Former Trump adviser Stephen Miller sues January 6 select committee over subpoena for phone records
Washington — Stephen Miller, who served as a senior adviser to former President Donald Trump, is suing the House select committee investigating the January 6 assault on the U.S. Capitol in an effort to block enforcement of a subpoena for his cell phone records.
Miller's complaint, filed with the federal district court in Washington on Wednesday, states T-Mobile was served with the subpoena on February 22 for subscriber information and records of phone calls and text messages from November 1, 2020, to January 31, 2021, for the phone number assigned to Miller's cell phone.
Miller's phone is part of a family plan account with his parents that is held by Carron Drive Apartments LP, a California limited partnership formed in August 1997, according to his suit. T-Mobile notified Carron Drive at the end of February it had been served with the subpoena from the House panel for Miller's phone information and intends to comply unless Carron Drive sought a court order to block it from turning over the records to investigators.
"Carron Drive and Mr. Miller have filed this complaint to obtain this court's protection from the select committee's intrusive and unjustified attempt to violate the privacy rights that Mr. Miller and, potentially, the other members of the Miller family have under the Family Plan Account," he said in his suit.
Miller claimed the House panel lacks the authority to obtain his phone records and called the subpoena "overly broad." The request, he continued, "seeks information that is unrelated to the purposes whereby Congress established the select committee" and violates his First and Fourth Amendment rights.
The former Trump adviser argued he used his cell phone for "personal and business communications" during the three-month span identified in the subpoena, including to consult with medical professionals regarding "serious medical complications that his wife and baby daughter experienced before and after his daughter was born" in November 2020.
"These medical consultations involved sensitive, private matters that are entirely irrelevant to the work of the Select Committee," he said.
Miller also told the court that several members of the plan account are attorneys who use their phones for privileged calls and text messages with clients.
"The chairman and the select committee are misusing their authority to investigate political adversaries, painting their opposition with a broad brush as insurrectionists and domestic terrorists," he argued. "The select committee cannot demonstrate a compelling justification that would justify this intrusion."
Miller joins a group of people close to Trump whose phone records have been sought by the House select committee and who have filed lawsuits to block subpoenas to their phone providers. In January, Sebastian Gorka, a conservative radio host and ally of Trump sued the panel to stop Verizon from handing over his phone records, and in February, longtime Trump loyalist Roger Stone filed a lawsuit to prevent AT&T from complying with a subpoena for his phone data.
The House panel has continued with its investigation into the events surrounding the January 6 assault amid the litigation. A committee aide told CBS News that investigators have conducted nearly 700 depositions and interviews and received more than 80,000 documents. The committee is also following up on more than 425 tips it received.
