Throughout President Donald Trump’s second term, Democratic lawmakers in the Republican-controlled Congress have been frustrated in their efforts to investigate what they see as rampant corruption and abuse of power in the White House. That will change if, as polls suggest, the Democratic Party wins one or both chambers of Congress in Tuesday’s midterm elections, securing broad powers to launch probes and hold hearings into the conduct of administration officials. Live coverageVoters head to the polls for election that could upend Trump presidency Democrats have long pointed to multiple ethical concerns and conflicts of interest during Trump’s second term, in which the personal wealth of the president and his family has ballooned.
In the run-up to the November vote, senior Democrats have made no secret of their plans to go after the Trump administration’s policies, the conduct of its personnel, and ties between government officials and private corporations that have sought to wield influence with the White House. A Democratic majority in either the House or the Senate would be armed with control of committees, bigger budgets and staff, and subpoena powers that could compel the Trump administration to be responsive to Congress. Trump family’s business dealings and broader allegations of corporate corruption will be a top priority for California Representative Robert Garcia, who is set to lead the powerful House Oversight Committee if Democrats win the chamber.
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Garcia has published a tracker of how Trump and his family have profited during his second term. He recently told the Washington Post, “there’s so much corruption and grift that it’s going to take the entire House on the Democratic side to do investigations appropriately”. Democrats have already requested information on the business dealings of Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, citing his dual roles as an informal foreign policy adviser to the president and the head of a private equity firm that does business with foreign governments.
They are also pushing for investigations into the Trump family’s massive investments in the crypto industry and whether crypto investments provided an avenue for foreign interests to influence the president. Representative Robert Garcia, the top Democrat on the House Oversight Committee, displays a family photo of Lorenzo Salgado Araujo, who was shot and killed in Houston by an ICE agent while driving to work in 2025. © J. Scott Applewhite, AP Trump's ties to disgraced financier Jeffrey Epstein will also be a focus of Democratic lawmakers, who are pushing for an investigation into whether the Justice Department violated the Epstein Files Transparency Act by withholding or improperly redacting documents.
Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who would return to the role of majority leader if Democrats capture the Senate, has already laid the groundwork by creating a special Senate working group in February to plumb Epstein-related information held back from the public by the Trump Justice Department. As they pursue the Republican administration, Democrats will be aware that they must balance their desire to inflict retribution on Trump with the need to address the immediate concerns of US voters angered by surging prices. We just have to be thoughtful and strategic about where investigative work goes and not allow that to distract us from solving fairly immediate cost problems that American families feel,” Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, a likely chair of the powerful Senate Judiciary Committee if Democrats capture the chamber, told The Hill on the eve of the vote.
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