Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, joined by Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations Chairman Ron Johnson and more than a dozen Republican colleagues, have pressed Verizon Communications for detailed answers regarding its handling of subpoenas issued during former Special Counsel Jack Smith’s Arctic Frost investigation.
In a letter dated July 30, 2026, to Verizon CEO Daniel Schulman, the senators expressed ongoing concerns not only about alleged abuses of power by federal actors, but, specifically, Verizon’s disclosure of senators’ phone toll records pursuant to a May 25, 2023, subpoena and its failure to inform affected members of Congress.
This is a continuation of a multi-year congressional examination of the Special Counsel’s investigative methods.
Arctic Frost was a “politically weaponized” FBI/DOJ investigation launched in April 2022 under the Biden administration, aimed at targeting President Trump, his allies, and the broader Republican political apparatus under the pretext of probing 2020 election-related conduct. The probe was driven by anti-Trump agents, led by then-Assistant Special Agent in Charge Timothy Thibault, and received explicit high-level approval from Attorney General Merrick Garland, Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, and FBI Director Christopher Wray.
Both Grassley and Johnson have described Arctic Frost as “worse than Watergate,” an abuse of power, and evidence of the Biden-era Justice Department and FBI being turned against political opponents.
In October 2025, their investigation revealed that Smith’s team cast a wide net, issuing numerous subpoenas for phone records of Republican lawmakers, staff, and hundreds of aligned individuals and organizations.
According to their report, Verizon complied with several such requests, including ones tied to senators such as Rick Scott, Josh Hawley, Marsha Blackburn, Lindsey Graham, and others, while at least one other carrier pushed back in certain instances.
Both subpoenas were immediately accompanied by a gag order signed by Judge James Boasberg, an Obama appointee.
The latest letter focuses on a specific omission.
Despite a May 22, 2022 Senate contract that required Verizon to notify the Sergeant at Arms of any subpoena targeting member office lines, the company did not do so for the May 2023 Arctic Frost subpoena.
In October 2023, Grassley had asked Verizon to identify all Justice Department or federal law enforcement requests involving Senate devices dating back to 2016.
Verizon’s response did not list the May 2023 Arctic Frost subpoena that included Senate Sergeant at Arms lines associated with members. In its October 24, 2025 letter to Chairman Grassley, Verizon stated that the May 25, 2023 subpoena “was not on that list, even though two numbers that are SAA lines were included in the subpoena. This was a mistake due to human error recently discovered while researching the May 25, 2023 subpoena.”
Grassley and colleagues have demanded a full timeline of Verizon’s handling of the May 2023 subpoena, the number of senator accounts involved, why earlier responses were incomplete, what corrective steps have been taken, and whether the company’s legal or compliance teams flagged the Senate notification requirement.
Verizon has said it complied with valid legal process and blamed any disclosure gaps on administrative issues, not concealment, while later noting system upgrades. The senators’ July 30 letter still calls the matter unresolved and demands a full accounting before the August recess.
