House Speaker Mike Johnson is forming a new panel to investigate the Democrat-led January 6 Committee amid allegations that members hid or destroyed evidence exonerating President Donald Trump.
The original committee was led by Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) and then-Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.). It was essentially hand-picked by then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.). At the time, she resorted to an unprecedented measure of refusing to allow the GOP minority to choose their own members for the panel, so then-House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) refused to participate at all.
Eventually, now-former GOP Rep. Adam Kinzinger of Illinois, who had also turned against Trump, joined Cheney on the committee.
Rep. Barry Loudermilk, a Republican from Georgia, will chair the upcoming select subcommittee, which will be part of the House Judiciary Committee.
Loudermilk conducted his own investigation into January 6 within the House Administration Committee and had long requested Johnson to separate the probe into its own entity.
Since the new panel will be a “select” subcommittee, that means the Speaker will have sole authority to decide which members of the House will sit on it.
It comes as several Republicans, including Johnson, have brushed off questions about President Trump’s decision to pardon nearly all of those who were convicted of participating in the riot at the U.S. Capitol Building on Jan. 6, 2021.
Most of those who were pardoned were convicted of low-level misdemeanors, though a few others were charged and convicted of assaulting police officers.
“House Republicans are proud of our work so far in exposing the false narratives peddled by the politically motivated January 6 Select Committee during the 117th Congress, but there is still more work to be done,” Johnson said in a statement. “We are establishing this Select Subcommittee to continue our efforts to uncover the full truth that is owed to the American people.”
In a statement, Loudermilk said he hoped to “uncover all the facts and begin the arduous task of making needed reforms to ensure this level of security failure may never happen again.”
In addition to security concerns, Republicans have been eager to continue investigating the original Jan. 6 select committee after previous investigations have turned up evidence that did not support Democrats’ initial narratives regarding Trump’s culpability or his alleged actions the day of the riot.
In December, Loudermilk released a report assessing the Jan. 6 committee’s “failures and politicization.” The report recommends a criminal investigation into Cheney, alleging that she may have engaged in witness tampering by communicating with Cassidy Hutchinson, a former White House aide and key witness.
In a statement at the time, Cheney said Loudermilk’s report “intentionally disregards the truth and the Select Committee’s tremendous weight of evidence, and instead fabricates lies and defamatory allegations in an attempt to cover up what Donald Trump did.”
The desire for prosecution may have contributed to former President Biden’s decision, just hours before the end of his presidency, to preemptively pardon the members of the Jan. 6 select committee and its staff, The Hill reported.
Those and other last-minute pardons have prompted suggestions that Republicans compel testimony or depositions from those who received pardons. This would remove a reason to refuse to answer questions by invoking a Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.
Loudermilk earlier this week suggested that Congress could subpoena former J6 select committee members for questioning despite the Biden pardons.
Asked if there is now an incentive to bring in the Jan. 6 select committee members for questioning, Loudermilk told The Hill: “I think definitely, this is a situation that we still got to dig a little deeper.”
“It’s also interesting, I think, to look at those he didn’t pardon,” Loudermilk added, a reference to Hutchinson.
