Jan. 6 Committee Pushes to Hold Trump DOJ Official in Contempt

Citing both executive and attorney-client privilege, Jeffrey Clark refused to turn over documents demanded by a subpoena and declined to answer questions at his deposition.

The House select committee investigating the Capitol attack has announced that it will vote to recommend the criminal prosecution of top former Trump Justice Department official Jeffrey Clark after he defied a subpoena seeking his cooperation with the inquiry, reports The Guardian. The vote is expected to be unanimous and will be sent to the House of Representatives for approval.

The select committee issued a subpoena to Clark last month in order to understand how the Trump White House sought to co-opt officials at the Justice Department to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s election victory from taking place on 6 January. A Senate judiciary committee report detailed Clark’s efforts to abuse the justice department and threaten the then acting attorney general, Jeffrey Rosen, to support Trump’s attempts to overturn the 2020 election. Clark, citing executive and attorney-client privilege, refused to turn over documents demanded by the subpoena and declined to answer questions at his deposition.