Republicans on the House Oversight Committee issued a subpoena Thursday to Anthony Bernal, a senior aide to former first lady Jill Biden, as part of their rapidly expanding investigation into former President Joe Biden’s mental fitness while in office.

The subpoena signed by Rep. James Comer of Kentucky, the Republican Oversight chairman, requires Bernal to appear for a deposition on July 16. It came after several weeks of back-and-forth with Bernal’s lawyer over the timing of a voluntary interview.

“Given your close connection with both former President Biden and former First Lady Jill Biden, the Committee sought to understand if you contributed to an effort to hide former President Biden’s fitness to serve from the American people,” the subpoena reads. “To avoid any further delays, your appearance before the Committee is now compelled.”

Bernal is the second former Biden staffer to be subpoenaed by the committee and unlikely to be the last. The committee this week heard voluntary testimony from Neera Tanden, a former director of Biden’s domestic policy counsel, and is intent on securing interviews with several other members of Biden’s inner circle as part of its investigation.

Bernal did not respond Thursday to a message seeking comment.

Trump 2020 election lawyer disbarred

Kenneth Chesebro, a lawyer who helped spearhead a brazen legal effort to use phony slates of pro-Trump electors to overturn the 2020 presidential election, was disbarred in New York on Thursday, cementing an indefinite ban issued last year.

In a seven-page opinion, the court cited a criminal racketeering case centered on the fake electors in Georgia, where in 2023 Chesebro pleaded guilty.

The New York court said Thursday that Chesebro’s “criminal conduct — conspiracy to commit filing false documents — is unquestionably serious” and that he had undercut “the very notion of our constitutional democracy that he, as an attorney, swore an oath to uphold.”

Chesebro, 64, could not be reached for comment, and lawyers who have represented him did not respond to requests for comment.

Feds: Abrego Garcia will be tried in U.S.

The Justice Department said Thursday that it intends to try Kilmar Abrego Garcia on federal smuggling charges in Tennessee before it moves to deport him, addressing fears that he could be expelled again from the U.S. within days.

U.S. Magistrate Judge Barbara Holmes in Nashville, Tenn., recently ruled that Abrego Garcia has a right to be released from jail while awaiting trial on the smuggling charges. But she decided Wednesday to keep him in custody for at least a few more days over concerns that U.S. immigration officials would swiftly detain him and try to deport him again.

But DOJ spokesperson Chad Gilmartin told The Associated Press that Abrego Garcia will first be tried in court on the charges.

Abrego Garcia became a flashpoint over President Donald Trump’s hardline immigration policies when he was mistakenly deported to El Salvador in March.

Facing mounting pressure and a Supreme Court order, the Trump administration returned him this month to face the smuggling charges, which Abrego Garcia’s attorneys characterized as an attempt to justify his erroneous deportation.

— From news services