In an extraordinary move, the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol subpoenaed former President Donald Trump on Friday, putting the panel into a legal confrontation with Trump, who has slammed the committee as politicized.
The committee “assembled overwhelming evidence” that Trump “personally orchestrated and oversaw a multi-part effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election and obstruct the peaceful transition of power,” according to a letter the panel sent Trump signed by its chairman, Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss.
The letter, which comes a little more than a week after the panel voted to take the action, listed a number of allegations, including that the former president “maliciously” disseminated false allegations of voter fraud to raise money and overturn President Joe Biden’s victory.
Trump also attempted to “corrupt the Department of Justice,” the letter read.
“In short, you were at the center of the first and only effort by any U.S. President to overturn an election and obstruct the peaceful transition of power, ultimately culminating in a bloody attack on our own Capitol and on the Congress itself,” states the letter, which the committee published on Twitter.
The committee asked Trump to produce documents by Nov. 4 followed by “one or more days” of testimony “beginning on or about” Nov. 14.
