If we have had one complaint against the bipartisan House January 6 Select Committee, it is that they have been so behind-the-doors. Sure we heard the riveting Capitol Police testimony, but then the January 6 Committee slammed the door shut. Who are they subpoenaing? Are they making progress? Are they talking to people in the ex-president’s former administration and close friends? Well, the Select Committee has just swung open that door again. They announced it was ready to start public hearings when the new year rolls into existence. Members wanted to “tell the story of the insurrection from start to finish.” At the same time, they have been putting together a report that they will release by spring’s end.
Select Committee staffers said they would begin lengthy public hearings this winter and into the spring. A top Select Committee aide added, according to The Washington Post:
‘I think we may issue a couple reports and I would hope for an [full] interim report in the summer, with the eye towards maybe another — I don’t know if it’d be final or another interim report later in the fall.’
The Select Committee members have finished with these:
‘The committee has taken in a massive amount of data — interviewing more than 300 witnesses, announcing more than 50 subpoenas, obtaining more than 35,000 pages of records and receiving hundreds of telephone leads through the Jan. 6 tip line, according to aides familiar with the matter who, like others, spoke on the condition of anonymity to describe details of the panel’s work.’
Time has begun pressuring the January 6 committee. If the state legislators are allowed to decide their electoral college votes, make voting too difficult for many, and/or people lose confidence in the legitimacy of the voting process, Democrats will lose the House and maybe the Senate. So they must wrap up their work.
Select Committee Chair Bennie Thompson (D-MS) said that they were working to make certain there was no January 6 repeat, according to the Washington Post:
‘We have to address it — our families, our districts and our country demand that we get as much of the causal effects of what occurred and come up with some recommendations for the House so that it won’t ever happen again.’
The Select Committee collected and screened “9,000 documents and records” just from the former Chief of Staff to Donald Trump, Mark Meadows. A second senior Select Committee aide noted:
‘We want to tell it from start to finish over a series of weeks, where we can bring out the best witnesses in a way that makes the most sense. Our legacy piece and final product will be the select committee’s report.’
The first senior aide said they were investigating how Trump conned people and continued to do so:
‘I think that Trump and his team have done a pretty masterful job of exploiting millions of American sHow do you get that many people screwed up that deeply? And continue to screw them up? Right? And what do we do about that? So there are some big, big-picture items that go well beyond the events of [Jan. 6] that the committee is also grappling with.’
The first aide continued:
‘In terms of criminal referrals more broadly, we are asking questions and finding facts. We’re not a law enforcement investigation, but we are finding facts, and we expect to make our findings public at the appropriate time for everyone to see.’
Pennsylvania House Representative Scott Perry (R) said “no” immediately, claiming the Select Committee was “illegitimate:”
‘I stand with immense respect for our Constitution, the Rule of Law, and the Americans I represent who know that this entity is illegitimate, and not duly constituted under the rules of the US House of Representatives use vote was not legitimate.’
The January 6 Committee has announced it will recommend changing the law to “compel lawmakers to cooperate” with subpoenas:
‘The fact that they have pretty much said that we’re not coming in is unfortunate. And so if they choose not to come voluntarily, we’ll have to see what, if any, options we have as a committee. But if we have the authority, and the lawyers are still looking at it, to pursue it, then we’ll do it.’
Case in point, The Vanity Fair announced that, Trump’s former personal attorney Rudy Giuliani may be next on the January 6 subpoena list.
Three White Lions podcast, Gloria Christie reads a chapter from her book of the same title. She also writes for the liberal online newspaper The Bipartisan Report. Gloria Christie Report her newsletter for people on the go. Written in her own unique style with a twist of humor in a briefer version of Bipartisan Report. Christie’s Mueller Report Adventures In Bite-Sizes a real-life compelling spy mystery (in process). Find her here on Facebook.
