As House Oversight and Government Reform Chairman Darrell Issa (R-Calif.) expands his investigation into the Department of Energy's controversial loan guarantee program, his Democratic counterpart this morning protested what he called Issa's "abusive" tactics, including the use of armed U.S. Marshals to serve subpoenas at agency headquarters.

Panel ranking member Elijah Cummings (D-Md.) today expressed his outrage in a harshly worded letter to Issa that accuses the chairman of being more concerned with generating press ahead of the November election than with conducting a responsible investigation.

Last week, while Democrats were busy with their presidential nominating convention in Charlotte, N.C., Issa issued a dozen subpoenas to current and former DOE employees and contractors for the agency.

Cummings' letter notes that among those targeted were Brandon Hurlbut, who serves as chief of staff to Energy Secretary Steven Chu, and Morgan Wright, the director of strategic initiatives in DOE's Loan Programs Office.

"Had you consulted me ... I would have strongly opposed sending four armed U.S. Marshals into the Department of Energy to physically serve the subpoenas," Cummings wrote. "There was absolutely no reason for this type of intimidation since the Department would have accepted the subpoenas by email, as it has done routinely in the past, including with our Committee."

Cummings also charged that Republican committee staff members tried to intimidate DOE employees with phone calls "threatening references to U.S. Marshals coming to their homes to serve subpoenas."

In addition to 10 document subpoenas, depositions were ordered for Hurlbut and Wright and scheduled for Wednesday and Thursday of this week, an action that the ranking member protested because he had not been consulted on those or any of the subpoenas.

Issa "violated Committee Rules that require the Chairman to consult with the Ranking Member prior to ordering depositions. I believe these subpoenas are invalid and that no depositions may go forward unless Committee Rules are followed and deficiencies in these orders are remedied," Cummings wrote.

In addition, Cummings said all of the subpoenas issued last week, including the 10 document subpoenas, "were inconsistent with the commitment you made at the Committee's first organizing meeting last year to consult with me prior to issuing subpoenas."

While the House Energy and Commerce Committee has been investigating the loan program as it relates specifically to the failed Solyndra solar energy company for more than 18 months, Issa's panel has been conducting a separate inquiry into the broader DOE program and its more than two dozen other loans.

Issa's probe reached a boiling point in March when Chu appeared before the Oversight Committee to testify about his deployment of stimulus funding, billions of which went to fund green energy projects through the loan program.

Since then, the committee has brought in CEOs of various companies that received loans to testify about the DOE program and has repeatedly charged that the White House used the green energy effort to reward political supporters.

During one of those hearings, Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), who chaired the Subcommittee on Regulatory Affairs, Stimulus Oversight and Government Spending hearing, said emails from BrightSource Energy Inc. CEO John Woolard show that the company got direct political help from the highest levels of the Obama administration.

Committee Republicans have noted that 15 months before the $1.6 billion BrightSource loan was finalized, Woolard emailed Matt Rogers, who was then DOE's top adviser on the administration of stimulus funds, to complain about the challenges involved in getting projects through the loan guarantee program pipeline.

"Things are not good and there is a sizeable group of private equity and investment banks writing a letter to [Energy Secretary Steven] Chu about the status of the program and the inability to get loans through," Woolard wrote.

Rogers replied that he appreciated the heads-up and was "working it on this end."

"If that's not political influence, I don't know what is," Jordan said during the May hearing (Greenwire, May 16).

Issa said at the time that he intended to invite Chu back before the committee to clarify the testimony he gave about the program in March.

More recently, Issa and Jordan appear to have been more concerned about whether DOE employees used private emails when conducting official business, a tactic they say could be used to hide overtly political communications from agency record retention systems (E&ENews PM, July 12).

Throughout the Oversight and Government Reform Committee and Energy and Commerce Committee probes, DOE and White House officials have maintained that all decisions regarding individual loans were made on the merits by career staffers and that politics did not play a role.

Yesterday morning, Cummings said that Issa has so far produced no evidence to support his claim of a "broad scandal" in the program.

"Nevertheless, it appears that the Committee is expanding and escalating its efforts directly ahead of the November election," Cummings wrote. "Although I strongly support the Committee's authority and respect your prerogatives as Chairman, I believe it is my responsibility to make my concerns known when Committee Rules are not honored, and when the exercise of the Committee's authority is intimidating, excessive, or abusive to federal employees and contractors serving their country."