One of the biggest challenges the House Select Committee investigating the January 6 Capitol insurrection has faced is that many former Trump administration officials have either refused to testify or invoked their Fifth Amendment privilege against self-incrimination.
But that may no longer be a hindrance, according to the New York Times, because the committee is ready to grant immunity in exchange for testimony and has already “flipped” six former staffers who are willing to tell what they know about the involvement of failed, one-term former President Donald Trump and others in what transpired:
Armed with reams of telephone records and metadata, the committee has used link analysis, a data mapping technique that former F.B.I. agents say was key to identifying terrorist networks in the years after the Sept. 11 attacks. The F.B.I. said it used a similar tactic last month to identify the seller of a gun to a man in Texas who took hostages at a synagogue.
Faced with at least 16 Trump allies who have signaled they will not fully cooperate with the committee, investigators have taken a page out of organized crime prosecutions and quietly turned at least six lower-level Trump staff members into witnesses who have provided information about their bosses’ activities.
As for those who continue to cling to the Fifth Amendment, the House panel also has a way to get their cooperation, the Times notes:
The committee is also considering granting immunity to key members of Mr. Trump’s inner circle who have invoked their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination as a way of pressuring them to testify.
Among the most important former staffers who might be convinced to tell what he knows if given immunity is former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, who was in contact with Trump, members of the Trump family, Fox News hosts, and GOP members of Congress as the rioting took place in the halls of Congress while the House and Senate met in joint session to certify the results of the 2020 presidential election.
Meadows and others can help fill in any missing information needed for criminal referrals to the Justice Department that would carry the name of Trump and his co-conspirators for the insurrection.
The Jan. 6 committee will begin holding public hearings in March.
