The indictment against Trump is a step further
At the last meeting of the commission of inquiry into the seizure of the Capitol on January 6, 2021, we can expect another blow.
How far does the committee go? The former US president at an event on November 18, 2022 in Mar-a-Lago, Florida.
Photo: Rebecca Blackwell (Keystone)
The indictment of former US President Donald Trump for his January 6, 2021 coup attempt is a step further. On Monday, a panel is expected to recommend for the first time that the former president be tried for the Capitol takeover. The House committee on the January 6 inquiry then meets to adopt its final report.
It will probably be one of the last official acts of the body that the House of Representatives had set up in the face of opposition from the vast majority of Republicans. Now that the Republicans are taking control of the big chamber, it’s high time for the Democrats to wrap up the work of the commission.
Since July 2021, he has presented the attack on American democracy in several spectacular auditions. He traced in detail how Donald Trump tried in various ways to overturn the outcome of the 2020 presidential election and at least accepted the sad January 6 climax with approval, if not planned it in advance.
Trump acted intentionally
Now a bang is again to be expected in the last session. After all this process, it is a formality that the committee recommends criminal charges against former president and new presidential candidate Trump. A subcommittee has already come out in favor of this during the preparation, as reported by the “Guardian”. Trump tried to interfere with Congress’ certification of the election results and did so knowing he was doing something wrong, the subcommittee argued. In his view, Trump acted with intent, a prerequisite for a criminal conviction.
However, we are impatiently awaiting how far the whole committee will go. A fraud charge against the United States is also under discussion. Apparently, some members even want Trump sued for “insurrection.” For this, US criminal law not only provides for a prison sentence of up to ten years, but also a life ban from holding public office. It’s also unclear whether the committee will also recommend charges against Trump employees and aides.
The special advocate works quickly
The Committee itself cannot institute criminal proceedings. But with his decisions, he increases the pressure on Attorney General Merrick Garland, who must make a decision on whether to indict him. The Justice Department has been investigating Jan. 6 for months, but so far Trump has not been charged. Meanwhile, a special counsel has taken over the Trump cases, veteran attorney Jack Smith. He seems to be progressing rapidly in his work. This week he invited election officials from seven states to take part in polls, in which Trump supporters refused to acknowledge the result and wanted to field competing voters.
The House of Representatives select committee will not formally decide until Monday whether or not to recommend an indictment. But the opinion of the members of the commission has already been clearly expressed during the hearings. Republican Liz Cheney once summed it up like this: “Donald Trump is a 76-year-old man, not an impressionable child, he is responsible for his actions.” It would be a huge surprise if Cheney, vice chair of the committee and thus ousted from the party in Wyoming and voted out of office, did not now campaign for an indictment of her nemesis.
Trump, who hopes his status as a candidate will shield him from such criminal charges, was able to console himself with yet another success this weekend. On Friday, he sold digital artworks that are also investment items, called NFTs. The images show Trump as a superhero, astronaut, and racing driver, in Trump’s words like baseball trading cards, simply digital and better.
The action was widely laughed at. Then in one day, Trump sold all 45,000 NFTs and pocketed nearly $4.5 million.
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