House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer (R-KY) sent a letter to Bill and Hillary Clinton’s lawyer on Friday, ordering the couple to appear for depositions in which they can answer questions from Congress about the extent of their ties to Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell.

The depositions are scheduled for next month. Former President Bill Clinton will testify first at 10 a.m. on Dec. 17, and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton will testify at 10 a.m. the following day.

Comer initially subpoenaed the Clintons in August regarding the congressional inquiry, but their lawyer argued they should not be required to appear for “live testimony” because the House Oversight Committee should accept “a written proffer of what little information” they have.

Clinton attorney David Kendall cited the committee’s decision to let other subpoenaed officials submit written statements rather than attend depositions. The GOP chairman disagreed with the basis of the attorney’s argument.

“You highlight the fact that the Committee elected to forego deposing other individuals subpoenaed as part of this inquiry,” he wrote in the letter. “However, your assertion conveniently ignores the fact that these individuals affirmed, subject to 18 U.S.C. § 1001, that they lacked any information relevant to the Committee’s investigation or otherwise had serious health issues that prevented their testimony.”

These officials included former Attorney General Jeff Sessions and former FBI Director Robert Mueller, whose family announced in August that he had been diagnosed with Parkinson’s disease four years earlier.

While Kendall contended his clients don’t know any information relevant to the investigation, Comer maintained otherwise.

“Your suggestion that your clients’ testimony would not be relevant to the stated purposes of the Committee’s investigation because the events in question took place outside of the Clintons’ respective official duties, misses the Committee’s point,” the congressman wrote. “It is precisely the fact President Clinton and Secretary Clinton each maintained relationships with Mr. Epstein and Ms. Maxwell in their personal capacities as private citizens that is of interest to the Committee.”

In a statement from the committee, Comer warned the Clintons “would be in defiance of lawful subpoenas” and subject to contempt proceedings in Congress if they further evaded the depositions.

“The Committee looks forward to confirming their appearance and remains committed to delivering transparency and accountability for the survivors of Epstein’s heinous crimes and for the American people,” he said.

House Oversight’s investigation is centered on the federal government’s handling of the Epstein case, with the GOP-led panel releasing more than 65,000 pages of documents from the Department of Justice and the Epstein Estate. Democrats on the committee have been pursuing the same end, but Comer criticized their lack of transparency this week while the House considered a bill that compels the DOJ to release the Epstein files.

“Oversight Committee Republicans have posted 65,000 pages of documents we have received to date. Democrats, by contrast, have released fewer than a dozen,” he said on the House floor. “In their latest selective leak, Democrats released just three of the 23,000 pages of documents from the Epstein Estate and made redactions to two of those emails that changed both the content and the meaning.”

TRUMP SIGNED THE BILL TO RELEASE THE EPSTEIN FILES. WHEN WILL WE SEE THEM?

The legislation ultimately passed the House and Senate before it was signed into law by President Donald Trump, who flipped his stance on the effort to release the Epstein files ahead of the vote.

Trump has repeatedly called the Epstein case a “hoax” because Democrats want to associate him with the late sex trafficker. But last week, the president directed the DOJ to look into several officials linked to Epstein. Bill Clinton and former Treasury Secretary Larry Summers, who has since taken a step back from the public spotlight, were among the names that Trump dropped.

, 2025-11-21 18:08:00, , Washington Examiner, %%https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/wp-content/uploads/2023/11/cropped-favicon.png?w=32, https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/feed/, David Zimmermann