Rep. Jim Jordan on Criminal Charges for Lois Lerner: ‘This Is the First Step’

‘When there’s the threat of jail time—there’s kind of a way of making them find the Lord and do the right thing’

VAN SUSTEREN: "And Representative Jim Jordan joins us. Nice to he so you, sir."
JORDAN: "Good to be with you Greta."
VAN SUSTEREN: "So what is next?"
JORDAN: "Well it's goes to the U.S. attorney. the statute says shall take it to a an attorney. Goes it to a judge and a judge will make a you will can. Our position is got something this important attack on First Amendment right to political speech, the most important speaking out against your government. One of the most rights that we have when you have the systematic attack and the irs won't give us emails and she won't talk and the justice department investigation is a joke, you have to use every tool, every means at your disposal to try to persuade her to talk to we can get to the truth. And that's what we did today."
VAN SUSTEREN: "What's the time line? How soon before this gets any place?"
JORDAN: "Yeah, I think -- I mean, who knoes, we have all dealt with the court system. We know it's typically a slow moving thing. This is the first step. Again, the statute is shall. So they are going to take to a grand jury it will get to a judge. We will will see happens. I think this is a little different animal than when we held Attorney General Holder in contempt. Here is the head of the Justice Department, the chief law enforcement officer, the attorney general, it's a little different animal. My understanding is of the history there has been six times this was done in the last 34 years. each time when it moved through and the judge said yeah, the Congress did in fact hold -- the person was persuaded to come aoun other questions or persuaded to give documents if that's what the subpoena was about, was persuaded to do that, because when there is the threat of jail time that's kind of a way of making them find the lord and do the right thing. So we hope this happens and I keep emphasizing -- and we've had Democrats, some of them have said, something of this importance, paramount importance, First Amendment liberties, you have got -- we have got to get to the truth, and the only means we have right now is to hold her in contempt, that's what we did."
VAN SUSTEREN: "She's not going to talk, she says she going to talk at least so far. Why don't you subpoena people who worked underneath her, grant them immunity and get them to answer questions too. Because they probably know more intimately what's going on in the office."
JORDAN: "Well we have talked to a bunch of those, and I sat down some of those."
VAN SUSTEREN: "Were they talking freely?"
JORDAN: "They were under oath. It wasn't a formal deposition but they had counsel. We asked them question. Now, you've you been in a lot of these. Some people who weren't necessarily under her, some were over her. Some under. You get a lot of I don't recall specifically what happened."
VAN SUSTEREN: "Which is why you need emails and the documents."
JORDAN: "Exactly."
VAN SUSTEREN: "The commissioner says he can't get you the e-mails, Lois Lerner's e-mails, for like a year or so. Do you believe that?
JORDAN: "No you can do it right away. And particularly the Ways and Means Committee doesn't have this 6103, this confidential taxpayer information that we're not allowed to receive. There are -- Chairman Camp -- they are allowed to get that. So the Ways and Means Committee could get every single e-mail from Lois Lerner like that."
VAN SUSTEREN: "Why don't they?"
JORDAN: "I don't know that's between them and the IRS."
VAN SUSTEREN: "Have you asked Chairman Camp?"
JORDAN: "We have asked for them in our committee. Ways and Means has worked out a different agreement which is a little bit frustrating."
VAN SUSTEREN: "Why doesn't Ways and Means ask for all of them?"
JORDAN: "I agree. You are exactly right. Because any parameters, any restrictions, only going to use certain search terms to decide which ones to get -- the IRS is in charge and they can say OK, well, here is what you are going to get. Can't put any parameters and framework. You have you got to have every single one. And that's what we've made clear."
VAN SUSTEREN: "You would like for Chairman Camp to do that?"
JORDAN: "I would."
VAN SUSTEREN: "Maybe he's watching. Anyway, nice to see you."
JORDAN: "Nice to see you Greta."

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