Jan 6 committee to subpoena Trump

The House select committee investigating the Jan 6, 2021, attack on the US Capitol voted to subpoena former President Donald Trump for documents and testimony during a public hearing Thursday.

"We must seek the testimony under oath of Jan 6's central player," Committee Vice-Chair Liz Cheney, a Republican from Wyoming, said.

She said a subpoena for Trump is necessary since several witnesses pleaded their Fifth Amendment right when pressed about their conversations with the former president surrounding the 2020 election and the insurrection.

Cheney said the committee had "sufficient evidence" to answer many of the "critical questions" about the attack and to make criminal referrals to the Justice Department, but she said a "key task" remained hearing from Trump.

"Our duty today is to our country and our children and our Constitution. We are obligated to seek answers directly from the man who set this all-in motion, and every American is entitled in those answers so we can act now to protect our republic," she said.

If Trump refuses to comply with the subpoena and doesn't appear, the select committee will decide if it will vote to hold him in criminal contempt of Congress. If it does, it will then go to the full House for a vote.

Several former presidents have voluntarily testified before the Congress, but there is no Supreme Court precedent that says whether Congress has the power to compel a former president to testify his action in office.

The vote on the motion to subpoena Trump was unanimous, 9-0, with all seven Democrats and two Republicans affirming their yes votes. The hearing concluded after the vote.

"The chance we see him testify is almost zero," Randall Eliason, a former federal prosecutor in Washington, DC, told The Wall Street Journal. "And even if he does appear, he is likely to assert his right under the Fifth Amendment not to answer questions.''

The issue would be moot if Republicans take back the House after November's midterm elections as they could cancel the subpoena, Eliason said.

A subpoena would come more than a year since the committee began investigating the insurrection.

Thursday's hearing — the ninth and likely final one — focused on Trump's state of mind before and after the election. The panel also examined what it has described as "ongoing threats to democracy that persist to this day", as Trump and some other Republicans continue to claim the 2020 presidential election was stolen.

Representative Bennie Thompson, Democrat of Mississippi, and the committee chairman, said the committee recognizes subpoenaing a former president is an extraordinary step, which is why the panel will "take this step in full view of the American people".

"We want to hear from him," Thompson said. "The committee needs to do everything in our power to tell the most complete story possible and provide recommendations to help ensure nothing like Jan 6 ever happens again."

Thompson said speaking with Trump goes beyond the committee's "fact-finding" and is a question about accountability to the American people. "He is required to answer for his actions," he said.

Thompson told reporters that the committee has no plans to subpoena former vice-president Mike Pence. Thursday's hearing recapped much of what the committee has learned so far about the attack. The committee showed video testimony from those around Trump, who said he acknowledged privately that he had lost the election.

California Representative Adam Schiff said during the hearing that the Secret Service knew more than 10 days before the Jan 6 attack that armed supporters of Trump would go to the Capitol then, with one agent describing that day's morning as the "calm before the storm".

Schiff read emails from the Secret Service in which agents tracked online conversations on pro-Trump blogs in which the former president's supporters talked about weapons and threatened violence ahead of Jan 6.

Just a few days after losing the 2020 election, Trump "rushed to complete his unfinished business" and signed orders to immediately withdraw troops from Afghanistan and Somalia — evidence that proves that he knew his term was going to end, the House panel said.

Illinois Representative Adam Kinzinger, a Republican, said on Nov. 11, 2020, Trump signed the order requiring the withdrawal be complete before Joe Biden's inauguration. Kinzinger played clips of Trump's advisers discussing the order, which ultimately wasn't carried out.

The Jan 6 riot prompted several Trump administration officials to resign, including Transportation Secretary Elaine Chao. Audio was played during the hearing in which she described her decision.

"The events at the Capitol, however they occurred, were shocking, and it was something that as I mentioned in my statement that I could not put aside," she said. "At a particular point, the events were such that it was impossible for me to continue given my personal values and my philosophy. I came as an immigrant to this country. I believe in this country. I believe in a peaceful transfer of power. I believe in democracy, and so I was — it was a decision that I made on my own."

Chao and her husband Kentucky Republican Senator Mitch McConnell, who was critical of the president in the aftermath of the riot, were recently attacked by Trump.