Trump will be summoned to appear before the commission investigating the assault on the Capitol

The US parliamentary commission that analyzes the role of Donald Trump in the assault on the Capitol on January 6, 2021, he voted unanimously on Thursday to summon the former president to appear before his members, being “obliged to answer for his actions.”

Donald Trump “is the person at the center of the story of what happened on January 6. So we want to hear from him,” Bennie Thompson said during a public hearing.

“He has to be held accountable. He has to answer for his actions,” he added.

The commission plans to “do everything possible to tell the fullest story possible and provide recommendations to help ensure that nothing like January 6 happens again in the future,” he continued.

Right away Trump he called the summons a “fiasco” and asked why he had not been called earlier to testify.

“Why didn’t the Select Committee ask me to testify months ago?” Trump said on his Truth Social platform after the decision by lawmakers investigating the Capitol assault.

“It has only served to further divide our country,” he added.

The mission of the panel, made up of seven Democrats and two Republicans, is to shed light on President Trump’s behavior before, during and after the attack on Capitol Hill, which shocked the entire world.

On January 6, 2021, supporters of Trump they broke into the headquarters of Congress to try to prevent legislators from certifying the victory of their Democratic rival, Joe Biden.

The tycoon continues to assure without proof that the victory was “stolen” from him.

On Thursday, before his shocking announcement, the commission had reconstructed the chronology of events, showing that the former president had planned “well in advance” to declare himself victorious in the 2020 elections, even before the results were released.

Democratic lawmaker Zoe Lofgren evoked “a premeditated plan by the president to declare his victory, whatever the actual outcome.” Her victory speech “was planned well in advance, before the votes were counted.”

“His intention was clear, to ignore the rule of law and stay in power,” said Republican Adam Kinzinger.

“Straight to Violence”

In support of their statements, the parliamentarians projected several videos of the former president, some of his relatives or former White House employees.

In footage taken just before the 2020 presidential election by a Danish documentary crew, Roger Stone, a longtime ally of the former Republican president, can be heard saying he doesn’t care about the vote.

“Fuck the vote, let’s go straight to violence,” he said.

Stone, who has not been charged in connection with the Jan. 6 incident, disputed the authenticity of the videos, saying they had been doctored.

The commission also played a recording of a call from Trump to Brad Raffensperger, Secretary of State of Georgia, in which the former president says that he “needs” about 11,000 ballots in his name, enough to beat his rival Biden in this southern state.

It also revealed elements of hundreds of thousands of pages provided by the Secret Service, the elite police force responsible for the close protection of high-ranking state officials.

The parliamentarians want to understand why SMS sent by the agents on the day of the assault were deleted.

The documents confirm evidence presented in previous hearings that Trump angered his supporters, even though they were briefed on the potential for violence, lawmaker Adam Schiff said.

Since its creation, the commission has questioned more than a thousand witnesses, including two sons of Donald Trump, and has finely combed tens of thousands of documents.

The investigative report is expected to be released later in the year, but probably not before the November 8 congressional elections, which will determine which party controls Congress for the remainder of President Biden’s term.

Panel members openly suggested that Attorney General Merrick Garland should indict Trump in connection with the attack on the Capitol.

The commission itself has not officially said whether it will recommend referrals to justice.

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