As the House Select Panel investigating the Jan 6th insurrection prepares to go into battle with some of their colleagues over their actions on that day and that may put some Republicans in an awkward spot, one GOP lawmaker has inadvertently opened the legal pathway to be subpoenaed by the Committee to testify under oath about his role in the deadly incident.
As noted by Politico, combative Rep. Jim Jordan (R-OH) may have handed committee members the key to subpoenaed him to testify about his multiple conversations with former president Trump before, during and after the January 6 riot.
Politico’s Kyle Cheney and Olivia Beavers wrote that “The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack has so far avoided directly roping in fellow lawmakers, even as it homes in on Trump’s inner circle. Yet each of its investigative steps so far has further underscored the roles that Trump’s staunchest House GOP allies played in his bid to throw out the election results,” before adding, “Those Republicans connected the former president to willing partners in the Justice Department who might fuel inflated claims of fraud. They huddled with Trump to deliver counsel. And they spoke with Trump by phone on Jan. 6 as he watched his own ‘Stop the Steal’ rally morph into a violent riot that overtook the Capitol.”
According to the report, Jordan will likely find himself under the microscope and — if he can’t get around being subpoenaed by his colleagues — he only has himself to blame.
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“That reality became more explicit this week, when Senate Judiciary Chair Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) asked the House to investigate Rep. Scott Perry (R-Pa.) for helping Trump pressure the Justice Department to overturn the election. Perry played a key role in linking Trump with a Justice Department official who was willing to aid the former president’s quest to overturn the election, Senate Judiciary Democrats found. Their report also referenced Rep. Jim Jordan’s (R-Ohio) contacts with the White House during that timeframe,” Politico is reporting.
In Jordan’s case, his participation into investigations of Democratic foes and the FBI provided a legal pathway that will likely come back to bite him.
“The question of whether to engage with the select panel is a particularly resonant one for Jordan, the top Republican on the House Judiciary Committee. He made his name as an aggressive conservative investigator when Republicans dug into allegations of impropriety at the FBI and Justice Department during the 2016 presidential election. At that time, House Republicans fiercely defended the power of the subpoena to compel testimony from executive-branch officials,” the report states. “Now Jordan and several of his colleagues are in uncharted territory, facing possible subpoenas from within their own branch.”
Ohio's @Jim_Jordan confirms to me:
“I spoke with [Trump] on Jan. 6th."
Before, during or after attack?
“I spoke with him that day, after? I think after. I don't know if I spoke with him in the morning or not. I just don't know…I don't know when those conversations happened.” pic.twitter.com/h4fbuMYtk0
— Taylor Popielarz (@TaylorPopielarz) July 28, 2021
Read more about this report on Politico.
