The Jan. 6 Committee is taking its most serious step to enforce a subpoena, kicking off the process to hold former Trump adviser Stephen Bannon in criminal contempt of Congress for withholding information that it describes as “central to its investigative process.”

But that process, even if Bannon is successfully prosecuted and jailed, still wouldn’t force him to disclose the information, legal experts say. And a Trump lawsuit filed Monday means the committee’s request for documents from inside the White House and administration might go unfulfilled as the case winds its way through the court system, potentially to the Supreme Court…

Civil enforcement of subpoenas is another route through which a committee can bring a civil lawsuit, and, if successful, a court would order disclosure of the information sought by the subpoena, according to CRS. But that has time constraints as well.

“It’s not as if the civil route is any quicker. It’s just, at the end of the day, you have a court order, potentially. … But that’s subject to appeal as well. The McGahn case went on for two years,” Brand said, referring to the congressional subpoena battle between Democrats and Don McGahn, who was White House counsel under Trump.