A Republican member of the House select committee investigating the January 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol and attempts to overturn the 2020 presidential election said that he believes former President Donald Trump is “guilty of a crime.”
Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Illinois), one of two GOP members on the January 6 committee (and one of 10 Republicans in the House who voted to impeach Trump for inciting an insurrection after the Capitol attack), suggested that panel members were likely to make criminal referrals for the former president to the DOJ.
“I think he’s guilty of a crime. I mean, look, he knew what he did. We’ve made that clear. He knew what was happening prior to January 6,” Kinzinger said, referring to the committee’s exposure of Trump’s actions in public hearings this past summer.
Kinzinger specifically cited the fact that Trump had pressured Department of Justice (DOJ) officials to help him overturn the election.
“He pressured the Justice Department officials to say, ‘Hey, just say the election was stolen and leave the rest to me,'” Kinzinger noted. “And then the Republicans all need to put the stamp of approval on it.”
Failing to make a referral to the DOJ would send a troubling message, Kinzinger went on:
I think he is absolutely guilty. If he is not guilty of some kind of a crime, I mean, what we’ve basically said is presidents are above the law and they can do everything short of a coup as long as it doesn’t succeed.
Kinzinger’s statement is the strongest indication yet from a member of the committee that the panel will likely refer charges for Trump.
The committee is set to make criminal referrals during its next (and likely final) public hearing, which is set to take place this coming Monday, committee chair Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Mississippi) told reporters on Tuesday.
Thompson did not indicate who would be the subject of referrals, or for what reasons. Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Maryland) indicated that there would be multiple referrals for several individuals.
“Different strokes for different folks,” Raskin said to The Associated Press. “Everybody has made his or her own bed in terms of their conduct or misconduct.”
Directly before the attack on the Capitol, Trump had peddled incendiary lies about election fraud to his loyalists, telling them they would “never take back our country with weakness,” and encouraging them to go directly to Congress to interrupt the legislative branch as it was meeting to confirm the election’s results.
As the January 6 committee has pointed out, Trump didn’t take action to stop the attack on the Capitol after it began for 187 minutes (more than three hours). During that time, many of his aides, confidantes and family members pleaded with him to call off the mob, which Trump eventually did — although he told his loyalists that he “loved” them while doing so.
Truthout Is Preparing to Meet Trump’s Agenda With Resistance at Every Turn
Dear Truthout Community,
If you feel rage, despondency, confusion and deep fear today, you are not alone. We’re feeling it too. We are heartsick. Facing down Trump’s fascist agenda, we are desperately worried about the most vulnerable people among us, including our loved ones and everyone in the Truthout community, and our minds are racing a million miles a minute to try to map out all that needs to be done.
We must give ourselves space to grieve and feel our fear, feel our rage, and keep in the forefront of our mind the stark truth that millions of real human lives are on the line. And simultaneously, we’ve got to get to work, take stock of our resources, and prepare to throw ourselves full force into the movement.
Journalism is a linchpin of that movement. Even as we are reeling, we’re summoning up all the energy we can to face down what’s coming, because we know that one of the sharpest weapons against fascism is publishing the truth.
There are many terrifying planks to the Trump agenda, and we plan to devote ourselves to reporting thoroughly on each one and, crucially, covering the movements resisting them. We also recognize that Trump is a dire threat to journalism itself, and that we must take this seriously from the outset.
Last week, the four of us sat down to have some hard but necessary conversations about Truthout under a Trump presidency. How would we defend our publication from an avalanche of far right lawsuits that seek to bankrupt us? How would we keep our reporters safe if they need to cover outbreaks of political violence, or if they are targeted by authorities? How will we urgently produce the practical analysis, tools and movement coverage that you need right now — breaking through our normal routines to meet a terrifying moment in ways that best serve you?
It will be a tough, scary four years to produce social justice-driven journalism. We need to deliver news, strategy, liberatory ideas, tools and movement-sparking solutions with a force that we never have had to before. And at the same time, we desperately need to protect our ability to do so.
We know this is such a painful moment and donations may understandably be the last thing on your mind. But we must ask for your support, which is needed in a new and urgent way.
We promise we will kick into an even higher gear to give you truthful news that cuts against the disinformation and vitriol and hate and violence. We promise to publish analyses that will serve the needs of the movements we all rely on to survive the next four years, and even build for the future. We promise to be responsive, to recognize you as members of our community with a vital stake and voice in this work.
Please dig deep if you can, but a donation of any amount will be a truly meaningful and tangible action in this cataclysmic historical moment. We are presently looking for 98 new monthly donors before midnight tonight.
We’re with you. Let’s do all we can to move forward together.
With love, rage, and solidarity,
Maya, Negin, Saima, and Ziggy