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The House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the US Capitol by Donald Trump supporters voted unanimously to ask the Justice Department to prosecute the former president for alleged crimes — including inciting an insurrection.
The committee’s nine members agreed Monday that their 17-month probe found enough evidence to urge that Trump and others face four federal criminal charges linked to efforts to overturn the 2020 election, which Joe Biden won.
“We’ve never had a President of the United States stir up a violent attempt to block the transfer of power,” Chairman Bennie Thompson said at the panel’s final meeting Monday. “If we are to survive as nation of laws and democracy, this can never happen again.”
The referrals do not carry any legal weight. The Justice Department has its own investigation and is free to disregard the lawmaker referrals. Trump and his allies have maintained their innocence and claimed the Jan. 6 committee was politically motivated. Even so, a summary spells out what the committee believes prosecutors can prove at trial, based on interviews and other evidence.
Obstruction of an official proceeding (18 U. S. C. § 1512(c))
It’s a crime to “corruptly” obstruct, influence or impede any official government proceeding, or attempt to do so. The committee said there “should be no question” that the Joint Session of Congress to count electoral votes on Jan. 6, 2021 was an official proceeding, and that Trump was part of an effort to obstruct it. Evidence showed that “Trump was attempting to prevent or delay the counting of lawful certified Electoral College votes” and was “personally involved” through his pressure on Vice President Mike Pence to derail the meeting, the panel said. Trump’s alleged obstruction was corrupt, the committee said, because he’d been told by his own experts that his theory on staying in power was unconstitutional, and his election fraud claims repeatedly failed in court.
