The Archive

INSURRECTION INVESTIGATION

Jan. 6 panel recommends Trump never hold office again in final report

Here’s some light holiday reading for you: The Jan. 6 select committee’s final report.

This document weighs in at a hefty 845 pages. It was released at around 10 p.m. last night. We’ll try to give you an overview of what the report means and how it fits into the select committee’s sweeping probe into former President Donald Trump’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election.

A place to start is with the select committee’s recommendations, at least one of which is on the verge of being implemented by Congress – reforming the Electoral College certification process. That proposal is included in the omnibus funding package the House will vote on today.

The select committee, led by Reps. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) and Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), also called on Congress to come up with a “mechanism” that can be used to bar Trump from ever being president again.

On Monday, the panel sent a criminal referral to the Justice Department urging federal prosecution of Trump for “assisting and providing aid and comfort to an insurrection.” The select committee notes Trump was “impeached by a majority of the House of Representatives for Incitement of an Insurrection, and there were 57 votes in the Senate for his conviction.”

Here’s the recommendation from the panel’s final report:

Other recommendations include employing “whole-of-government strategies” to combat white extremists and anti-government groups; declaring the joint session of Congress held to certify Electoral College results a “National Special Security Event” and beefing up penalties for anyone who tries to disrupt the proceedings; adding protections for election workers; improving oversight of the U.S. Capitol Police; and exploring limits on the Insurrection Act. Some Trump allies urged him to invoke the 1807 statute to help stay in office, a move that could’ve provoked an even more serious constitutional crisis.

The select committee’s final report is the culmination of nearly 18 months of investigative work. It provides a definitive roadmap of what happened in the period leading up to, during and after the Jan. 6 insurrection. The panel is scrambling to release everything it can before Republicans take over the House next month.

As we’ve mentioned, the nearly 200-page executive summary has already been released. And a lot of the other information contained in the final report came out during the panel’s hearings this summer.

Yet it’s still stunning to consider the sheer scale and audacity of Trump’s bid to remain in office. As Cheney has repeatedly described it, this “multi-pronged effort” including Trump’s “launch of the Big Lie”; pressure on state officials to refuse to certify their state’s election results; the “fake elector” scheme; a plan to name an interim attorney general who’d declare the election results fraudulent; a sustained campaign to influence former Vice President Mike Pence to refuse to certify Joe Biden’s Electoral College win; the Ellipse rally; and more.

Look at this striking statistic from the report:

The select committee notes that Trump tried to reach Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger 18 times before the infamous “Find 11,780 votes” call.

Trump also continued to raise vast sums of money after the 2020 election was over based on the “Big Lie,” according to the select committee. Trump and the RNC took in more than $250 million, the report states, even though Republican officials knew he’d lost, the panel states.

Perhaps the most disturbing portion of the report covers the role of far-right extremists in the insurrection. The Proud Boys, Oath Keepers, Roger Stone, white nationalists and QAnon adherents all responded to Trump’s unprecedented call for a “wild” protest on Jan. 6. They were the shock troops for the assault on Congress, the select committee asserts. The leader of the Oath Keepers has been convicted of seditious conspiracy for his role in the incident.

In addition to issuing its final report, the select committee has also released transcripts from dozens of witness interviews, although it still has far more to unveil.

These two interviews with the panel’s star witness, former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson, were released yesterday as well and have already attracted enormous scrutiny. Hutchison alleges that former Trump White House lawyer Stefan Passantino, who represented her at one point, suggested Hutchinson risk a contempt charge rather than continuing to cooperate with the select committee.

The Coverage:

→	NYT: “Jan. 6 Panel Issues Final Report, Placing Blame for Capitol Riot on ‘One Man,’” by Luke Broadwater and Maggie Haberman

→	Rep. Adam Schiff in the NYT: “Don’t Forget That Many Republicans in Congress Enabled Trump’s Big Lie”

Politico

→	“Extremists at the vanguard of a siege: The Jan. 6 panel’s last word,” by Nicholas Wu and Kyle Cheney

– John Bresnahan

EXCLUSIVE

DOJ blocking Congress’ access to Trump Mar-a-Lago docs

The Justice Department is blocking the Senate Intelligence Committee — and congressional leaders — from accessing information related to former President Donald Trump’s warehousing of highly classified documents at his Mar-a-Lago estate.

DOJ’s position has alarmed the top Democrat and Republican on the powerful panel, especially after prosecutors previously suggested in court filings that they intended to share such information with both the Intelligence Committee and the “Gang of Eight” as part of their regular oversight duties.

We caught up on Thursday with Sen. Mark Warner (D-Va.), the panel’s chair, and Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), the vice chair. They said DOJ’s newly-appointed special counsel for Trump-related investigations, Jack Smith, has raised doubts about sharing information related to the Mar-a-Lago investigation with Congress.

“There are some concerns from the special counsel, but I don’t think that’s a valid issue,” Warner said. “[DOJ] was willing to brief [us] a number of months back.”

Rubio noted there’s always a push-and-pull between prosecutors and congressional investigators. But, Rubio added, both the Gang of Eight and the Intelligence Committee are charged with conducting oversight of the intelligence community. DOJ’s descriptions of the high-level information Trump was storing at his estate underscore that responsibility.

This will be a “flash point” early in 2023, Rubio added, especially because he and Warner are in agreement. Here’s more from Rubio:

A Justice Department spokesperson declined to comment. A representative for the Office of the Director of National Intelligence also declined to comment.

The Gang of Eight — of which Warner and Rubio are members, along with the top Republican and Democrat in each chamber — has already asked to see the documents that were retrieved from Mar-a-Lago during the FBI search. Lawmakers had complained that they didn’t even know about the investigation until the search became public.

Warner and Rubio previously asked Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines to assess possible national security risks stemming from Trump’s possession of the sensitive materials and brief them on her findings. Along with a classification review, those are ongoing.

Back in September, Warner blamed the briefing delays on District Judge Aileen Cannon’s ruling in favor of a special master appointment. At the time, Warner said the Biden administration wasn’t the reason for the lag. That appears to no longer be the case.

The result is that Congress remains largely in the dark about one of the country’s most explosive national security investigations. Both Warner and Rubio say they don’t care about the legal jeopardy Trump faces. Instead, the two senators want to know what, if any, national security vulnerabilities were created by Trump’s behavior — and what’s being done to mitigate them.

—Andrew Desiderio

THE NEW LEADERSHIP

Who will be leading Team Jeffries’ transition

We have exclusive details this morning on who will be leading the transition for incoming Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries as he succeeds Speaker Nancy Pelosi as the top House Democrat.

Jeffries has tapped longtime Pelosi aide Emily Berret as executive director of the transition. Berret will be in this role for at least four months – likely longer – as she helps Team Jeffries take over full leadership operations for House Democrats.

This is a big get for Jeffries. Berret has been a trusted aide to Pelosi for a decade now, both as her director of operations for several years and, most recently, as deputy chief of staff since 2021.

One of the main concerns among House Democrats is how smooth the transition will be to a new crop of leaders following so many years with Pelosi and her two deputies – Steny Hoyer and Jim Clyburn – running everything.

But all three incoming leaders – Jeffries, Minority Whip Katherine Clark and Democratic Caucus Chair Pete Aguilar – have been making key hires in recent weeks, bringing on some of the most knowledgeable senior leadership staffers.

Cedric Grant, a close Jeffries ally downtown, has also been tapped to advise on all aspects of the transition externally, we’re told. Grant, Jeffries’ former chief of staff, works at the lobbying firm Subject Matter. He’s a key part of Jeffries’ tight-knit inner circle, as we’ve previously reported.

Jeffries is still working to finalize his leadership team but current top aides Tasia Jackson, Gideon Bragin and Emily Noriega-May are all expected to have senior roles in the minority leader’s office.

Jackson, Jeffries’ chief of staff since 2017, has worked in the New York Democrat’s office for a decade. Bragin is currently executive director of the House Democratic Caucus and Noriega-May is deputy executive director of the caucus.

– Heather Caygle

PUNCH POWER MATRIX

— Max Cohen

THE CAMPAIGN

→	The Human Rights Campaign is running a new spot in Harrisburg-Lancaster-Lebanon-York, Pa., about LGBTQ rights. We don’t see this buy anywhere else.

– Jake Sherman

MOMENTS

4 p.m.: President Joe Biden and First Lady Jill Biden will leave the White House for Children’s National Hospital.

4:15 p.m.: The Bidens will arrive at Children’s.

5:45 p.m.: The Bidens will leave Children’s for the White House, where they will arrive around 6 p.m.

CLIP FILE

NYT

→	“Congress Votes to Expand U.S. Power to Prosecute International War Crimes,” by Aishvarya Kavi

WaPo

→	“Pelosi reflects on transition from ‘awesome power’ to ‘strong influence,’” by Amy B Wang

→	“Deep secrecy, high risk: How Zelensky’s improbable D.C. visit came together,” by Tyler Pager and Yasmeen Abutaleb

WSJ

→	“Far From the U.S.-Mexico Border, a Migrant Surge Strains Denver,” by Robert Barba in Denver