He also suggested that the Department of Justice charge the former president with obstruction of official proceedings, conspiracy to defraud the Government and making false statements.
Trump knew there were weapons in the Capitol mob and wanted to join: “I’m the fucking president”
The commission of the assault on the Capitol accuses Trump: “It was the culmination of an attempted coup”
The House of Representatives committee investigating the assault on the Capitol on January 6, 2021 by a mob of supporters of Donald Trump and the campaign of the former US president for turning around the results of the presidential elections of 2020 held its last public meeting on Monday. In it, its members voted unanimously to refer to the Department of Justice the indictment of Trump and several of his direct allies for the commission of four crimes.
The charges that the committee recommends that Trump be charged are: obstruction of an official congressional procedure, conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to make false testimony, and inciting, assisting, or aiding an insurrection.
The committee is made up of seven Democratic members and two Republicans, although the latter -Liz Cheney and Adam Kinzinger- are two declared enemies of Trump -something exceptional in the party- and will leave Congress this January.
The recommendation for charges was announced after a review of more than an hour to the conclusions of the investigation by the committee, which has collected evidence and testimony for a year and a half, presented in public appearances with great media impact since the beginning of last summer.
Job summary
In turns, the committee members offered a summary of this work, which will be published in a report this Wednesday: the doubts that Trump sowed about the electoral results before the appointment with the polls; his victory announcement on election night, despite the fact that he was aware that there was a long recount ahead and that he was likely to lose; his knowledge that no significant voter fraud had robbed him of victory, as insisted to him by members of his team and as established by his own attorney general and courts; his lobbying the Justice Department and state election authorities to fraudulently flip the results; his pressure on his vice president, Mike Pence, not to certify Joe Biden’s victory in Congress on January 6; the call to his followers to put pressure on legislators at a massive rally in Washington, which ended with the tragic and embarrassing assault on the seat of popular sovereignty; and his refusal for hours to publicly ask the mob to leave the Capitol.
The committee named among those who should also receive indictments John Eastman, the lawyer who became the mastermind of Trump’s attempt to turn the tide of the election, and “others” who were not named.
A recommendation by a legislative committee to the Department of Justice for criminal charges does not imply that those charges will eventually occur.
A recommendation by a legislative committee to the Department of Justice for criminal charges does not imply that those charges will eventually be produced. For example, during the Trump presidency, the Republican majorities in Congress served to refer charges against authorities, such as the former FBI director, Andrew McCabe, for his persecution of Trump in the plot of Russian interference in the 2016 elections. On most occasions, the Justice Department did not follow the recommendation.
In addition to referring the charges, the committee also decided to recommend to the House Ethics Committee sanctions against four Republican representatives – Kevin McCarthy, who will become House speaker in January; Jim Jordan, Scott Perry and Andy Biggs-, all close to Trump. They refused to comply with documentary and testimony requirements before the committee. The vast majority of Republicans see the committee as a partisan effort to bury the political career of Trump, who ran him in the 2024 election last month.
Among those who reacted this Monday against the recommendation for charges is Pence himself, whose own life was in danger on January 6, considered a traitor by Trump supporters for his refusal to prevent Biden from being certified as the winner.
“Hang Mike Pence!” the mob chanted that afternoon, as Trump watched it all on television and refused to act for hours. Pence was against the committee’s recommendation and defended that the Department of Justice should not go against the former president either.
“The president’s words and actions on January 6 were reckless,” he said. “But I don’t know if it entails criminal responsibility to follow bad advice from your lawyers,” he justified.
The last session of the committee on January 6 also included new evidence against Trump, such as the testimony of Hick Hopes, a collaborator of Trump since before his political career who held different communication positions in his electoral campaigns and in the White House.
Hicks recommended to Trump, through members of his team, that he issue appeals the days before for the demonstration called for January 6 to be peaceful. But the then-president refused to do so, he confirmed to the committee. What the committee did not mention in its conclusions, as in previous appearances, was that Trump asked the protesters to march towards the Capitol in a “peaceful and patriotic” manner, in a speech with many aggressive allusions, such as the demand for than “fight like hell” to avoid a Biden presidency.
The possibility of the Justice Department following the committee’s recommendation and impeaching Trump is just one of the former president’s legal battles. He also faces investigations for withholding confidential documents at his Mar-a-Lago residence, for election interference in a lawsuit in Georgia and for fraud in the valuation of his businesses in New York.
