January 6th Committee looking at criminal referral against Donald Trump for wire fraud and other charges
The January 6th Committee was always going to end up targeting Donald Trump for his crimes, but what exactly was that going to look like? Now we’re getting that answer, and it’s shaping up to be a doozy.
The committee is looking at whether it has enough evidence to make a criminal referral against Donald Trump for multiple felonies, including obstruction of Congress (for sending his supporters to disrupt the election certification process), to wire fraud (for raising a quarter billion dollars on the lie that the election was stolen).
This is according to a remarkable report tonight from the New York Times, which spells out that the January 6th Committee really is looking to put Donald Trump in federal prison. The committee can’t force the Department of Justice to criminally indict Trump, but in reality a viable criminal referral would go a long way toward prompting the DOJ to take action. For instance, after the committee referred Steve Bannon for criminal contempt, he was indicted and arrested three weeks later.
Of course the committee will still need to comprehensively build its case against Donald Trump before making such a referral, so as to make it easier for the DOJ to say yes to prosecuting him (or to make it harder for the DOJ to say no). And as a practical matter the committee will first need to make its case to the American people, which will come in the form of televised hearings after the holidays; the majority of the public needs to be on board with the notion that Trump committed these crimes and needs to be prosecuted for them.
But we now have a very clear picture of where this is all heading. Also keep in mind that the January 6th Committee itself is very likely the source of tonight’s New York Times article. The committee wouldn’t be putting it out there publicly that it’s looking to ring Trump up for these specific kinds of crimes unless it fully expects to amass (or already has amassed) enough evidence to prove Trump guilty of these crimes in a court of law and in the court of public opinion.
