The House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol played a video featuring Donald Trump.
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The FBI raided the Virginia home of Jeffrey Clark, a former Justice Department official who worked closely with Donald Trump to try to keep him in office, just before the House hearing on Thursday.
During the hearing, which followed the FBI raid, it was revealed that Clark was trying to help Trump. The raid is significant because it shows that the Justice Department may be investigating Trump and his associates for their attempt to stage a coup.
The people who were part of the mob that took over the U.S. Capitol were the focus of the Justice Department's investigation. Many of the low-level rioters were charged by federal prosecutors, which led to criticism that Attorney General Garland wasn't going after the people who actually inciting the insurrection.
Garland and the Justice Department began to move against the leadership of the insurrection after prosecutors charged the leader of the Proud Boys and other members with seditious conspiracy. The raid on Clark's house suggests that the Justice Department is investigating the repeated attempts by Trump and his allies to overturn the election.
The evidence of a broader Justice Department investigation comes as the House January 6 committee has far exceeded expectations for its public hearings, uncovering damning evidence of the lengths that Trump was willing to go to remain in power The hearings have become something like a criminal referral to the DOJ. It would be hard for Garland to not act in the face of the facts.
Gathering evidence from and about Clark would be a good place to start a case against Trump.
Clark is a conservative lawyer in Washington, D.C. He joined the Trump Justice Department as an assistant attorney general for the environmental and natural resources division, where he sought to delay bringing charges against the operator of a North Dakota gas line.
Clark was willing to do anything to keep the president in office. In the midst of Trump trying to overturn the election, Clark wanted Trump to take over the Justice Department and fire the acting attorney general. He was going to issue a letter to state officials in Georgia claiming that the Justice Department had found evidence of election fraud and that the Georgia state legislature should be called into a special session to reopen the debate about who won the presidential election there. The Justice Department did not find evidence of election fraud. Clark had to know that Trump had been told by senior Justice officials that there was no proof.
According to testimony from former Justice Department officials at Thursday's hearing, Trump was told by senior Justice Department officials that there was no evidence that he wanted Clark to run the Justice Department.
Eric Herschmann told the House committee that if Clark took over at the Justice Department, he would be guilty of a crime. It is possible that the FBI raid on Clark's home was related to the case against Trump. Is Trump and Clark guilty of a seditious conspiracy, like the Proud Boys?
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