During a recent appearance on CNN, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) — who chairs the House Intelligence Committee and serves as a member of the House committee investigating the Capitol riot — pledged that the riot investigation committee is “going to look into every effort made to subvert the election.” Schiff made this remark in the context of a memo prepared by conservative lawyer John Eastman in which he laid out a scheme by which then-Vice President Mike Pence could overturn Joe Biden’s presidential election victory, although Pence did not actually possess the legal power to throw a procedural wrench in the counting and confirmation of the electoral votes. Still, Trump himself backed Eastman’s efforts, which now appear to be among the investigation’s targets.
Discussing those who worked against the democratic process after last year’s election, Schiff commented as follows while on CNN in recent days:
‘They all understood they lost the election. And this memo, along with other work of the Trump campaign, was designed to overturn the clear results of the election. They just didn’t care. They don’t care about our democracy anymore. Apparently, all that matters is staying in power. So, they’ll pass voter suppression laws around the country, they’ll strip independent election officials of their powers and give them to partisan boards to help them succeed where they failed to overturn the last election. And yes, they’ll write memos saying, hey, here’s a way we can subvert the will of the voters if we can just get the vice president to ignore his Constitutional duty. And this is indeed how democracies come to an end.’
Asked if the riot investigation committee would be seeking to speak with Eastman, Schiff added the following:
‘We’re going to look into every effort made to subvert the election and how it led us to that violent insurrection on the 6th.’
Watch Schiff below:
The committee has already subpoenaed four prominent individuals from Trump’s orbit, including former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, former Trump adviser Steve Bannon, former White House deputy chief of staff Dan Scavino, and former Defense Department official Kash Patel. The subpoenas demand that each of the targeted individuals hand over certain documents before sitting for a mid-October deposition.
