Democrats Denounce Contempt Move Aimed at Holder Democrats on the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee on Thursday struck back at the committee majority's threat to find Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. in contempt of Congress for refusing to comply with a subpoena, saying that Republicans on the panel were acting out of partisan spite and that their maneuver was legally deficient. The committee's Republican chairman, Representative Darrell Issa of California, has been engaged in a prolonged struggle with Mr. Holder over documents involving the Justice Department's handling of a gun operation over the border with Mexico, known as Fast and Furious. "Holding the attorney general in contempt of Congress for protecting these documents is an extreme and blatant abuse of the Congressional contempt power that undermines the credibility of the committee," a staff memo released by the committee's Democrats said. In the 13-page memo, the Democrats said it would be a violation of federal law for Mr. Holder to provide the documents, because many of them are from grand jury testimony and are part of the Justice Department's continuing prosecutions. The memo said that Mr. Issa's threat to move ahead with a contempt citation exposed "the committee's action as a politically motivated, election year witch hunt rather than a legitimate exercise of Congressional oversight designed to develop reform measures to combat the flow of illegal guns." Mr. Issa has scheduled a committee vote for Wednesday on the question of contempt. The investigation into Fast and Furious arose after Arizona-based agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives did not intercept illegally purchased guns in an attempt to build a bigger case.