WASHINGTON, D.C. — The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol attack is now deciding whether to do something unprecedented: subpoena a sitting member of Congress.

It could happen to Rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, after he indicated over the weekend that he will not voluntarily meet with the panel.

Jordan, one of former President Donald Trump's most vocal supporters in Congress, sent the committee a strongly worded letter Sunday night saying it’s “unprecedented…inappropriate…[and] an outrageous abuse” that the panel wants to interview him about his interactions with Trump before, during and after Jan. 6, 2021.

While Jordan didn’t explicitly say he will not cooperate, the committee is taking it that way.

In a statement to Spectrum News on Sunday night, a spokesperson for the panel said, “Mr. Jordan has previously said that he would cooperate with the committee’s investigation, but it now appears that the Trump team has persuaded him to try to hide the facts and circumstances of Jan. 6.”

Jordan’s position on cooperating has evolved.

“If you end up being asked to come testify or [get] subpoenaed before this select committee, will you agree to testify?” Jordan said in an interview with Spectrum News last July. “I mean, look, I got nothing to hide. I got nothing to hide.”

Then in November, Jordan was asked again by Spectrum News, if the committee did reach out and request anything, would he be open to providing it?

“Depends what it is,” Jordan said then. “I mean, I’m not going to answer hypothetical questions, but I just think this is a complete sham what these guys are doing.”

In a letter last month, the committee asked Jordan to voluntarily meet for an interview to discuss, among other things, his communications with Trump on the day of the Capitol attack. The committee cited a July 2021 interview Spectrum News conducted with Jordan where he struggled to answer that question.

“I spoke with him that day, after? I think after? I don’t know if I spoke with him in the morning or not, I just don’t know,” Jordan said at the time. “I’d have to go back and — I don’t know when those conversations happened.”

Pennsylvania Rep. Scott Perry (R) also has indicated he will not cooperate with the committee.

It’s possible the panel may try to subpoena Jordan and Perry, which would be unprecedented. But one legal expert said the committee would have the right to do so.

“The Constitution specifically provides that each chamber may police its own members, which could include certainly testimony in front of a committee. So I don't think that there's a big issue here,” said Professor David Super, a constitutional law scholar at Georgetown Law.

Super said this could be an effort by Jordan to drag the investigation out into 2023, when Republicans may regain control of the House and dissolve the committee. 

But he said if Jordan were subpoenaed, he would not be shielded by the speech protections he cites in his letter.

“The Speech and Debate Clause says that members of Congress shall not be held accountable anywhere else for things that they do as members,” Super said. “Well, this is not anywhere else. This is the chamber of which he is part, so he would not have any legal grounds to fight them.”

If Jordan gets subpoenaed but ignores it, the Justice Department would then have to determine if he could be held in criminal contempt of Congress — a review that would continue even if Republicans take control of the House and dissolve the Jan. 6th Committee.