Sen. Chris Coons is among those who want Ted Cruz to investigate Donald Trump's Russian hacking plea. | Getty Dems want Cruz to investigate Trump's Russian hacking plea

Two Senate Democrats are demanding that Sen. Ted Cruz hold a hearing investigating whether Donald Trump's plea to Russian hackers to go after Hillary Clinton’s private emails violated federal law.

"Mr. Trump’s encouragement of a Russian cyber incursion of a U.S. presidential candidate represents an unprecedented call for a foreign government to spy on a U.S. citizen and interfere with a U.S. election," Sens. Chris Coons of Delaware and Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island said Wednesday in a letter to Cruz, Trump's former presidential rival who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee oversight subpanel.


The missive is the first explicit call by Capitol Hill Democrats to investigate comments Trump made last week during a news conference.

“Russia, if you're listening I hope you're able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” Trump said, referring to the cache of personal emails Clinton said she deleted from the private email account she used while serving as secretary of state.

Whitehouse and Coons, the ranking member on the oversight subpanel, argued that the GOP standard-bearer's remarks might violate a number of U.S. criminal laws, including the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, the Espionage Act and the Logan Act, which forbids unauthorized citizens from communicating with foreign governments that have disputes with the U.S.

The duo said a hearing could determine whether these federal laws are enough to safeguard U.S. elections from foreign meddling.

They noted that Russia has a long track record of trying to influence elections in other countries, such as Georgia, Ukraine and France.

"Specifically, we ask that you consider whether requests for foreign entities to conduct cyberattacks on political opponents violate existing federal criminal statutes, and whether there are obstacles to the federal courts asserting jurisdiction to protect the integrity of our nation’s elections," the pair asked Cruz.

Cruz was not immediately available for comment on the Democrats’ request.