Verizon said Tuesday that it will implement new safeguards to ensure top-level review before complying with subpoenas that target members of Congress after acknowledging it had secretly provided the call records of Republican lawmakers to the Justice Department as part of the sprawling Arctic Frost investigation that served as the foundation for the federal indictment of President Donald Trump.
“In 2023 Verizon was ordered to turn over call records for certain members of Congress to the Department of Justice. The Special Counsel and DOJ at the time decided who to target,” Verizon spokesman Kevin Israel told the Washington Examiner, referring to former special counsel Jack Smith and the Biden administration. “A court ordered Verizon not to tell anyone about that. We had no choice but to comply with the court order. So we did.”
The announcement from the telecommunications giant came as House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-OH) on Tuesday launched a separate investigation into how Verizon and AT&T responded to the Arctic Frost subpoenas and the court-ordered nondisclosures that prevented Congress from learning about them.
#NEWS: @Jim_Jordan launches probe into @ATT & @Verizon’s responses to Jack Smith’s partisan investigation. pic.twitter.com/tPqg38wfE6
— House Judiciary GOP 🇺🇸🇺🇸🇺🇸 (@JudiciaryGOP) November 4, 2025
“We’re now actively working with Chairman Jordan and relevant Senate committees on implementing a rigorous new protocol for subpoenas involving congressional members, requiring escalation to a senior Verizon leader prior to us taking any action,” Israel said.
Jordan wrote letters to both companies stating that the committee is requesting documents and communications related to their respective handling of the records sought by Smith, who inherited the investigation’s findings and ultimately used them to bolster his cases against Trump regarding Jan. 6 and the 2020 election.
“Recently released internal DOJ documents indicate that former Special Counsel Jack Smith compelled the production of phone records belonging to several Republican Members of Congress and simultaneously sought a gag order to prevent your company from disclosing the DOJ’s subpoenas,” Jordan wrote to the companies. He warned that the findings raise “serious concerns about potential statutory and constitutional violations, including violations of the Speech or Debate Clause.”
The Arctic Frost operation began in 2022 during the Biden administration, under the direction of Attorney General Merrick Garland, and served as a conduit that fed into Smith’s later prosecution of Trump. Records revealed by whistleblower documents last week showed that investigators issued nearly 200 subpoenas touching more than 400 Republican-linked individuals and organizations.
Jordan’s request follows disclosures from Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley (R-IA), who last week released subpoenas and court orders showing Smith obtained toll data — which include call times and durations, not content — for several Republican senators and Rep. Mike Kelly (R-PA) in 2023, related to their phone use from around Jan. 4 through Jan. 7, 2021.
AT&T confirmed to Grassley that it resisted a similar subpoena involving two lawmakers, prompting prosecutors to abandon the request. Verizon, however, complied with Smith’s subpoenas for 12 phone numbers associated with congressional offices, according to earlier correspondence.
Chief Judge James Boasberg, a D.C. federal judge, approved orders preventing both carriers from notifying the lawmakers. On Tuesday, Rep. Brandon Gill (R-TX) introduced articles of impeachment against Boasberg related to his role in imposing the order.
“Judge Boasberg abused his power by weaponizing the judiciary against critics of the Biden Administration,” Gill wrote in a post on X. “As part of the Arctic Frost Investigation, Boasberg signed off on frivolous nondisclosure orders to conceal the fact that sitting U.S. Senators were being surveilled. Not only was this action egregiously improper; it was a gross violation of the separation of powers.”
‘BIDEN’S WATERGATE’: JACK SMITH SOUGHT 197 SUBPOENAS IN ARCTIC FROST INVESTIGATION
Republicans have been critical of Boasberg for other matters related to his handling of cases in Washington, including a March order that temporarily paused Trump’s migrant deportation flights to El Salvador.
Any impeachment effort against the judge is likely to remain a symbolic gesture, however, as it takes a two-thirds majority vote in the Senate to convict and remove judges from office.
