The House panel investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, violent attack on the U.S. Capitol on Monday urged the Justice Department to bring criminal charges against former President Donald Trump over his extensive efforts to reverse his 2020 election loss .
Lawmakers have recommended charges on four counts stemming from Trump’s months-long bid to stay in power after his election defeat: obstruction of official proceedings, conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to make a false statement and attempts to incite, aid or assist or comfort a rebellion.
The panel voted unanimously to send the criminal referrals to the Department of Justice. The referrals, which mark the first time the House has recommended criminal charges against a former president, don’t guarantee Trump will be indicted — but they do add to the evidence being weighed by the Justice Department and Special Counsel Jack Smith in his own business. investigation into Trump.
Panel members argued that Trump’s efforts to overturn the election results — including pushing baseless claims of voter fraud and urging his supporters to send bogus voters to Washington — are evidence enough for federal prosecutors to issue a to win a conviction against the former president.
“Even if it were true that President Trump genuinely believed the election was stolen, this is not a defense. No president can ignore the courts and deliberately violate the law, regardless of what supposed “justification” he or she presents, the House investigators wrote in a portion of their report released Monday.
The panel also advised the House Ethics Committee to investigate colleagues who overruled congressional subpoenas to testify about their knowledge and efforts about the Jan. 6 attack — including House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif ., rep. Jim Jordan, R-Ohio, Rep. Andy Biggs, R-Ariz., and Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa.
Ahead of Monday’s final hearing, Trump attacked House lawmakers in posts on his social media platform Truth Social.
“The Unselect Committee of Political Hacks is the same group that came up with the RUSSIA, RUSSIA, RUSSIA HOAX, not to mention many others. They are corrupt cowards who hate our country!” He wrote.
Trump did not directly address the report’s findings, including the core tenet that he incited his followers to action but did not participate himself, but he did reiterate his baseless claims that the 2020 election was “rigged and stolen.”
The criminal references mark a historic end to the House Select Committee’s 18-month-long investigation and are detailed in portions of the report released Monday. The release comes just days before House Republicans, including many who collaborated with Trump in his bid to overturn the 2020 election results, take office next month as a result of November’s midterm elections.
In a 161-page section of the panel’s larger report, expected to be made public later this week, lawmakers wrote that Trump obstructed official Congressional proceedings with his repeated attempts to delay the counting of the January 1 election votes. to assert or deny. 6 which would complete the handover of power to then President-elect Joe Biden.
The lawmakers wrote that Trump was “conspiring to defraud the United States,” especially when he offered to make DOJ official Jeffrey Clark Acting Attorney General if Clark agreed to help him push through the fake voter scheme by falsely claiming that the Justice Department had found evidence of massive voter fraud.
They also wrote that Trump entered into a “conspiracy to make a false statement” when he “conspired with others to submit false voters to Congress and the National Archives.”
And for the fourth criminal reference, they wrote that Trump was trying to foment, aid, or aid and comfort an uprising. “President Trump was directly responsible for summoning what became a violent mob to Washington, DC, urging them to march on the Capitol, and then further taunting that already violent and lawless mob with his tweet of 14: 24 hours on the vice president,” the lawmakers wrote.
