January 6 panel chair says Trump ‘broke the faith’ of US elections in final session
The House Ways and Means Committee voted on Tuesday to publicly release six years of Donald Trump’s tax returns.
The former president has long tried to stop the disclosure of the returns, fighting the request for his records all the way to the Supreme Court.
It’s unclear how quickly his taxes will be released, but with just two weeks left until Republicans formally take control of the House, this could be the last opportunity for Democrats to disclose whatever new information they have gleaned.
The vote comes a day after the January 6 select committee decided to refer Mr Trump to the Department of Justice for prosecution on charges stemming from alleged violations of at least five separate sections of the United States criminal code.
Mr Trump pushed back on Monday’s vote to refer the Capitol riot panel’s findings to Justice Department special counsel Jack Smith.
He claims that because he was impeached for his role in inciting the 6 January 2021 attack on Congress, he cannot now be prosecuted for it. Mr Smith is also overseeing the Mar-a-Lago classified documents probe.
Jan 6 committee already cooperating with Justice Department
The House Jan 6 select committee has reportedly been “extensively cooperating” with the Department of Justice probe into Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 election.
It includes providing documents and data pertaining to Mr Trump’s former White House chief of staff and the conservative law professor who pushed for the plan.
According to Punchbowl News, the panel began transmitting documents to the office of special counsel Jack Smith, the prosecutor appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland to oversee investigations into Mr Trump’s conduct.
Specifically, the committee has reportedly provided Mr Smith’s office with “documents and transcripts” relating to Mark Meadows, who served as Mr Trump’s final White House chief of staff from April 2020 through the end of his term on January 2021.
Andrew Feinberg has more.
Alisha Rahaman Sarkar21 December 2022 06:15
Schumer reveals why he believes Pelosi was able to ‘handle’ Trump
The Senate Majority leader credited the House speaker’s motherhood with enabling her to deal with the former president, as the two Democrats sat down for their first-ever joint interview together.
Oliver O’Connell21 December 2022 05:45
Donald Trump calls Elon Musk a ‘hero’
Donald Trump has called Elon Musk a “hero” for promoting allegations against Hunter Biden and claims the Twitter CEO wants to quit the social media platform.
The former president said in a new interview that he believes the billionaire deliberately lost a poll on his Twitter future as he no longer wants the job of running his $44bn purchase.
“I think he wants to step down, I think that’s a good way of stepping down, you know just lose in a poll and say ‘I’m out of here’,” Mr Trump told Chanel Rion of far-right cable network One America News.
Alisha Rahaman Sarkar21 December 2022 04:45
Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert snipe at each other over House speaker race
MAGA Republicans Marjorie Taylor Greene and Lauren Boebert have turned on each other, with the Colorado congresswoman mocking the far-right conspiracy theorist’s belief in “Jewish space lasers”.
The one-time close allies – who infamously joined forces to heckle President Joe Biden’s State of the Union speech just as he spoke about the need to provide healthcare to sick and dying veterans – came to blows on Monday over the future of the House speaker role.
Rachel Sharp reports on all the “high school drama”.
Oliver O’Connell21 December 2022 03:15
Trump calls Musk a ‘hero’ and says he held poll on quitting as Twitter CEO because he wants out
The former president said in a new interview that he believes the billionaire deliberately lost a poll on his Twitter future as he no longer wants the job of running his $44bn purchase.
“I think he wants to step down, I think that’s a good way of stepping down, you know just lose in a poll and say ‘I’m out of here’,” Mr Trump told Chanel Rion of far-right cable network One America News.
And on Tuesday night Mr Musk said that he would quit the role – eventually.
“I will resign as CEO as soon as I find someone foolish enough to take the job! After that, I will just run the software & servers teams,” he tweeted.
Graeme Massie has the full story.
Josh Marcus21 December 2022 02:09
GOP has muted response to Trump criminal referral
The Republican Party quickly and forcefully rallied behind Donald Trump in the hours after federal agents seized classified documents from his Florida estate this summer.
Four months later, that sense of intensity and urgency was missing — at least for now — after the Jan. 6 House committee voted to recommend the Justice Department bring criminal charges against him. Leading Republicans largely avoided the historic criminal referral Monday, while others pressed to weigh in offered muted defenses — or none at all.
Oliver O’Connell21 December 2022 01:45
House votes to release Donald Trump’s tax returns after years of legal fighting
The Democratically controlled House Ways and Means Committee agreed 24 to 16, along partisan lines, to share the returns with the public.
Though large parts of Mr Trump’s tax returns have been reported by the press and scrutinised by investigators in places like New York, the release still marks a major political blow for Mr Trump, who sought to block Congress from accessing his taxes.
More details from our full story.
Josh Marcus21 December 2022 01:29
Ethics review urged for McCarthy and three other GOP lawmakers
Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy and three other GOP lawmakers should face ethics investigations for their refusal to comply with congressional subpoenas, the House Jan. 6 committee said Monday in the culmination of a monthslong standoff over their testimony.
Oliver O’Connell21 December 2022 00:15
Jan 6 charges on Trump would be ‘terribly divisive’ says Pence
“I hope the Justice Department understands the magnitude, the very idea of indicting a former president of the United States,” Former Vice President Mike Pence said. “I think that would be terribly divisive in the country at a time when the American people want to see us heal.”
Oliver O’Connell20 December 2022 23:15
What do we already know about the contents of the Jan 6 committee report?
After 18 months of investigations, hundreds of witness interviews, and nine blockbuster public hearings, the House January 6 select committee has issued the first summary of what promises to be an eight-chapter report on former president Donald Trump’s attempt to overturn results of the 2020 election and the riotous attack on the Capitol that ensued as a result.
On Monday, the panel voted unanimously to approve the full report that will be released on Wednesday, along with the majority of evidence it has collected since it began its’ probe in July 2021.
Here’s what we know from the executive summary, released on Monday:
Oliver O’Connell20 December 2022 22:15
