The Daily - A Congressional Call to Prosecute Trump

Episode Date: December 20, 2022

Every step of the way, the congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol has been groundbreaking.As it wraps up its work, the panel referred former President Donald J. Trump to the Justice Department and accused him of four crimes, including inciting insurrection. The referrals do not carry legal weight or compel any action by the Justice Department, but they were a major escalation.Here’s what happened during the committee’s final public meeting.Guest: Luke Broadwater, a Congressional reporter for The New York Times.Background reading: Here are six takeaways from the final Jan. 6 hearing, and key findings from the panel’s report, annotated.Mr. Trump’s current woes extend beyond the report, but the case the committee laid out against him further complicates his future.For more information on today’s episode, visit nytimes.com/thedaily. Transcripts of each episode will be made available by the next workday. 

From The New York Times, I'm Michael Barbaro. This is The Daily. Today, the Congressional Committee investigating the January 6th attack on the U.S. Capitol has recommended that former President Donald Trump be charged with four crimes, including insurrection. My colleague, Luke Broadwater, was in the room as it happened. It's Tuesday, December 20th. So Luke, this long, strange journey is now over. The January 6th Committee has just finished its 11th and final public meeting

and really finished this historic project of investigating what happened before and on that very dark day. And I know that you have tucked yourself into a little phone booth inside the Capitol, which I know can be very loud. So thank you for being willing to talk to us from there. So I'm curious, since you just walked out of the room where this last meeting was held, what is your reaction to it? Well, I think every step of the way, the January 6th committee has been a history-making congressional investigation. If you look at how deep and wide their investigation went, it's pretty unprecedented in the annals of American democracy. They interviewed more than a thousand witnesses.

They obtained more than a million documents. They issued easily more than a hundred subpoenas. And so as I'm watching this, I'm seeing a congressional committee go where Congress has not gone before. Most congressional investigations end with a report, maybe some legislative recommendations. They don't end with lawmakers sitting up at a dais telling the Justice Department what crimes a former president committed and how he should be investigated. Okay, so tell us exactly how it is they go about doing that last piece of history-making. What happens in this final meeting? Unlike the committee's previous hearings this summer, which were quite lengthy and full of detailed evidence, this meeting on Monday was designed to be efficient.

A quorum being present, the select committee to investigate the January 6th attack on the United States Capitol will be in order. The purpose of this meeting was to remind the American people of the important points along the way at which Donald Trump and his allies attempted to overturn the election. And so Benny Thompson, the chairman of the committee, a Democrat from Mississippi, opens the hearing and laid out sort of the broad principles that were at play here. To cast a vote in the United States is an act of faith and hope.

When we drop that ballot in the ballot box, we expect the people named on the ballot are going to uphold their end of the deal. About the importance of a president admitting when he lost and turning over the reins of government to the person who beat him. Those who come up short ultimately accept the results and abide by the rule of law. That faith in our system is the foundation of American democracy. If the faith is broken, so is our democracy.

Donald Trump broke that faith. Donald Trump refused to admit he lost. But he chose to try to stay in office through a multi-part scheme to overturn the results and block the transfer of power. And for that, Chairman Thompson said, he needs to be held accountable. If we are to survive as a nation of laws and democracy, this can never happen again. How do we stop it? There's one factor I believe is most important in preventing another January 6th, accountability.

Right, I remember thinking when he used that word accountability, he's hinting at not just what's to come, but why it must come, why this committee will be recommending criminal charges. Right, this whole hearing was laying the groundwork, laying the argument for what the panel planned to do at the end. And that was issuing the criminal referrals. And so what Chairman Thompson is doing here is he's reminding the public once again of exactly what Donald Trump did. And he starts to utilize the rest of the committee.

I especially want to thank and acknowledge our vice chair. To lay out this case, he kicks the mic to Liz Cheney, the vice chairwoman from Wyoming, who... Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman, and thank you for your... Starts to remind the public of how Donald Trump did nothing. Among the most shameful of this committee's findings was that President Trump sat in the dining room off the Oval Office watching the violent riot at the Capitol on television.

And then we hear from other members about various ways Donald Trump attempted to overturn the election. The president's January 2nd, 2021 call to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger, in which the president urged the secretary to find 11,780 votes, he needed to change the outcome in that state. One member spoke of how Donald Trump furthered what she called the big lie. The big lie. The enormous effort led by ex-President Trump to spread baseless accusations and misinformation

in an attempt to... They talked about how Donald Trump pressured the Justice Department, how he even pressured his own vice president. In multiple heated conversations, President Trump directly pressured Vice President Pence to adopt the Eastman theory and either reject the electors or send them back to the state legislatures. And he personally asked for us to come to D.C. that day. They played evidence time and time again from rioters themselves.

And I thought, for everything he's done for us, if this is the only thing he's going to ask of me, I'll do it. Who, as they're storming the Capitol, say they're doing it because they believe that's what Donald Trump wants them to do. One of the new pieces of evidence they introduced was video from a White House aide named Hope Hicks, who recalled a one-on-one conversation she had with Donald Trump. Seeing evidence of fraud on a scale that would have impacted the outcome of the election, and I was becoming increasingly concerned that we were damaging his legacy. What did the president say in response to what you just described? He said something along the lines of, you know, nobody will care about my legacy if I lose. And Donald Trump didn't seem to care, she said.

So that won't matter. The only thing that matters is winning. The only thing he cared about was winning, not about his legacy. Right. And in doing this, Luke, it struck me that the committee was not just running through the hits of these hearings and how much evidence they have revealed. They're also, in a way laying out a legal case. I mean, I think about that Hope Hicks testimony as motivation. I mean, here's

a president saying, I won't stop making these false claims because I have to win. If I don't win, nothing else matters. Then you have evidence of his actual conduct. Then his behavior during the actual riot and his indifference to it. And so this was not just a highlight reel, it was almost kind of a summary of a legal case. Oh, absolutely. And so, you know, a little of the backstory of how this hearing came about was a team of the four lawyers on the committee, came about was a team of the four lawyers on the committee, Jamie Raskin, Liz Cheney, Zoe Lofgren, and Adam Schiff, have been working for weeks to study the case for criminal referrals. And so as these lawyers were looking through the legal code and studying exactly what the elements of various crimes were, they were matching up evidence in their treasure trove of interviews

and documents to specifically match certain acts to certain crimes. And so every clip they played at this hearing, every piece of testimony they put forward was done with that purpose in mind, with building a certain case against Donald Trump or one of his allies on one of these specific charges. Got it. Okay, so what happens next? The chair recognizes a gentleman from Maryland, Mr. Raskin, for an opening statement. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, and I want to—

Then Jamie Raskin, the Democrat from Maryland who's a constitutional law professor, gets his turn to speak. Several months ago, you tasked several of our members in a subcommittee with bringing recommendations to the full committee about potential referrals to the Department of Justice and other authorities. And up on the screen pops the words everyone in the room has been waiting for, criminal referrals. We are now prepared to share those recommendations today. Now, what is a criminal referral? It is essentially a recommendation from Congress to the Justice Department that says, based on our investigation, we believe that you should investigate and potentially charge the following people for the following crimes.

And it's very clear, as Jamie Raskin is talking, that he has issues of fairness on his mind. The dangerous assault on American constitutional democracy that took place on January 6, 2021, consists of hundreds of individual criminal offenses. Most such crimes are already being prosecuted by the Department of Justice. Ours is not a system of justice where foot soldiers go to jail and the masterminds and ringleaders get a free pass.

He's thinking of the 700, 800 people who were on the Capitol grounds that day and invaded the Capitol who have been charged with crimes while no political actors have been. Both former President Donald Trump and John Eastman likely violated two federal criminal statutes. Then he names two of the masterminds. John Eastman, a conservative lawyer who those who have watched the hearings have gotten to know pretty well because he's the guy who comes up with this legal theory for overturning the election. And then he names the biggest mastermind of all, Trump himself. We'll be right back. So, Luke, tell us about the criminal referrals that Raskin outlines when it comes to these two big-name alleged masterminds, John Eastman and President Trump.

The first criminal statute we invoke for referral, therefore, is Title 18, Section 1512C. therefore, is Title 18, Section 1512C. The first criminal code that Congressman Raskin puts up on the screen is obstruction of an official proceeding, the certifying of Joe Biden's election in Congress. The central moment for the lawful transfer of power in the United States. Right, and just to summarize this, I mean, the charge here is that the president, and in this case his lawyer, have intentionally sought to subvert the regular course of democracy on the most basic level, which is, of course, what January 6th was about.

Absolutely. Okay. Second, we believe that there is more than sufficient evidence to refer former President Donald J. Trump. So the second charge they bring up is called conspiracy to defraud the United States. In other words, to make an agreement to impair, obstruct, or defeat the lawful functions of the United States government by deceitful or dishonest means. And this is a count that has to do with all the lying,

all the false documents that Donald Trump and his allies engaged in. Lying to the public about him being the true winner of the election, about Dominion voting machines rigging the election. Our report describes in detail the actions of numerous co-conspirators who agreed with and participated in Trump's plan. In the written version of this charge, of this criminal referral, the committee names several other allies, including Rudy Giuliani, the president's campaign lawyer, and Mark Meadows, the president's former chief of staff.

Interesting. Third, we make a referral based on Title 18. Then they move on to conspiracy to make a false statement. The evidence clearly suggests that President Trump conspired with others to submit slates of fake electors to Congress and the National Archives. We're talking about the same sort of elements of the crime, interrupting the congressional proceeding, putting of the crime, interrupting the congressional proceeding, putting forward the fake electors. And again, Donald Trump and John Eastman

are named. The fourth and final statute we invoke for referral is Title 18, Section 2383. And finally, we come to perhaps the most consequential charge. The statute applies to anyone who incites, assists, or engages in insurrection against the United States. And that is the charge of insurrection. An insurrection is a rebellion against the authority of the United States. And for this referral, the committee focuses solely on Trump himself. exists for a criminal referral of former President Trump for assisting or aiding and comforting those at the Capitol who engaged in a violent attack on the United States. Nothing could be a greater betrayal of this duty than to assist in insurrection against the constitutional order. Wow. So, Luke, how does this meeting end? Well, the very last act the committee takes at this business meeting is to put these criminal referrals up for a vote. Mr. Chairman, I move

that the committee favorably report to the House the select committee's final report. And if there was any doubt that there was any dissension on the committee or conflict about what to do, it wasn't apparent up at the dais. The clerk will call the roll. Ms. Cheney. Aye. Ms. Lofgren. Aye. Mr. Kinzinger. All nine members of the committee. Mr. Schiff. Aye. Seven Democrats and two Republicans. Mrs. Murphy. Aye. Mr. Chairman, you are not recorded.

Chair votes aye. Voted to endorse criminal referrals against Donald Trump and some of his top allies and send those referrals to the Justice Department. There being no further business, without objection, the select committee stands adjoined. Look, I think it's worth pausing to reflect on the enormity of a bipartisan group of lawmakers recommending criminal charges be brought against a former president who is now a declared candidate for president again in 2024 for all these charges, but especially for the charge of insurrection. Right. I mean, when you think about it, it's almost mind-blowing. It is. Right. Congress is determining this former president essentially presided over a self-coup against his own government. And the very person he sought to steal the election from is in the White House presiding over the Justice Department, who Congress is recommending should investigate Trump. It really is a completely unique situation in American history. But it's a situation that Congress feels they have a duty to recommend these criminal referrals because no president ever in American history did what he did. limits of what this enormous moment that you and I are describing means, and how much of a criminal

referral from the House of Representatives is symbolic, and how much of it has real-world implications. So just remind us of all that. Right. Well, it is a symbolic act, but it is a powerfully symbolic act. It is the United States Congress saying we've thrown every resource imaginable into this investigation. And these are our conclusions. And we wish we had the power to charge, but we don't. And so the ball is now in your court. Now, of course, it doesn't oblige the Justice Department to do anything.

The Justice Department doesn't have to listen to Congress. But it does create a tremendous amount of public pressure, and it will be hard for the Justice Department to simply ignore them. Luke, these criminal referrals, they are not just the culmination of an investigation, but really a kind of national event, right? This set of televised meetings, unlike anything in my lifetime, event, right? This set of televised meetings, unlike anything in my lifetime, structured to be riveting, dramatic television, and that produced a set of really shocking bombshells about a moment when our democracy truly teetered on the edge. So I want to end this conversation

by asking what you have come to understand as the impact of the committee's total body of work now that it's over. Right. Well, I think the committee has been groundbreaking in a number of ways. One, with its televised hearings, it clearly set a new standard for how a congressional hearing could be conducted and produced.

These streamlined, captivating narratives that brought in millions and millions of viewers, both in primetime and during the day, which is something that really does not happen in Congress. I mean, most congressional committees are watched by maybe a few hundred people, certainly not more than 20 million people. And if you think about it as Americans, I think that showed how seriously the country was taking this, too. I believe they really broke ground in terms of how wide and deep the investigation was. This congressional investigation, again, staffed by former federal prosecutors, got well ahead of the Justice Department for a period of time.

And you could see the Justice Department responding in real time, ramping up their own investigation into January 6th as the January 6th committee put forward evidence. And then I would say that they did elevate to the country the issue of election denialism. And you could see in polling around the time of this summer when the committee was putting on its hearings that threats to democracy rose to the top of voters' concerns. And what we actually saw at the midterm elections was voters were smart enough to determine which Republicans were election deniers and which ones weren't. And those people who really ran on Trump denialism on the 2020 election, those people were rejected. And that happened in state after state after state. So to the degree that that day, January 6th, now means something different than it did when these hearings started a year or so ago. What does it mean now to people, do you think? I think two years ago,

when people heard January 6th, they thought of just the storming of the Capitol. Now I think after this committee has finished up its work, January 6th is now more synonymous with a more wide-ranging and longer plot to overturn the election. I think when people think of January 6th, they now think of the fake elector plot, and they think of pressuring Vice President Mike Pence and meddling in the Justice Department and all the different ways that Donald Trump tried to cling to power. And so, yes, January 6th did culminate in the storming of the Capitol, but it was only after the seizing of voting machines had been rejected

or the plans to invoke martial law had been rejected. And so I think, big picture, this committee has been successful in broadening the definition of January 6th beyond just the riot and into the widespread plot to overturn an election. Well, Luke, thank you very much. We appreciate it. Thank you so much for having me. The January 6th committee is scheduled to release its full report, including a detailed explanation of its criminal referrals tomorrow. We'll be right back.

Here's what else you need to know today. A Times investigation has found that the winner of a New York congressional race that helped Republicans win narrow control of the House last month appears to have fabricated much of his resume. Congressman-elect George Santos of Long Island claims that he graduated from Baruch College, worked at Citigroup and Goldman Sachs, and now runs a

non-profit animal rescue group. But the Times could find no evidence to support any of those claims. Instead, it found records of criminal charges and evictions. And Elon Musk may be stepping down as the CEO of Twitter after he commissioned a poll of its users asking whether he should quit. When the poll closed on Monday, a clear majority of respondents said that he should, a verdict that Musk had said he would follow.

But in the hours since, Musk has taken no action, leaving his future uncertain. Today's episode was produced by Diana Nguyen, Sidney Harper, and Michael Simon-Johnson. It was edited by Lexi Diao and Paige Cowett, with help from Lisa Chow. Thank you. That's it for The Daily I'm Michael Bilboro See you tomorrow