Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin, under pressure to explain the administration’s controversial move to ease Russia sanctions, is in talks with House Financial Services Chairwoman Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) about appearing before her committee.

Waters called on Mnuchin to testify amid complaints by Democrats that Treasury failed to deliver documents they requested regarding the department’s decision to lift penalties targeting billionaire Russian oligarch Oleg Deripaska, a close ally of President Vladimir Putin.

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Waters and Mnuchin spoke by phone Wednesday and are working to find a “mutually agreeable date” for him to appear before the committee, a Treasury spokesperson said. In the interim, Treasury is in the process of responding to the document request, according to the spokesperson.

Mnuchin had been asked to testify next week but declined.

Waters, who famously shut down Mnuchin in a 2017 committee hearing when she insisted on “reclaiming my time,” told POLITICO that she wanted to hear directly from the secretary about its decision to move forward with a plan to relax sanctions last month on three companies tied to Deripaska.

“What we’re going to do is we’re going to get Mr. Mnuchin into the committee and ask him real pointed questions about de-listing,” she said.

Waters is unlikely to back down.

Now armed with subpoena power, she and other House committee chairs have promised to pursue intense oversight of President Donald Trump and his appointees. Trump denounced the effort in his State of the Union address Tuesday evening, claiming “ridiculous partisan investigations” could hurt economic growth.

Efforts to resist congressional testimony are becoming somewhat of a pattern among some Cabinet officials in the new era of House Democratic oversight.

Mnuchin is already resisting appearing before the Ways and Means Committee, according to Chairman Richard Neal (D-Mass.), while Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar is refusing to testify before the House Energy and Commerce Committee about the Trump administration’s controversial family-separation policy.

Rep. Patrick McHenry (R-N.C.), the top Republican on the Financial Services Committee, confirmed that Mnuchin declined to testify next week but said Treasury offered to appear later, once the administration releases a budget. A spokesperson for Waters declined to comment.

At issue for Democrats — and many Republicans — is that the administration was too easy on Deripaska when Treasury cut a deal to relax sanctions on Russian companies Rusal, EN+ and EuroSibEnergo.

The firms had been targeted because of their ties to Deripaska, and as part of U.S. efforts to punish Russian entities for interfering in the 2016 election. Treasury tried to make the case that the companies had done enough to blunt his influence, including shaking up the corporate boards and attempting to reduce his holdings.

Last week, Waters and the chairmen of the House Intelligence and Foreign Affairs Committees asked Mnuchin to produce all documents related to the decision.

Democrats had already set their expectations low. They had no confidence that Treasury would meet their document request on time, given the scope of the demands in addition to the contentious relationship between the department and congressional Democrats over the implementation of congressionally mandated Russia sanctions.

Waters said the Treasury Department did not meet the Tuesday deadline the committee chairs set.

“They stiff-armed us,” Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.) said.

A bipartisan coalition of lawmakers attempted to reverse Treasury’s controversial decision to de-list the companies tied to Deripaska, but they ultimately failed to clear the 60-vote threshold in the Senate. The House’s effort to block the de-listing passed overwhelmingly, 362 to 53.

RICHMOND, Va. — Democratic legislators arrived at the state capitol Wednesday hoping for a respite from the mind-boggling spate of news battering the highest ranks of state government.

They ended the day with their party in free fall.

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At 11 a.m., state Attorney General Mark Herring gathered black lawmakers for a private meeting, where he showed them a photo of himself in blackface and apologized for his past behavior. The news visibly shook lawmakers emerging from the meeting.

Within hours, the next bombshell shook Richmond: Vanessa Tyson, who says Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax sexually assaulted her in 2004, spoke publicly for the first time in a lengthy statement detailing her alleged experience.

Few in the state capitol professed to have any idea what the makeup of state’s leadership will be a week from now. Gov. Ralph Northam, who is engulfed in a controversy over a racist yearbook photo and appearing in blackface in the past, is working to clear his name amid widespread pressure to resign. Fairfax and Herring, the other two top-ranking officials in the state who could potentially ascend to the governorship in the coming days, are battling increasingly treacherous scandals of their own.

“We’re just taking a measured approach and we’re taking it step by step,” said Democratic Del. Joe Lindsey on Wednesday, minutes after meeting with Herring. “We’re just trying to deal with the matter at hand.”

Allies of Northam — who less than a week ago appeared to have met the end of his political career — expressed optimism that the governor could survive the scandal. It would be extremely difficult for the state Legislature to impeach Northam, they note, and he has three years left in his governorship if he refuses to go on his own.

“He knows he’s not a racist. If you knew you weren’t racist, and something happened to you 35 years ago, would you quit?” said David Saunders, a longtime Virginia political consultant.

The scandals dogging Fairfax and Herring at least for a time relegated Northam’s troubles to the back burner, if that was possible. The governor is working to prove he was not in a photo from his medical school yearbook depicting one man in blackface and another in a Ku Klux Klan robe — after initially conceding he was in the picture. State and national officeholders have called on Northam to resign over the past five days, but he’s not budging, at least not yet.

Fairfax, who would replace Northam if the governor were to resign, has so far not responded to Tyson’s new account of their 2004 encounter in a Boston hotel room. She said an encounter that was initially consensual quickly turned into forced oral sex, leaving her with “deep humiliation and shame,” Tyson wrote in her statement.

Fairfax has denied he assaulted Tyson.

Many Virginia lawmakers who had previously said they wanted to hear from Tyson before commenting on her allegation remained silent after her statement was released. One exception was recently elected Rep. Jennifer Wexton (D-Va.).

“I believe Dr. Vanessa Tyson,” Rep. Wexton tweeted.

Lawmakers cleared out of the state Capitol midafternoon, rushing out of meetings while saying few words to bystanders and reporters looking for comment on whether the state’s top three leaders are still viable to hold office.

Democratic state Sen. Louise Lucas was asked whether she thinks Herring should resign, and whether Virginia can get past all this.

Surrounded by the media, she covered her forehead and eyes with her left hand, walked out of the statehouse to her car, and refused to answer.