House Republicans are preparing to subpoena the State Department for documents about the suspension of Robert Malley — and compel testimony from the former Iran special envoy after his security clearance was quietly revoked earlier this year.
The House Oversight Committee is requesting information and a personal interview with Malley to determine the circumstances under which he was placed on unpaid leave, a panel spokesman confirmed to The Post.
The Oversight Committee is also asking for information about a security clearance granted to one of Malley’s advisers, Ariane Tabatabai, who participated in a program with Tehran’s Foreign Ministry to influence nuclear negotiations with the US, according to leaked documents.
Oversight Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) may also subpoena Tabatabai as part of the committee’s probe.
A senior aide on the GOP-led committee told Semafor, which first reported on the expected subpoena, that lawmakers have been unable to learn much about Malley’s ouster, even after the FBI opened an investigation into the envoy’s conduct.
A State Department spokesperson told The Post that the agency does not comment on congressional correspondence as a general matter and declined to share further details “due to privacy considerations,” confirming only that Malley “remains on leave.”
House Republicans are preparing to subpoena the State Department for documents about the suspension of Robert Malley. AFP via Getty Images
Oversight Chairman James Comer (R-Ky.) may also subpoena Tabatabai as part of the committee’s probe. Getty ImagesMatthew Miller, the department’s spokesman, told reporters in response to a question during his Sept. 26 briefing that lawmakers had “been briefed adequately” on the matter.
“Do we really have to go to these lengths? Can’t they say this isn’t true?” a Republican senior aide told The Post Monday. “I find this administration to be very quick to deny those accusations that they find ridiculous. I guess this one’s not so ridiculous.”
The request for documents follows a Wall Street Journal report that Iran helped Hamas plan its Oct. 7 terror attack that slaughtered more than 1,300 people in southern Israel, including women and children as well as at least 29 American citizens.
In the largest offensive against the Jewish state since the 1973 Yom Kippur War, Hamas terrorists launched thousands of rockets and a multi-front invasion from the Gaza Strip.
Malley also served as a Middle East foreign policy adviser under former President Barack Obama — but was briefly dropped from the latter’s 2008 campaign for being in talks with Hamas. Anadolu Agency via Getty ImagesThe jihadists took 199 hostages back into the Hamas-controlled territory after paragliding into an Israeli music festival to brutalize citizens and carrying out a campaign of carnage against families at kibbutzim near the Gaza border.
President Biden spoke Friday with the families of at least 14 Americans who remain missing, some of whom are confirmed to be hostages.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared war on Hamas following the attack, launching airstrikes ahead of an anticipated ground invasion while jihadists prevent citizens from fleeing the territory.
Israel has also ordered all civilians to evacuate the northern part of Gaza and make their way south.
In the largest offensive against Israel since the 1973 Yom Kippur War, Hamas terrorists launched thousands of rockets and a multi-front invasion from the Gaza Strip on Oct. 7. APRep. Darrell Issa (R-Calif.), a member of the House panel, told The Post last week that Malley deserved “extensive scrutiny” for any policy decisions he made that may have allowed for the bloodshed.
“Rob Malley deserves extensive scrutiny — yesterday, today and tomorrow,” Issa said of the report that Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps coordinated and signed off on the atrocities.
“These reports could not be more concerning, and they hint at what could be the worst State Department scandal since Alger Hiss,” he added, referring to the US government official accused of spying for the Soviet Union in the 1930s.
Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian met with Hamas’ political bureau chief Ismail Haniyeh in Doha, Qatar, on Oct. 14. Iranian Foreign Ministry/AFP via Getty ImagesMalley also served as a Middle East foreign policy adviser under former Presidents Bill Clinton and Barack Obama — but was briefly dropped from the latter’s 2008 campaign for being in talks with Hamas, the New York Times reported.
He was also an architect of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, which briefly waived some sanctions on Iran but was abandoned three years later by President Donald Trump.
Tabatabai, an adjunct professor at Georgetown University and the daughter of an Iranian academic, was one of three advisers who sought advice from the Iran Experts Initiative, an influence project begun under then-Iranian President Hassan Rouhani, Semafor previously reported.
Along with two other academics, Mostafa Zahrani and Dina Esfandiary, Tabatabai wrote op-eds and advocated for the US to sign the nuclear deal, known as the Joint Plan of Comprehensive Action, which reduced Tehran’s uranium enrichment in exchange for sanctions relief.
The five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council — China, France, Russia, the UK and US, as well as Germany — all signed onto the agreement before the Trump administration withdrew in May 2018.
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared war on Hamas following the offensive, killing at least 1,500 Hamas terrorists. AFP via Getty ImagesTabatabai currently serves in the Pentagon as chief of staff for the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations, Christopher Maier, for which she has a security clearance.
Esfandiary serves as a senior adviser on the Middle East and North Africa at the International Crisis Group, a think tank that Malley ran from 2018 to 2021. Zahrani works at the Tehran-based think tank the Institute for Political and International Studies.
Congressional Republicans and foreign policy hawks have criticized the Biden administration for having a “permissive” stance toward Iran that has allowed tens of billions of dollars to flow to Tehran-affiliated terrorist groups such as Hamas and Hezbollah.
They have taken particular issue with the recent unfreezing of $6 billion in Iranian assets as part of a prisoner exchange made last month.
Israel Defense Forces have also launched airstrikes that have killed at least 2,750 Palestinians, according to Gaza’s health ministry, as jihadists have prevented citizens from fleeing the territory. AFP via Getty ImagesWhite House national security adviser Jake Sullivan declined to confirm Tehran’s involvement in the bloodshed during a briefing last week but said Iran was “complicit” given its large “funding for the military wing of Hamas.”
National Security Council spokesman John Kirby has also said that the $6 billion set aside for Iran has not been accessed yet.
Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir Abdollahian met Saturday with Hamas’ political chief Ismail Haniyeh in Doha, Qatar, where the terrorist group’s leadership has been holed up for more than a decade.
“President Biden’s weakness on the world stage has emboldened the Iranian regime and the disastrous policies pushed by his administration have led to turmoil and chaos in the region,” Comer said in a statement. “Not only has the Biden Administration negotiated with Iran in secret, but this President has failed to be transparent with Congress or the American people about these negotiations.
“The Biden administration’s foreign policy decisions regarding Iran, including promoting officials with sympathetic views of the Iranian regime, continue to defy logic and are making Americans less safe at home and abroad. All options are on the table to provide Americans with what the Biden administration refuses to: transparency and answers.”






