THE House Committee on Judiciary and Governmental Operations will ask the House speaker to refer Gov. Ralph DLG Torres to the Office of the Attorney General for contempt if he fails to appear before the panel at 10:30 a.m. on Tuesday, Dec. 14, Rep. Tina Sablan said. The governor, she added, should answer questions pertaining to his “shameful waste of public funds.”
Tina Sablan
Chaired by Rep. Celina Babauta, the committee met on Monday to discuss what transpired on Friday. The governor was scheduled to appear before the committee but he invoked his executive privilege through his legal counsel, Gil Birnbrich.
Babauta said when Department of Public Safety Commissioner Robert Guerrero appeared before the committee on Friday, the governor sent his chief of staff, Wil Castro, to deliver a letter to Guerrero’s counsel, Anthony Aguon, “invoking” the governor’s “immunity over the DPS commissioner.”
Babauta said the governor’s letter to Guerrero “basically translates to nothing more than a gag order” over the DPS commissioner.
Rep. Tina Sablan, for her part, noted that the governor “has repeatedly said that he has nothing to hide.”
She said the governor has “all but dared the committee to subpoena him” so he can “explain his shameful waste of public funds, and even worse his abuse of the people’s trust.”
However, she added, when the committee subpoenaed the governor to appear and testify under oath on Friday, he failed to do so.
Instead of following the Constitution and the law, Sablan said the governor preferred to release “misleading” videos and has refused to testify under oath.
Sablan said the governor’s actions speak louder than his words.
She said the committee has been “patient and reasonable, and has made every effort to engage in accommodation and negotiation out of respect for other branches of the government.”
But the governor has spurned the committee’s efforts to conduct “reasonable negotiations.”
She said the governor “and his team of taxpayer-paid lawyers have repeatedly raised objections without legal merit. They have created unnecessary delays and instead of negotiating in good faith, they have offered insulting ultimatums.”
“Make no mistake,” she added. “The governor’s actions have consequences. The committee has informed the governor that he can cure himself of contempt if he appears in the chamber and testifies under oath at 10:30 a.m. on Tuesday, Dec. 14, 2021. If the governor fails to cure his contempt he alone will be responsible. And we will refer his contempt violation to the attorney general for prosecution,” Sablan said.
