MPs want answers directly from the man “who started it all”: The Congressional Committee on the storming of the US Capitol invites former President Trump. If he refuses to appear, he faces the same fate as ex-adviser Bannon.
The investigative committee into the attack on the US Capitol in January 2021 has summoned former President Donald Trump. Such an escalation in investigations is extremely rare. Previously, the congressional committee tried to hold Trump more responsible for the attack with new evidence. If Trump doesn’t obey the subpoena, the House of Representatives could report him to the Justice Department for contempt of Congress. Trump’s former adviser Steve Bannon, for example, has already been convicted for this.
However, time is running out. A new House of Representatives will be elected on November 8th. The committee must complete its work by the end of the year – before the newly elected House of Representatives begins its work in January. Even if Trump should follow the subpoena, he can refuse to testify.
The attack on the Capitol came right after Trump’s appearance, during which the then US President stirred up crowds of his supporters with false claims that his election victory against challenger Joe Biden had been stolen from him. “We have an obligation to seek answers directly from the man who set this all in motion,” Republican Rep. Liz Cheney said in the subpoena. The evidence presented so far has shown that “the central cause of January 6th was one man – Donald Trump”.
The session included video footage of Trump’s longtime confidante Roger Stone, a notorious political adviser. Stone says ahead of the November 2020 presidential election that he doesn’t want to wait for all the votes to be counted. “Let’s go straight to the violence.” Reference was also made to Stone’s connections to the extremist groups Oath Keepers and Proud Boys. Members of these groups were charged with seditious conspiracy after the Capitol storm.
The U-Committee of the House of Representatives had already held eight public hearings in the summer, in which Trump was heavily incriminated. Another hearing was actually planned for the end of September – but this was postponed due to Hurricane “Ian” and has now been made up for. It should be the last hearing before the congressional elections on November 8th.
Hundreds of radical Trump supporters stormed the Congress building in January 2021 when Biden’s election victory was to be finally confirmed there. The storming of the Capitol with five dead and around 140 injured police officers caused horror worldwide and is considered a black day in the history of US democracy.
In the weeks before, Trump had spread the false claim that he had actually won the election and had been deprived of a second term through massive electoral fraud. Representative Elaine Luria said at the committee meeting on Thursday that Trump spread this “nonsense” even though he knew full well that the allegations were false. MP Zoe Lofgren said Trump planned from the start to declare himself the winner on election night “regardless of what the actual result is”.
The committee meeting also showed emails and text messages from the Secret Service and other security agencies citing fears of violence and an attack on the Capitol ahead of Jan. 6. On the day of the attack itself, the Secret Service quickly realized that many Trump supporters who had gathered in Washington were armed.
