Representative Cushman urges subpoenas, body cameras and moving investigations to law enforcement

Representative Leah Cushman presented a detailed set of recommendations to the special committee and explained the constitutional basis for legislative enforcement powers. Cushman noted that her cease-and-desist email asking DCYF to stop "internal tribunals" and to put allegations into court was an attempt to protect due process and that she had not used threatening language.

Cushman argued the House and its committees already possess coercive powers under parliamentary law and the New Hampshire constitution and suggested the committee report could recommend giving future committees explicit subpoena and warrant authority so they could compel testimony and documents without sending every request to the full House. "When a witness lawfully summoned refuses to appear, a warrant may be issued to compel the witness's attendance," she said, citing Mason's-style parliamentary rules she read into the record.

She proposed specific reforms including: requiring body cameras (or similar exculpatory-record procedures) for social workers subject to exculpatory evidence rules; rewriting statutory language inserted with SB 417 that she said creates vague fitness tests and can unfairly weigh compliance; moving criminal child-abuse investigations to law enforcement and reserving DCYF for voluntary services, kinship placement and family therapy; and ensuring prosecution funding flows from the state budget rather than federally incentivized programs.

Cushman urged legislative tools to hold administrators accountable — including bills of address for named state employees — and stronger protections and pathways for whistleblowers. The committee thanked Cushman for laying out the statutory and procedural options and requested copies of her recommendations and any draft language for further review.