Jan 6 committee supoenas former president Donald Trump

A subpoena demands the former president appear for deposition testimony and comes as his former aide Steve Bannon is jailed for refusing to testify at congressional probe.

A video of then-President Donald Trump is displayed as the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol riot held a hearing this month.

The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot issued a subpoena Friday to Donald Trump demanding documents and testimony, setting the stage for a tense standoff between lawmakers and the former president heading into the midterm elections.

The subpoena demands that Mr Trump produce phone records, text messages and other documents by Nov. 4 and appear on Nov. 14 for deposition testimony under oath in Washington or by videoconference. Election Day is Nov. 8, when voting finishes in races nationwide to determine control of the House and Senate.

The panel took the step as it wraps up its investigation into Mr Trump’s actions surrounding the riot, in which his supporters tried to stop the counting of electoral votes in the 2020 presidential election. It is also probing his efforts to get state and federal officials, as well as his own vice president, to block President Biden’s win based on false claims of a stolen election.

A lawyer who represents Mr Trump said the subpoena will be reviewed, while criticizing the committee for its public release. “As with any similar matter, we will review and analyze it, and will respond as appropriate to this unprecedented action,” said David A. Warrington.

Mr Trump, who has denied wrongdoing related to the riot and remains the most powerful figure in Republican politics, has taken a dim view of the subpoena but hasn’t ruled out cooperating. Last week, after the Jan. 6 panel voted to issue the subpoena during a televised hearing, Mr. Trump criticized the move. “Why didn’t the Unselect Committee ask me to testify months ago,” he wrote on Truth Social. “Because the Committee is a total ‘BUST’ that has only served to further divide our Country.”

The subpoena of a former Republican president by the Democratic-led House panel, coming weeks before the election, marks the latest escalation in a longstanding battle over the results of the 2020 election and Mr Trump’s efforts to stay in power. Mr. Trump continues to claim that the election was stolen, and hundreds of Republican candidates for state and federal seats have echoed his claims of fraud.

The Justice Department is conducting a separate investigation into the election.

In a letter to Mr Trump, the committee said its investigation showed that “you personally orchestrated and oversaw a multi-part effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election and to obstruct the peaceful transition of power.” The panel said it recognizes that a subpoena to a former president “is a significant and historic action.” The deposition would be led by the committee’s professional staff as well as members of the committee, the committee said in its letter.

Mr Trump could comply with the subpoena and testify, though legal observers have cast this as unlikely. He could also appear and assert his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination, a step he took recently in a New York probe of his financial dealings. Mr. Trump could also contest the legitimacy of the subpoena in court or simply refuse to appear, potentially setting up a time-consuming legal fight while counting on Republicans to retake the House and end the investigation next year.

Democrats currently have a narrow majority in the House, and nonpartisan analysts favor the GOP to win the majority. The committee’s mandate will end when the current Congress completes its term in early January.

In its subpoena, the committee seeks records of telephone calls, text messages or communications placed by Mr Trump on Jan. 6, 2021. It also requested records of calls and messages placed by Mr Trump to members of Congress from Dec. 18, 2020, to Jan. 6, 2021, and documents related to communications with the far-right groups Oath Keepers and Proud Boys from Sept. 1, 2020, to the present.

The document requests indicate that the committee believes Mr Trump could have used the encrypted messaging app Signal, widely seen as one of the most secure messaging services. For instance, the committee requested communications “sent or received through Signal…concerning both the Department of Justice and actions, statements, or correspondence relating to the 2020 presidential election.”

Steve Bannon was one of the masterminds of Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and victory.

The committee also requested communications with allies of the former president who assisted in the campaign to overturn the 2020 election, including longtime adviser Roger Stone and White House adviser Stephen Bannon. A federal judge on Friday sentenced Mr. Bannon to four months in prison for defying a subpoena from the House select committee. Mr. Bannon said he plans to appeal the decision.

Other people in Mr Trump’s orbit who refused to comply with subpoenas have met mixed fates. Former Trump administration adviser Peter Navarro was indicted by the Justice Department on charges of contempt of Congress. Mr Navarro has pleaded not guilty.

Several members of Congress subpoenaed by the panel have refused to comply, often claiming the committee is politically motivated. In May, the committee issued five subpoenas for lawmakers, including House GOP Leader Kevin McCarthy, the first time it attempted to compel testimony from colleagues in Congress.

“They just want to go after their political opponents,” Mr McCarthy said at the time.

Prosecutors declined to charge two other officials who the committee subpoenaed, former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and Dan Scavino, the deputy chief of staff for communications in the Trump White House. Unlike Messrs. Navarro and Bannon, both had provided some level of cooperation with the committee before cutting off talks.

The select committee is expected to issue a final report before the end of the year, and might hold another hearing around that time.

The subpoena of a former president is rare but not unprecedented. In 1846, congressional select committees subpoenaed former Presidents John Quincy Adams and John Tyler in connection with an investigation into Daniel Webster’s disbursements from a covert “contingent fund” during his time as secretary of state. The former presidents complied, giving testimony and submitting a deposition.

During the McCarthy era in 1953, former President Harry Truman refused to comply with a subpoena issued by the House Un-American Activities Committee, which was investigating Mr Truman’s nomination of U.S. government economist Harry Dexter White to a top International Monetary Fund post. Mr White, who was by then deceased, had been accused of being a spy, which he had denied.

The Wall Street Journal