DOJ: Courts Can't Interfere in Obama's Executive Privilege Claim

"Fast and Furious" fight between White House and Congress

The federal courts have no authority to intervene in the dispute that led to President Barack Obama asserting executive privilege for the first time in the context of a Congressional inquiry, the Justice Department argued in a legal brief filed Monday night.

Soon after that assertion of privilege in June, the House voted to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt of Congress for failing to turn over documents related to a House probe of the Fast and Furious gunrunning scandal.

The Justice Department brief (posted here) argues that the executive branch's decision not to comply with such subpoenas or portions thereof cannot be second-guessed or rejected by the judiciary—a sweeping claim of executive power that aligns the Obama administration with the stance President George W. Bush's administration took in a similar dispute in 2008.