Reps. Liz Cheney (R-WY) and Elaine Luria (D-VA), both of whom serve on the Jan. 6 Select Committee, on Sunday outlined what new information they hope to gain ahead of additional hearings in September as the panel continues to expand its investigation.
During the committee’s public hearing on Thursday, committee vice chair Cheney announced that the panel will hold additional hearings in September because it has “considerably more to do” after receiving new evidence and having new witnesses come forward.
Asked about witnesses she would want the committee to interview in the future during an interview on CNN, Cheney said the panel has “many interviews” scheduled, which includes members of former President Trump’s cabinet and his campaign.
“We’re very focused as well on the Secret Service and on interviewing additional members of the Secret Service and collecting additional information from them,” Cheney said.
The committee subpoenaed the Secret Service recently in light of the agency’s handling of its text records that were received and sent on the day before and the day of the Capitol insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021. Department of Homeland Security inspector general Joseph Cuffari sent a letter to the House and Senate homeland security committees earlier this month informing them that the Secret Service had deleted texts from Jan. 5 and 6, 2021 after oversight officials had requested them. The Secret Service claimed it is unable to recover the deleted texts after the Jan. 6 Select Committee’s subpoena.
Cheney also said the committee is in contact with the legal counsel of Ginni Thomas, wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, and is “fully prepared to contemplate a subpoena” if she doesn’t come forward voluntarily. The panel hopes to speak with Thomas about her communications with former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows and conservative lawyer John Eastman about efforts to subvert the 2020 election results.
During an interview on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Luria also shed light on what new information the panel hopes to have by the time its hearings resume in September now that the “floodgates have opened.”
Luria said that although the committee’s original intent was for Thursday’s hearing to be the grand finale, their plans changed because “so many more witnesses have come forward.” The panel is also receiving and requesting new information, which includes information from the Secret Service, Luria said.
“Just a lot of questions still to be answered on that front,” Luria said. “So I think that’s something we’re still working through – taking in this new information, putting it on top of, laying it on top of what we’ve already presented.”
“So I think there’ll be some information that covers the whole span, but probably more in-depth and more conclusive about maybe some things we didn’t know as much about,” Luria continued. “I mean, there’s still so much out there that we don’t fully understand yet.”
Thursday’s primetime hearing featured witness testimony that demonstrated then-President Trump’s refusal to issue a public statement demanding his supporters leave the Capitol on Jan. 6, despite calls to do so by officials in his own administration as well as his own family.
Thursday’s hearing was the eighth of the committee’s public hearings outlining the panel’s case that the Capitol insurrection was a multi-step, concerted effort to overturn the election results — a push that was carried out by Trump and his allies.
