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Page Number: 7.0

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TRUMP v. MAZARS USA, LLP 

Opinion of the Court 

elections.  The President contends that the House lacked a 
valid  legislative  aim  and  instead  sought  these  records  to
harass him, expose personal matters, and conduct law en-
forcement activities beyond its authority.  The question pre-
sented is whether the subpoenas exceed the authority of the
House under the Constitution. 

We  have  never  addressed  a  congressional  subpoena  for 
the President’s information.  Two hundred years ago, it was
established  that  Presidents  may  be  subpoenaed  during  a 
federal  criminal  proceeding,  United  States  v.  Burr,  25  F. 
Cas. 30 (No. 14,692d) (CC Va. 1807) (Marshall, Cir. J.), and
earlier today we extended that ruling to state criminal pro-
ceedings, Trump v. Vance, ante, p. ___.  Nearly fifty years 
ago,  we  held  that  a  federal  prosecutor  could  obtain  infor-
mation  from  a  President  despite  assertions  of  executive 
privilege, United States v. Nixon, 418 U. S. 683 (1974), and 
more recently we ruled that a private litigant could subject 
a President to a damages suit and appropriate discovery ob-
ligations  in  federal  court,  Clinton  v.  Jones,  520  U. S.  681 
(1997).

This case is different.  Here the President’s information 
is sought not by prosecutors or private parties in connection 
with a particular judicial proceeding, but by committees of
Congress  that  have  set  forth  broad  legislative  objectives. 
Congress and the President—the two political branches es-
tablished  by  the  Constitution—have  an  ongoing  relation-
ship that the Framers intended to feature both rivalry and
reciprocity.  See The Federalist No. 51, p. 349 (J. Cooke ed.
1961) (J. Madison); Youngstown Sheet & Tube Co. v. Saw-
yer,  343  U. S.  579,  635  (1952)  (Jackson,  J.,  concurring).
That distinctive aspect necessarily informs our analysis of 
the question before us. 

I 
A 
Each of the three committees sought overlapping sets of