In late September, Republican U.S. Sen. John Curtis called for an investigation into President Donald Trump’s son. He pushed for his colleagues in Congress to look into whether Donald Trump Jr. had used his proximity to the presidency for financial gain — a request that went nowhere.

But with Democrats now set to control Congress, it could pick up traction.

“My position hasn’t changed,” Curtis said in a statement to The Salt Lake Tribune Friday. “Congress has a responsibility to examine whether presidential family members are using their access for personal financial gain, regardless of party.”

The incoming Democratic chair of the powerful House Oversight Committee has set four investigative priorities: “the Trump Crime Family, corporate corruption, DHS and ICE abuses, and the cover-up of the Epstein files,” he wrote in a Tuesday statement.

It is a wide-ranging plan that also raises the question of whether any Utahns could find themselves the subject of congressional investigation.

While the Oversight committee does not historically investigate lawmakers themselves, Democrats have already signaled some potential candidates, including Utahns who received or were connected to Trump’s steady flow of pardons, such as auto company founder, convicted fraudster and Trump donor Trevor Milton.

Democrats are “looking at everybody along the assembly line of clemency for cash,” U.S. Rep. Jamie Raskin, a Maryland Democrat and ranking member of the House Judiciary Committee, said in September.

But how effective the new round of investigations will be remains an open question.

“A subpoena or compulsion for witness testimony is only as good as your ability to enforce it,” said former U.S. Rep. Jason Chaffetz, a Republican who chaired the House Oversight Committee from 2014 to 2017.

“I issued dozens of subpoenas,” Chaffetz said in an interview Thursday. “I was investigating the Obama administration and had to go to the Obama administration to get them to enforce it, and they wouldn’t do it. That standard and precedent will come back to haunt the Democrats.”

Presidential connections

In late September, Republican U.S. Sen. John Curtis called for an investigation into President Donald Trump’s son. He pushed for his colleagues in Congress to look into whether Donald Trump Jr. had used his proximity to the presidency for financial gain — a request that went nowhere.

Now, with Democrats vowing to look into Trump family dealings, Curtis’s push could pick up traction.

“My position hasn’t changed,” Curtis said in a statement to The Salt Lake Tribune on Friday. “Congress has a responsibility to examine whether presidential family members are using their access for personal financial gain, regardless of party.”

Curtis has also called for continuing investigations into former President Joe Biden’s son Hunter Biden, he noted in his statement. Hunter Biden has also been the subject of congressional investigations regarding whether he used his father’s position for personal gain.

Lawmakers, Curtis said in September, “nearly wore out the subpoena machine investigating Hunter Biden’s foreign relationships” and, he said, “they shouldn’t unplug it now.”

But that same scrutiny hasn’t been applied to Trump Jr., Curtis said, linking it to why Republicans suffered such extreme losses in the midterm elections.

“Any investigation should follow the facts and focus on restoring public trust,” he said in the Friday statement. “That’s one of the many reasons Americans voted the way they did on Tuesday.”

Claire Leavitt, a Smith College professor with a focus on government oversight, noted in an interview Friday that the Oversight Committee has broad responsibilities and abilities.

“They can really investigate anything they want,” she said, adding that while all congressional committees have subpoena power, most are hemmed in by their jurisdiction. “What makes House Oversight and Reform different is that they have a jurisdiction that’s completely wide open.”

That means, she said, that Democratic lawmakers could take up almost any issue they like, both in the public and private sectors. She noted that when Democrats took control of Congress in 2019, one of their first hearings was on the high price of pharmaceuticals.

“It was intended to send a message like, ‘Yes, we’re going to investigate Trump, but also we’re going to investigate the problems that besiege Americans,’ and a lot of those problems require looking at the private sector,” Leavitt said. “I think you’ll see that in 2027.”

Pardon power

Leavitt said she expects the committee will make the question of possible corruption in the Trump administration a top priority. That could include giving government contracts to friends and donors, as well as pardons the president has issued while in office.

Among them could be pardons issued to several Utahns, including Milton. In May, Democrats sent a letter to Milton raising questions about his donations to the president.

“Public reporting has raised questions about certain pardons issued by President Donald Trump, including yours,” the letter read. “These reports suggest that some individuals may have received favorable consideration from President Trump or his advisors through intermediaries, financial contributions, or other forms of influence.”

“If true,” they wrote, “these allegations raise legitimate concerns that improper considerations, including quid pro quo or ‘pay-to-play’ dynamics, may have affected the clemency process.”

Similarly, lawmakers have promised to investigate all of Trump’s January 6 pardons, citing concerns about taxpayers being left on the hook to pay for damages caused by the Trump-allied rioters. Among them were 18 Utahns who participated in the January 6 riots and were pardoned by the president.

And though he hasn’t been named directly by lawmakers, another Utahn, Brett Tolman, could also be caught up in the sweeping investigations, as Tolman, a former U.S. attorney who has worked to secure dozens of pardons directly from Trump.

Raskin objected in September: “They’ve basically converted the president’s pardon power into a for-profit industry,” he said at the time.

Both Chaffetz and Leavitt said they think it is likely the president will not comply with investigations, and that lawmakers will have little power to force him to do so.

But, Leavitt said, the public spectacle of the investigations could still be a boon for Democrats even without the president’s compliance.

“Research tells us that public hearings, public investigative hearings, have the capacity to diminish the president’s approval rating, even if they’re not getting new information from the administration,” she said. “They can still draw negative attention to the administration that may hurt Trump.”