In the wake of the House Committee on House Administration releasing its interim report on the failures and politicization of the January 6 Select Committee, in which it accused former Rep. Liz Cheney of criminal witness tampering, amongst other crimes like perjury, and recommended that Cheney be arrested for those alleged crimes, Cheney lost it and sounded off on the investigation.
As background, the report compiled a great deal of evidence that then-Rep. Cheney illegally communicated with witness Cassidy Hutchinson, as she did so without the knowledge or permission of Hutchinson’s lawyer. “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 stated, at one point, after producing evidence showing those potentially unethical communications.
Later on, in the conclusion, the report called for Cheney to be investigated by the FBI. Beginning that call, it said, “Based on the evidence obtained by this Subcommittee, numerous federal laws were likely broken by Liz Cheney, the former Vice Chair of the January 6 Select Committee, and these violations should be investigated by the Federal Bureau of Investigation.”
Continuing, it reiterated what the alleged witness tampering consisted of, noting, “Evidence uncovered by the Subcommittee revealed that former Congresswoman Liz Cheney tampered with at least one witness, Cassidy Hutchinson, by secretly communicating with Hutchinson without Hutchinson’s attorney’s knowledge.”
Then, it noted what law it appears that former Rep. Cheney might have broken with those communications, saying, “This secret communication with a witness is improper and likely violates 18 U.S.C. 1512. Such action is outside the due functioning of the legislative process and therefore not protected by the Speech and Debate clause.”
In response to the report, former Rep. Cheney issued a statement released to Fox News Digital. Beginning the statement by going on the counter-offensive against President-elect Donald Trump, she said, “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.”
Continuing, Cheney snapped that the J6 committee’s report relied on a great deal of evidence, not commenting on the witness tampering allegations. She said, “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. All of this testimony was painstakingly set out in thousands of pages of transcripts, made public along with a highly detailed and meticulously sourced 800 page report.”
She concluded, finally getting to the allegations, “Now, Chairman Loudermilk’s ‘Interim 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. Their allegations do not reflect a review of the actual evidence, and are a malicious and cowardly assault on the truth. No reputable lawyer, legislator or judge would take this seriously.”
Watch Trump comment on the J6 Committee here:
Featured image credit: By Milonica – Own work, CC BY-SA 3.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=29255035
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