MFormer US President Donald Trump wrote a 14-page letter of anger in response to a subpoena from the parliamentary investigative committee into the Capitol storming in early 2021. In the letter to committee chair Bennie Thompson, published on Truth Social on Friday, Trump berated the panel members, called the investigation a “witch hunt” and a “show trial,” and reiterated his widely debunked allegations of massive fraud in the 2020 presidential election will testify before the committee, the Republican did not state.
“Despite very poor television ratings,” the House of Representatives investigative committee held a “show trial the likes of which the country has never seen before,” Trump wrote to Thompson, emphasizing his “anger” and “disappointment.” The body disregards rule of law standards, has no “real” Republicans as members and has “no legitimacy” because it does not deal with the “massive voter fraud”. “It’s a witch hunt at the highest level, a continuation of what has been going on for years,” said Trump, who is flirting with another presidential nomination in 2024.
Rarely occurring escalation of investigations
At a public meeting on Thursday, the investigative committee voted to subpoena Trump. Chairman Thompson, after a unanimous vote by the nine committee members, said the ex-president must be “accountable to the American people.” It’s a rare escalation of investigations. However, it is considered unlikely that Trump will follow the subpoena, which could lead to legal disputes. At the initiative of the investigative committee, Trump’s former chief strategist Steve Bannon, who had refused to testify, had previously been accused of contempt for Congress and found guilty in a trial.
In his letter, Trump now writes that “radical left Democrats” founded the committee “to destroy the lives of many hard-working American patriots”. The body did not act against those responsible for the alleged election fraud, but against “concerned American citizens who have protested against the fraud”. Trump claimed to be writing on behalf of millions of Americans, indeed a “majority of the population,” who agree with him.
The letter is four pages long, Trump added ten pages listing alleged voter fraud in various states and photos of his supporters on January 6, 2021. In the letter, Trump complains that the U-Committee and the media never get involved the “massive size of the crowd” who attended his speech before the Capitol was stormed. Photos of the size of the crowd may have been “cancelled”.
Hundreds of radical Trump supporters stormed the Capitol when Democrat Joe Biden’s victory in the 2020 presidential election was to be finally confirmed there. In the weeks before, Trump had spread the false claim that massive election fraud had robbed him of a second term. In a speech immediately before the Capitol was stormed, he called on his followers to fight “whatever the hell”. Five people died as a result of the riots.
