| | | Jan 6 Committee's intel could be used to sue Trump into oblivion — even if he isn't charged with a crime: report
Matthew Chapman
June 08, 2022
On Wednesday, The Daily Beast reported that even if President Donald Trump is never indicted or convicted over the revelations from the January 6 Committee, it could still provide fodder for civil liability that could be used to bankrupt the former president under a mountain of litigation.
"While it’s doubtful the hearings will meet the sky-high expectations of those who believed the committee would expose open-and-shut wrongdoing from some of the nation’s top officials, the prime-time hearings will deliver one thing: evidence for many of the lawsuits seeking to make former President Donald Trump and other election denialists actually pay for the violence," reported Jose Pagliery. "'What the committee can't do is hold people accountable. But that’s where criminal prosecutions and civil litigation comes in,' said Edward G. Caspar, an attorney representing injured and traumatized Capitol Police officers who are suing Trump after the violence insurrection."
As the report noted, the committee will be revealing a treasure trove of information for anyone who wants to pursue Trump civilly.
"According to the panel, it has interviewed more than 1,000 witnesses and collected at least 140,000 documents, obtained through subpoenas and delivered under oath," said the report. "Attorneys working on cases against Trump are already considering how to get that evidence — in some cases, videos or interview transcripts — into a form that’s admissible in court for their cases. Luckily for those attorneys, the witnesses who spoke to the committee were already under oath when they testified."
The report also suggests that the liability could extend to members of Congress closely allied with Trump's efforts to overturn the election, like Rep. Mo Brooks (R-AL).
"One of the attorneys on [Congressman Eric] Swalwell’s legal team, Phil Andonian, thinks new evidence might persuade the judge that there’s a strong enough case that the Republican congressman bore some responsibility for the damage at the Capitol," said the report. "It was already known that Brooks, a Trump loyalist who peddled all kinds of disproven voter fraud claims, wore a bulletproof vest on the morning of Jan. 6 when he told riled up protesters near the White House that their ancestors had 'sacrificed their blood… and sometimes their lives.'"
According to previous reporting, Trump, who has repeatedly tried to paint the committee as illegitimate, has considered making a public appearance of some sort to try to build a counternarrative against the committee's findings — but hasn't made a determination on it one way or the other.
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