The Washington Post - USA (2022-04-10)

SUNDAY, APRIL 10 , 2022. THE WASHINGTON POST EZ RE A

the intelligence community who

prompted the 2019

impeachment investigation into

Trump, keeping the intelligence

officer’s identity and

communications shielded from

Republicans. Republicans also

complained that Democrats

selectively released witness

testimony that bolstered their

case for impeachment while

other transcripts that

contradicted that case remained

under seal for weeks.

Republicans think Pelosi and

Democrats on the Jan. 6

committee were always going to

bend precedents to drive this

investigation wherever they

wanted, leaving GOP members

somewhat in the dark.

“The rules have to work the

best in the hardest cases, not

change the rules in the hardest

cases, and that’s exactly what

happened,” Armstrong, a former

federal public defender, said.

In hindsight, McCarthy’s

biggest mistake might have been

backing away from creating an

independent commission to

investigate the Capitol attack

along the lines of the 9/

commission.

As originally conceived, the

10-member panel of

nongovernment officials would

have been evenly divided with

five appointments each coming

from Democratic and

Republican congressional

leaders. Subpoenas would have

required bipartisan support, and

the panel would have had until

Dec. 31, 2021, to finish its work.

The legislation creating the

commission passed the House in

May, with just 35 GOP votes,

then died in the Senate as

Republicans filibustered the

proposal.

McCarthy, rather than

promising a clean slate next year

if Republicans win the majority,

has already laid out a plan of

vengeance and promised to

throw some Democrats off their

committees.

Armstrong wishes that were

not the case. Issa also hopes that

this practice will not become the

new normal.

“That is a decision that, I

hope, no speaker will ever do

again,” Issa said, “but if another

speaker does it, and says that’s

the precedent, then this body

will be less good for it.”

investigations.

Pelosi moved then-Rep. Elijah

E. Cummings (Md.) into the top

Democratic spot on the

oversight panel, giving Obama a

counterbalance to Issa. When

Republicans created a select

committee to investigate the

2012 attack on the U.S.

Consulate in Benghazi, some

pushed Pelosi to boycott — she

instead chose Cummings to run

point on the panel.

Cummings, who died in 2019,

paid a funny tribute to Issa

when the Oversight Committee

unveiled Issa’s portrait to go on

its wall of former chairs.

“Don’t be mad at that man,”

Cummings recalled his 88-year-

old mother telling him. “That

man done made you famous.”

But Issa blamed Pelosi for

starting this new fight over the

Jan. 6 committee. “There was

only one decision, which was her

decision to throw our selections

off — which is unprecedented,”

he said.

Under normal committee

investigations, the minority

party gets full participation in

witness interviews and an open

window into the documents

turned over to the panel. During

the first Trump impeachment

investigation, conducted by the

intelligence committee in the

fall of 2019, each side got one

hour to question a witness, then

45 minutes per side, until all

questions were asked.

Cummings and his staff had

similar access during the

Benghazi probe and gave the

Maryland Democrat a chance to

forcefully challenge Republican

attacks during public hearings.

Last summer McCarthy

weighed the same

considerations as Pelosi did over

the Benghazi panel. He decided

to submit the original five

names, trying to compile a cross

section of his conference. With

more than 60 percent of his

conference voting against

certifying President Biden’s

victory, he picked three who

voted that way on Jan. 6.

Some Republicans believe

that nothing would be different

if any McCarthy picks served on

the panel other than giving the

investigation a more bipartisan

appearance.

They point to how Democrats

handled the whistleblower from

have privately told him that it

was the “worst strategic

blunder” of McCarthy’s career.

Every few years the House

minority has been tempted to

boycott seemingly partisan

investigations of a president

from its party. Almost always the

minority has decided it was

better to be on the inside

scrapping with the majority —

rather than standing on the

outside wondering what was

happening behind closed doors.

“In a democracy the

opposition is more important

than the management, because

every government has people in

charge," said Rep. Darrell Issa

(R-Calif.). “Only democracies

have real opportunity for the

opposition to be heard.”

Issa first rose to fame as the

loyal opposition on the House

Oversight and Reform

Committee, the ranking

Republican in the first two years

of Barack Obama’s presidency.

His feisty work drew attention to

scandals from conservative

activists and, once the GOP took

the majority in early 2011, gave

Issa a platform to explore those

conservative voters, she said.

“I think what you are really

doing is you are allowing the

majority to silence entire

constituencies,” Armstrong said.

Some members of the

committee think McCarthy got a

short-term morale boost with

his decision but lost out in the

long run. “He made a huge

mistake pulling everybody off,

from a strategy perspective,”

Kinzinger said.

Raskin said that Republicans

three members who voted

against certifying President

Biden’s victory: Reps. Jim Banks

(Ind.), Jim Jordan (Ohio) and

Troy E. Nehls (Tex.). His other

two picks — Rep. Kelly

Armstrong (N.D.) and Rep.

Rodney Davis (R-Ill.) — voted to

certify Biden’s clear victory.

Pelosi rejected Jordan and

Banks without ever giving a full

explanation. Jordan has publicly

discussed that he was in contact

with Trump on Jan. 6 and, some

believe, should be a fact witness

in the probe, not an investigator.

In their places, Pelosi selected

two GOP exiles who broke

sharply against Trump, Reps. Liz

Cheney (Wyo.) and Adam

Kinzinger (Ill.), giving the

committee a bipartisan veneer.

McCarthy then decided none

of his chosen members would

serve on the committee.

“Could you have made an

argument that we should have

submitted a second set of

names? Possibly,” said

Armstrong. But replacing the

two staunch conservatives

aligned with Trump would have

set a bad precedent that silenced

One by one,
Republicans
eviscerated the
work of the House
committee
investigating the Jan. 6, 2021,
attack on the Capitol, each one
bemoaning the fact that the
chief congressional security
officials had not been
subpoenaed to examine that
day’s security lapses. Not
interviewing these key officials
was proof, they suggested, that
the committee was just out to
score political points against
Republicans.
Finally, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-
Md.) shut down that line of
debate on Wednesday with some
information these Republicans
did not seem to know. “We have
in fact interviewed precisely the
people they set up as a test for
the validity of our investigation,”
Raskin said.
Those top security officials
“didn’t need a subpoena” to
testify about that horrible day’s
events, Raskin said. “They came
voluntarily.”
The moment served as a
reminder for Republicans that
they have no insight into this
powerful committee’s inner
workings.
Without knowing precisely
what the committee is doing and
who it is talking to, Republicans
have struggled to prepare lines
of defense for former president
Donald Trump. Even more
important to their own personal
interests, dozens of GOP
lawmakers are left in the dark
about what evidence the
committee has collected
involving their own contacts
with Trump and his senior
advisers in the run up to, and
during, the attack on the
Capitol.
Republicans have refrained
from second-guessing House
Minority Leader Kevin
McCarthy (R-Calif.), publicly
supporting his decision to pull
out entirely from the Jan. 6
panel’s work once House
Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.)
rejected two of his initial five
choices for the committee. Pelosi
broke all precedent in that
move, as the majority and
minority party have traditionally
always picked their own slates
for congressional committees.
McCarthy’s picks included

House GOP leaders are in the dark about J an. 6 committee’s inner workings

@PKCapitol

PAUL KANE

JABIN BOTSFORD/THE WASHINGTON POST

The House panel investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol meets in October. Republicans

have struggled to prepare lines of defense for former president Donald Trump.

“He made a huge

mistake pulling

everybody off, from a

strategy perspective.”

Rep. Adam Kinzinger (R-Ill.), who is

on the panel, on House Minority

Leader Kevin McCarthy’s decision to

withdraw his slate of GOP members

following House Speaker Nancy

Pelosi’s unprecedented move to

reject two of his choices

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