House Republicans officially signed off on their promised investigation into Democrats' alleged weaponization of the federal government against conservatives on Tuesday.
In a strict party-line vote of 221-211, the Judiciary Committee's select subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government was formed, with Republican congressman Jim Jordan of Ohio slated to be chairman.
"This is about the First Amendment, something you guys used to care about," Jordan directed at Democrats during a floor speech. "And I'd actually hoped we could get bipartisan agreement on protecting the First Amendment – the five rights we enjoy as Americans under the First Amendment."
"We don't want to go after anyone. We just want it to stop. And we want to respect the First Amendment to the Constitution that the greatest country in the world has," he added. "That's what this committee is all about, and that's what we're going to focus on. That's what we are going to do."
According to The New York Times, the subcommittee will have open-end jurisdiction to examine how any federal agency has collected, analyzed, and used information about Americans.
It also reportedly has the authority to obtain sensitive information that is usually the unique territory of the congressional intelligence committees, including covert actions.
Democratic congressman Jim McGovern of Massachusetts compared the panel to the House Un-American Activities Committee created during the Second Red Scare, which targeted individuals suspected of sympathizing with communism.
"I call it the McCarthy committee, and I'm not talking about Kevin; I'm talking about Joe," McGovern said. "This committee is nothing more than a deranged ploy by the MAGA extremists who have hijacked the Republican Party and now want to use taxpayer money to push their far-right conspiracy nonsense."
The House Republicans' new probe follows several supposed whistleblowers approaching Republican lawmakers with allegations of political favoritism in government agencies, notably the case of former agent Timothy Thibault.
It also comes after Elon Musk's "Twitter Files" suggested the FBI provided Twitter with over $3 million to suppress foreign interference in the 2020 presidential election, eventually leading to the platform's suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story.