about matters that arose during his tenure and that relate to his official duties in that capacity." Leahy claimed that President Bush was not involved in the decision to terminate the service of U.S. attorneys. Furthermore, he asserted that the president's executive privilege claims to protect Bolten and Rove were illegal. The senator demanded that Bolten, Rove, Sara Taylor, and J. Scott Jennings comply "immediately" with their subpoenas. This development paved the way for a Senate panel vote on whether to advance the citations to the full Senate. "It is obvious that the reasons given for these firings were contrived as part of a cover-up and that the stonewalling by the White House is part and parcel of that same effort", Leahy concluded. , Rove still claimed executive privilege to avoid a congressional subpoena. Rove's lawyer wrote that his client is "constitutionally immune from compelled congressional testimony." Obama administration On June 20, 2012, President Barack Obama asserted executive privilege to withhold certain Department of Justice documents related to the Operation Fast and Furious controversy ahead of a United States House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform vote to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt of Congress for refusing to produce the documents. Later the same day, the House Committee voted 23–17 along party lines to hold Holder in contempt of Congress over not releasing the documents. House investigation of the SEC Leaders of the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) testified on February 4, 2009, before the United States House Committee on Financial Services subcommittee. The subject of the hearings was why the SEC had failed to act when Harry Markopolos, a private fraud investigator from Boston, alerted the SEC, detailing his persistent and unsuccessful efforts to get the SEC to investigate Bernard Madoff beginning in 1999. One official claimed executive privilege in declining to answer some questions. Trump administration While investigating claims of Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election, the Senate Intelligence Committee subpoenaed former FBI Director James Comey to testify. Comey was fired several weeks before being subpoenaed but had appeared before the committee once before in March while still serving as director. Less than a week before the scheduled hearing, it was reported that President Trump was considering invoking executive privilege to prevent Comey's testimony. According to attorney Page Pate, it seemed unlikely that executive privilege would be applicable, as Trump had publicly spoken about