If the high court sides with Starbucks, it could make it tougher for the agency to step in when it alleges corporate interference in unionization efforts.
A dozen defecting Republicans joined Senate Democrats on the joint resolution Thursday, which capped a week of confrontation with the White House as both parties in Congress strained to exert their power in new ways.
It has long looked like the Republican-run Senate would join the Democratic-led House in voting to block President Donald Trump's border emergency. That would set up the first veto of Trump's presidency. But there have been signs that opposition by a few GOP mavericks is softening.
Committee Chairman Jerrold Nadler said that the document requests, with responses to most due by March 18, are a way to "begin building the public record" and that the committee has the responsibility to investigate and hold public hearings.
President Donald Trump has declared a national emergency along the southern border to fund his proposed wall, and he plans to use Defense Department funds from military construction and counter-drug programs to pay for it. Members of Congress are challenging that.
Enough Republicans are chewing over whether to support Trump's plan to create suspense about the vote and how the issue will play in the 2020 elections.
In an unusual joint statement, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., said such a declaration would be "a lawless act, a gross abuse of the power of the presidency and a desperate attempt to distract" from Trump's failure to force Mexico to pay for the wall, as he's repeatedly promised for years.
Defense Secretary Jim Mattis on Saturday took aim at Russian President Vladimir Putin, accusing him of trying to "muck around" in the U.S. midterm elections, of duplicity in arms control and of acting irresponsibly in last weekend's naval confrontation with Ukraine.