Michael Flynn sued the committee Jan. 6 in an attempt to dismiss the subpoenas

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Former national security adviser Michael Flynn sued the House committee investigating the riot on Jan. 6, saying its subpoenas violated his right to free speech and his right against self-exploitation.

“Without the intervention of this Court, General Flynn faces the damages of being irrevocable and illegally compelled to produce information and testimony that violates the law and his constitutional rights,” the lawsuit, filed in federal court in Florida, where Flynn lives.

In a letter to Flynn last month, Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., The chairman of the committee, that the panel wanted to ask him about a meeting he had with former President Donald Trump and others at the Oval Office in December 2020. During the meeting, the letter said, “discussed of participants seizing voting machines, declaring a national emergency, exercising certain national security emergency powers, and continuing to spread the message that the November 2020 election was tainted by widespread fraud. “

The letter mentioned that Flynn, a retired Army lieutenant general who briefly served as Trump’s national security adviser, made similar suggestions in an interview with Newsmax a day before the meeting.

Flynn’s lawsuit makes many of the same arguments put forward by other Trump allies to challenge their subpoenas, including former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and radio host Alex Jones. It defended that the House committee had no power to issue subpoenas because it did not have enough Republican members and because it lacked the necessary “legislative intent” – an argument already dropped by the federal appeals court in Washington, DC. .

The nine -member House panel consists of two Republicans and seven Democrats.

Flynn’s attorney argued in the lawsuit Tuesday that Flynn had nothing to do with the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol and accused the committee of overreaching to its subpoenas. The suit says the panel made “a wide range of document requests relating to his activity in the 1st Amendment as a private citizen, including the basis of his political beliefs, what he informed about his political beliefs, and to whom he communicated those political beliefs. “

The House committee did not respond to a request for comment.

It argues that the committee also violates Flynn’s Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination by soliciting documents involving a nonprofit organization founded by former Trump attorney Sidney Powell, of which Flynn is the interim director. The Justice Department is investigating the group, called Defending the Republic, the suit said.

“Encouraging General Flynn to produce the types of records specified in the Subpoena would violate General Flynn’s 5th Amendment privilege against self-aggregation until the admissions that there are certain records, that they are in his possession, and that they really can be used. as evidence against him in the aforementioned criminal investigation, “the suit said.

The Justice Department declined to comment.

Flynn’s case went on to say he was concerned he could face a criminal contempt charge if he did not cooperate with the Jan. 6 panel.

“General Flynn was caught between alternatives that both threatened criminal prosecution by the Department of Justice, either an ongoing criminal investigation, or a new prosecution for contempt in Congress,” the suit said. .

The Justice Department has prosecuted Flynn previously. He pleaded guilty to lying to federal agents about his conversation with a Russian diplomat when he was cooperating with former special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election. He later stopped cooperating and sought to withdraw the guilty plea. Trump gave him a full pardon last year.

The suit filed Tuesday says Flynn “famously led a perjury trap” by the FBI.

Dareh Gregorian is a political reporter for NBC News.

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