Republican says evidence supports criminal charges against Donald Trump

A Wyoming congresswoman said a select committee of Congress would be justified in referring former President Donald Trump for prosecution on charges of obstructing a congressional proceeding and conspiring to defraud the American people.

“It’s absolutely clear that what President Trump was doing — what a number of people around him were doing — that they knew it was unlawful. They did it anyway,” said Rep. Liz Cheney, the daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney and a member of the House Jan. 6 investigative committee.

Cheney, a Republican who represents Wyoming, rejected a report that there is a dispute among members of the Jan. 6 House select committee about whether to make a criminal referral to the Department of Justice (DOJ) for Trump.

The members are at odds over whether the referral, which is mostly symbolic, would have an adverse effect by staining the DOJ’s ongoing investigation.

Asked by co-anchor Jake Tapper on CNN’s “State of the Union” about the report of disagreement among committee members, Cheney rejected the characterization of the situation as a dispute.

“There’s a dispute on your committee, as I don’t need to tell you, some people feel like a referral, which actually has no legal weight, would only taint the process under which Attorney General Merrick Garland might act. Some feel that that’s the wrong argument, that right is right, and the committee has the evidence it has. Where do you come down?” Tapper asked.

“There’s not really a dispute on the committee,” Cheney responded.

“The committee is working in a really collaborative way to discuss these issues, as we are with all of the issues we’re addressing, and we’ll continue to work together to do so. So I wouldn’t characterize there as being a dispute on the committee,” Cheney added.

She called the panel, made up of seven Democrats and two Republicans, “the single most collaborative committee on which I’ve ever served.”

“I’m very proud of the bipartisan way in which we’re operating, and I’m confident that we will work to come to agreement on all of the issues that we’re facing. So I wouldn’t say that it’s accurate right now to say that there’s a dispute on this issue,” she added.

Asked by Tapper if the committee has enough evidence to refer Trump for criminal charges, Cheney said “we have not made a decision about referrals on the committee.”

The top Republican on the January 6th Committee said Trump’s embrace of his supporters convicted of crimes related to the attack sends a dangerous message and his public comments have exposed him for being culpable for various crimes.

“Some of those people have been charged with things like seditious conspiracy,” said Cheney. “He uses the same language that he knows caused the January 6th violence, and I think that it tells us that he clearly would do this all again if he were given the chance.”