Last month, CREW, with three other organizations, filed a friend of the Court brief in the executive privilege case, Committee on the Judiciary v. Miers.  The lawsuit, brought by the Democrats on the House Judiciary Committee, seeks to "compel Josh Bolten and Harriet Miers to comply with subpoenas issued by the Judiciary Committee as part of its investigation into the firing of U.S. Attorneys."

Our brief, which can be found here [0], contends that "contrary to the defendants' position, the court must exercise jurisdiction over the case to ensure the separation of powers that is at the core of our constitutional scheme."  

The case will be argued today before a Federal District Court Judge [1]: 

House Democrats will get their day in court on Monday as a federal judge hears oral arguments in a groundbreaking lawsuit over the limits of executive privilege.

Irv Nathan, the House general counsel, will present the Judiciary Committee’s case in the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia as the panel seeks to enforce subpoenas to White House Chief of Staff Josh Bolten and former White House Counsel Harriet Miers.

The Judiciary Committee issued subpoenas last year to Bolten and Miers as part of the panel's investigation into the firing of nine U.S. attorneys in 2006. Judiciary Committee Democrats are seeking information from on the White House's role in the firings, but President Bush, asserting executive privilege, has refused to make senior aides available for questioing under oath by congressional investigators or turn over a "privilege log" of documents being withheld.

House lawyers argue that, in refusing to allow Bolten and Miers to even appear before the Judiciary Committee in order to assert executive privilege, the Bush administration is seeking to expand presidential power in a dramatic fashion, one that cannot go unchallenged by Congress.