华盛顿——一个调查1月6日国会大厦暴动的国会委员会周四对特朗普的亲密顾问史蒂夫·班农采取了积极行动，迅速安排投票，建议对这位前白宫助手藐视传票后提出刑事藐视指控。
特别委员会主席本尼·汤普森议员。，该委员会将于周二投票，建议对班农提出指控，班农是唐纳德·特朗普在两个世纪以来对国会最严重的攻击之前，他与总统保持联系。
汤普森在一份声明中说:“特别委员会不会容忍无视我们的传票。他说，班农“隐藏在前总统关于他声称援引的特权的不充分、笼统和模糊的声明背后”。我们完全拒绝他的立场。”
如果获得民主党多数党委员会的批准，刑事指控的建议将提交给众议院全体议员。那里的批准将把他们送到司法部，司法部对起诉有最终决定权。
与班农的摊牌只是广泛且不断升级的国会调查的一个方面，迄今已发出19份传票，数千页文件流向委员会及其工作人员。挑战班农的挑衅行为对该小组来说是至关重要的一步，该小组的成员发誓要恢复国会传票的效力，此前在特朗普执政期间，这些传票经常遭到藐视。
该委员会原定于周四向班农作证，但他的律师表示，特朗普指示他不要遵守，理由是信息可能受到总统行政特权的保护。班农在1月6日不是白宫工作人员，他也没有在上周截止日期前向专家组提供文件。
尽管如此，在特朗普政府官员多年拒绝与国会合作后，该委员会可能会再次陷入困境。这位特朗普的长期顾问在2018年共和党领导的对特朗普与俄罗斯关系的调查中同样藐视传票，但众议院没有采取行动对他进行蔑视。
即使总统乔·拜登一直支持委员会的工作，不确定司法部是否会选择对班农或任何其他可能违抗陪审团的证人提起藐视法庭的刑事指控。即使司法部真的起诉了，这个过程也可能需要几个月，甚至几年。而这样的藐视案件是出了名的难赢。
委员会成员向该部门施压，要求他们站在自己一边。
众议院情报委员会主席亚当·希夫也是1月6日小组成员，他说，他预计司法部将起诉这些案件。
“过去四年给了像史蒂夫·班农这样的人一种凌驾于法律之上的印象，”希夫在接受下周末播出的C-SPAN图书电视采访时说。“但他们会发现不是这样。”
希夫说，在俄罗斯调查期间，试图以藐视法庭罪起诉班农等人的努力遭到了共和党人和特朗普政府司法部的阻挠。
希夫说:“但现在我们有了梅里克·加兰，我们有了独立的司法部，我们有了相信法治的司法部长——所以这就是为什么我有信心我们会得到答案的原因。
虽然班农公然藐视1月6日的委员会，但其他被传唤的特朗普助手似乎正在谈判。委员会的一名助手说，原定于周四由第二名证人、前国防部官员卡什亚普·帕特尔进行的证词被推迟，但帕特尔仍在与陪审团接触。这名助手要求匿名，以便讨论秘密会谈。
另外两名为特朗普工作的人——前白宫办公厅主任马克·梅多斯和长期担任特朗普社交媒体主管的丹·斯卡维诺——原定于周五作证，但他们都被推迟了。这位助手说，梅多斯和帕特尔一样，被“短暂推迟”，因为他也在与陪审团接触，斯卡维诺的作证被重新安排，因为他的传票送达出现延误。
除了他的律师试图维护行政特权之外，尚不清楚特朗普试图在多大程度上影响他的助手。这位前总统在周四的一份声明中表示，该委员会的成员应该“对自己进行刑事藐视”，并补充说“人民不会支持它!”
其他目击者也在配合，包括一些在暴乱前组织或安排特朗普在白宫后面椭圆广场集会的人。该委员会传唤了11名集会组织者，并给了他们周三上交文件和记录的最后期限。他们也被要求出席预定的作证。
遵守规定的人包括林登·布伦特纳尔(Lyndon Brentnall)，他的公司被雇来为当天的椭圆活动提供安保，以及特朗普竞选团队和白宫的两名长期工作人员梅根·鲍尔斯(Megan Powers)和汉娜·萨利姆(Hannah Salem)。目前还不确定其他被传唤的人是否已经照办。
1月6日，许多冲进国会大厦的暴徒在参加了特朗普的至少一部分集会后，走上了国家广场，在那里，特朗普重申了他对选举欺诈的无理指控，并恳求人群“像地狱一样战斗。”特朗普的支持者压倒了数十名警察，他们冲破门窗，中断了对拜登胜利的认证，数十名警察受伤。
暴徒在国会大厦游行时重复了特朗普关于普遍存在欺诈的说法，尽管选举结果得到了州官员的确认和法院的支持。特朗普的司法部长威廉·巴尔曾表示，司法部没有发现可能推翻选举结果的广泛欺诈证据。
该小组还向一名前司法部律师发出传票，该律师将自己定位为特朗普的盟友，并帮助共和党总统努力挑战2020年大选的结果。
周三，该律师杰弗里·克拉克(Jeffrey Clark)宣布要求提供文件和证词，这反映出该委员会不仅努力调查这场叛乱，还努力调查在此之前几周扰乱司法部的骚乱，因为特朗普及其盟友依赖政府律师推进他的选举主张。
特朗普政府的助理司法部长克拉克已经成为一个举足轻重的人物。上周发布的一份参议院委员会报告显示，他支持特朗普撤销选举结果的努力，并因此与抵制压力的部门上级发生冲突，最终导致一场戏剧性的白宫会议，特朗普在会上反复思考将克拉克提升为司法部长。
Jan. 6 panel moves against Bannon, sets contempt vote
WASHINGTON -- A congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6 Capitol insurrection moved aggressively against close Trump adviser Steve Bannon on Thursday, swiftly scheduling a vote to recommend criminal contempt charges against the former White House aide after he defied a subpoena.
The chairman of the special committee, Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., said the panel will vote Tuesday to recommend charges against Bannon, an adviser toDonald Trumpfor years who was in touch with the president ahead of the most serious assault on Congress in two centuries.
“The Select Committee will not tolerate defiance of our subpoenas,” Thompson said in a statement. Bannon, he said, is “hiding behind the former president’s insufficient, blanket and vague statements regarding privileges he has purported to invoke. We reject his position entirely.”
If approved by the Democratic-majority committee, the recommendation of criminal charges would go to the full House. Approval there would send them to the Justice Department, which has final say on prosecution.
The showdown with Bannon is just one facet of a broad and escalating congressional inquiry, with 19 subpoenas issued so far and thousands of pages of documents flowing to the committee and its staff. Challenging Bannon's defiance is a crucial step for the panel, whose members are vowing to restore the force of congressional subpoenas after they were routinely flouted during Trump’s time in office.
The committee had scheduled a Thursday deposition with Bannon, but his lawyer said Trump had directed him not to comply, citing information that was potentially protected by executive privileges afforded to a president. Bannon, who was not a White House staffer on Jan. 6, also failed to provide documents to the panel by a deadline last week.
Still, the committee could end up stymied again after years of Trump administration officials refusing to cooperate with Congress. The longtime Trump adviser similarly defied a subpoena during a GOP-led investigation into Trump’s Russia ties in 2018, but the House did not move to hold him into contempt.
Even though PresidentJoe Bidenhas been supportive of the committee’s work, it is uncertain whether the Justice Department would choose to prosecute the criminal contempt charges against Bannon or any other witnesses who might defy the panel. Even if it the department does prosecute, the process could take months, if not years. And such contempt cases are notoriously difficult to win.
Members of the committee are pressuring the department to take their side.
House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, who also sits on the Jan. 6 panel, said he expects the Justice Department to prosecute the cases.
“The last four years have given people like Steve Bannon the impression they’re above the law,” Schiff said during an interview for C-SPAN’s Book TV that airs next weekend. “But they’re going to find out otherwise.”
Schiff said efforts to hold Bannon and others in contempt during the Russia investigation were blocked by Republicans and the Trump administration’s Department of Justice.
“But now we have Merrick Garland, we have an independent Justice Department, we have an attorney general who believes in the rule of law -- and so this is why I have confidence that we will get the answers,” Schiff said.
While Bannon has outright defied the Jan. 6 committee, other Trump aides who have been subpoenaed appear to be negotiating. A deposition by a second witness that had been scheduled for Thursday, former Defense Department official Kashyap Patel, was delayed, but Patel is still engaging with the panel, a committee aide said. The aide requested anonymity to discuss the confidential talks.
Two other men who worked for Trump — former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and longtime Trump social media director Dan Scavino — were scheduled for depositions Friday, but they have both been pushed back as well. Meadows, like Patel, has been given a “short postponement” as he is also engaging with the panel, the aide said, and Scavino’s deposition has been rescheduled because there were delays in serving his subpoena.
It is unclear to what extent Trump has tried to influence his aides, beyond his lawyers' attempts to assert executive privilege. In a statement Thursday, the former president said the members of the committee should “hold themselves in criminal contempt” and added “the people are not going to stand for it!”
Other witnesses are cooperating, including some who organized or staffed the Trump rally on the Ellipse behind the White House that preceded the riot. The committee subpoenaed 11 rally organizers and gave them a Wednesday deadline to turn over documents and records. They have also been asked to appear at scheduled depositions.
Among those complying was Lyndon Brentnall, whose firm was hired to provide Ellipse event security that day, and two longtime Trump campaign and White House staffers, Megan Powers and Hannah Salem. It is uncertain whether any of the others subpoenaed have complied.
Many of the rioters who stormed the Capitol on Jan. 6 marched up the National Mall after attending at least part of Trump’s rally, where he repeated his meritless claims of election fraud and implored the crowd to “fight like hell.” Dozens of police officers were injured as the Trump supporters overwhelmed them and broke through windows and doors to interrupt the certification of Biden’s victory.
The rioters repeated Trump’s claims of widespread fraud as they marched through the Capitol, even though the results of the election were confirmed by state officials and upheld by courts. Trump’s attorney general, William Barr, had said the Justice Department found no evidence of widespread fraud that could have overturned the results.
The panel has also issued a subpoena to a former Justice Department lawyer who positioned himself as Trump’s ally and aided the Republican president’s efforts to challenge the results of the 2020 election.
The demands for documents and testimony from that lawyer, Jeffrey Clark, announced Wednesday, reflect the committee’s efforts to probe not only the insurrection but also the tumult that roiled the Justice Department in the weeks leading up to it as Trump and his allies leaned on government lawyers to advance his election claims.
Clark, an assistant attorney general in the Trump administration, has emerged as a pivotal character. A Senate committee report issued last week showed that he championed Trump’s efforts to undo the election results and clashed as a result with department superiors who resisted the pressure, culminating in a dramatic White House meeting at which Trump ruminated about elevating Clark to attorney general.
