Just wondering why the department would schedule such a briefing on a statute without having read it and especially why no actions have been brought under Section 1507 for these actions.

I've got a lot to cover. Can you answer that in a minute? I try to answer all these questions. But no, just tell me, am I right in concluding that you haven't brought any charges under 1507? So I don't know the answer to that. We have the thing that mattered and as soon as the dobs draft leaked, I ordered the marshals to do something that the United States marshals had never in history done before, which was protect the justices' homes, residents, and lives 24-7. No Attorney General had ever ordered that before and no Justice Department had ever done that before. Which is terrific. That's fantastic.

So I'm getting to the why. So we sent more than 70 U.S. marshals for this purpose. Those marshals' priority is protection of the lives of the justices and their families. They are on site, but their priority job is protection. That is why when someone did come to assault Justice Kavanaugh, he had to go away from where they were because there were two marshals in front of the house and eventually he self-reported himself.

The marshals have been advised and they know the marshals on the ground. They have full authority to arrest people under any federal statute, including that federal statute. But they have to make the determination on the ground whether they can do that in a manner that is safe and able to protect their main mission. Now there are also state and local entities which have similar authorities and which I understand the Supreme Court Marshall has asked them to do this as well. I don't know whether they have done any of those things. Okay, thank you. I'd love to follow up with you more on that later.

It is concerning to me when you show up at the home of a public official, you're sending the message of implicit violence. You're sending the message, we know where you sleep. We know where you and your family are most vulnerable and it's very concerning to me.

Sen. Mike Lee, AG Merrick Garland, Senate