The real reason Ivanka Trump is in talks to cooperate with the January 6th Committee
Earlier today it was reported that Rudy Giuliani has decided to sell out numerous congressional Republicans, but not necessarily sell out Donald Trump himself, as a way of trying to get the January 6th Committee off his back. This is a partial, yet huge, victory for the committee. It gives them a key inside witness to help take down insurrectionist House Republicans – some of whom may then turn around and flip on Trump.
We also predicted that a broader domino effect could now begin. There are only so many inside witnesses who are going to be able to get away with convincing the January 6th Committee to let them partially cooperate, or treat them with kid gloves as part of their cooperation. Once those spaces are used up on the bingo card, every other witness is going to have to decide whether to fully cooperate or get rung up for contempt.
Now the New York Times is reporting that Ivanka Trump is in talks to voluntarily testify to the January 6th Committee. Based on the way the Times article is phrased, it sounds like Ivanka’s camp is the source claiming she’s considering cooperating, and that the committee itself is somewhat skeptical about just how complete her “cooperation” might end up being.
But the parameters for this always end up being the same. If a Trump world person doesn’t want to have to testify, but believes he or she must sell out others in Trump world in order to get off the legal hook, that person will go ahead and cooperate. The extent of that cooperation will come down to how little or much that person believes is necessary in order to get off the hook.
In Ivanka’s case, she’s not known to have any criminal liability in relation to the Capitol attack, and is instead a material witness to Donald Trump’s actions on that day. If she refuses to cooperate, she could end up referred to the DOJ for criminal contempt, which would then put her in criminal jeopardy. But as best anyone can tell, she can get herself off the hook with regard to January 6th simply by giving cooperative testimony.
So the question comes down to whether Ivanka Trump believes she has to cooperate in order to avoid contempt charges, and how much cooperation she believes she has to provide in order to avoid those contempt charges. Does this mean she’ll testify against her father? If so, she may end up helping send him to prison. Or is she looking to pull a Rudy and only testify against people who aren’t named Trump? We’ll see what the committee gets out of this. But it’s progress. And the committee always retains the option of ringing these folks up for contempt in the end, if it turns out they’re just playing games.
