Former President Donald Trump unloaded his frustrations on Democrats and the January 6 committee in particular during an interview with the Washington Examiner over the weekend.
The ex-president appeared incensed at the targeting of Ivanka Trump, his eldest daughter, by the House select panel. Ms Trump, who served in the White House as an adviser for nearly four years, was contacted by the committee with a request for her voluntary cooperation with the committee’s investigation.
Speaking with the right-leaning publication, Mr Trump attacked Democrats for what he described as a politically-motivated campaign against him and his family.
“They are using whatever powers they have. They couldn’t care less. They are vicious people,” he said of Democrats and the January 6 panel specifically.
“It's a disgrace, what's going on. They're using these things to try and get people's minds off how incompetently our country is being run. And they don't care. They'll go after children,” he said.
Ms Trump is of course a full-grown adult and former White House staffer; nonetheless, Mr Trump has reacted with anger to the committee’s request for her testimony as well as the ongoing efforts of New York Attorney General Letitia James to investigate the Trump Organization, run by his sons Eric and Donald Jr.
His daughter’s testimony was not demanded by the committee via subpoena but that could change in the future should she decline their request.
On Thursday, the panel’s chairman Rep Bennie Thompson wrote that the committee planned to investigate the attempts by White House staff and other Trump supporters to spur Ms Trump and others within the president’s closest circle of advisers to convince the president to either call off his supporters or call in the National Guard during the January 6 siege on Congress.
The panel has obtained testimony indicating that Ms Trump, like White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, was a top recipient of desperate pleadings by other Trump allies who urged the president to act and deal with the attack as it occurred, according to Mr Thompson, who wrote that “members of the White House staff requested your assistance on multiple occasions to intervene in an attempt to persuade President Trump to address the ongoing lawlessness and violence on Capitol Hill.”
Ivanka Trump responded in a bizarre statement distancing herself from the rally attended by her father next to the White House on January 6, while not addressing the committee’s request directly.
“Ivanka Trump just learned that the January 6 Committee issued a public letter asking her to appear. As the Committee already knows, Ivanka did not speak at the January 6 rally,” said a spokesperson for Ms Trump.
“As she publicly stated that day at 3:15pm, ‘any security breach or disrespect to our law enforcement is unacceptable. The violence must stop immediately. Please be peaceful,’” the spokesperson noted.
Republicans have spent months minimising the findings of the Capitol riot committee after publicly resisting any attempts to set up a bipartisan commission to investigate the attack on Congress throughout 2021.
The panel currently has just two Republicans, both of whom are strong supporters of the investigation and top opponents of House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, complicating those efforts by the GOP to delay or otherwise hamper the committee’s work.
