(WASHINGTON) — Republican Rep. Barry Loudermilk, chairman of the House Administration’s subcommittee on Oversight, in a new report suggests former GOP Rep. Liz Cheney should be investigated for alleged criminal witness tampering, claiming she played an “integral role” shaping key witness testimony before the Jan. 6 committee investigating the attack on the U.S. Capitol by a pro-Trump mob.
President-elect Donald Trump posted early Wednesday morning on his social media platform that “Liz Cheney could be in a lot of trouble based on the evidence obtained by the subcommittee, which states that ‘numerous federal laws were likely broken by Liz Cheney, and these violations should be investigated by the FBI.”
Earlier this month, Trump, speaking about Jan. 6 committee members, said on NBC’s “Meet the Press” that, “for what they did, honestly, they should go to jail.”
The House GOP report released Tuesday marks not only the latest effort by House Republicans to discredit the Jan. 6 committee, but also a possible preview of its oversight efforts in the next session of Congress beginning in January.
Cheney’s name appears in the report more than 120 times, excluding the table of contents, going line-by-line to blast her participation as vice chair of the Jan. 6 committee.
“Without authority and against House Rules — the role of ranking member, Congress itself must right its former wrongs and declare this appointment of Representative Cheney invalid now,” the report states.
The report alleges that as Cheney participated in the investigation, she colluded with Cassidy Hutchinson, the former Trump White House aide, about her testimony describing then-President Trump’s efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election.
The report contends that Cheney not only “backchannelled” with Alyssa Farah Griffin, a former Trump White House aide and a host of ABC’s “The View,” to get Hutchinson to change her narrative but also communicated with her “directly for days.” After that, the report alleges that Cheney also convinced Hutchinson to fire her attorney, Stefan Passantino.
“According to text messages, that appear to be from the encrypted messaging app “Signal,” between Hutchinson and Farah Griffin obtained by the Subcommittee, Cheney agreed to communicate with Hutchinson through Farah Griffin,” the subcommittee said.
“It is unusual — and potentially unethical — for a Member of Congress conducting an investigation to contact a witness if the Member knows that the individual is represented by legal counsel,” the report states. “This appears to be precisely what Representative Cheney did at this time, and within a matter of days of these secret conversations, Hutchinson would go on to recant her previous testimony and introduce her most outlandish claims.”
“What other information was communicated during these phone calls may never be known, but what is known is that Representative Cheney consciously attempted to minimize her contact with Hutchinson in her book, and the most likely reason to try to bury that information would be if Representative Cheney knew that it was improper and unethical to communicate with Hutchinson without her counsel present,” the report states.
“It must be emphasized that Representative Cheney would likely have known her communications without the knowledge of Hutchinson’s attorney were illicit and unethical at that time,” the report said. Farah Griffin indicated as much … in her … message to Hutchinson … when she wrote that Representative Cheney’s “one concern” was that as long as Hutchinson was represented by counsel, “she [Cheney] can’t really ethically talk to you [Hutchinson] without him [Passantino].”
Despite Representative Cheney’s initial hesitation, the Subcommittee uncovered evidence of frequent, direct conversations between Hutchinson and Representative Cheney without Passantino’s knowledge, and also through their intermediary Farah Griffin.”Cheney responded in a statement stressing the testimony “was painstakingly” presented in thousands of pages of transcripts, made public along with a “highly detailed and meticulously sourced 800-page report.”
“Chairman Loudermilk’s ‘Interim Report’ intentionally disregards the truth and the Select Committee’s tremendous weigh of evidence, and instead fabricates lies and defamatory allegations in an attempt to cover up what Donald Trump did,” Cheney wrote. “Their allegations do not reflect a review of the actual evidence, and are a malicious and cowardly assault on the truth.”
Cheney also did not back off her role and the committee’s findings.
“January 6th showed Donald Trump for who [he] really is – a cruel and vindictive man who allowed violent attacks to continue against our Capitol and law enforcement officers while he watched television and refused for hours to instruct his supporters to stand down and leave,” she noted. “The January 6th Committee’s hearings and report featured scores of Republican witnesses, including many of the most senior officials from Trump’s own White House, campaign and Administration.”
Farah Griffin also disputed the GOP report’s conclusions.
“This report is full of inaccuracies and innuendo,” she said in a statement. “The report wrongly states – and without any evidence – that I acted as an intermediary between Cassidy Hutchinson and Liz Cheney for “a month.” That is not true, and these messages demonstrate the full extent of my involvement. Further, these messages weren’t ‘obtained’ by the Committee – they were requested by the Committee and voluntarily handed over to the Committee. I believe in Congressional oversight, whether it be the January 6th investigation or this inquiry.”
Trump has denied any wrongdoing in relation to Jan. 6.
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