Jan. 6 committee requests interview with Ivanka Trump
Associated PressWASHINGTON — The House committee investigating the U.S. Capitol insurrection is asking Ivanka Trump, daughter of former President Donald Trump, to voluntarily cooperate as lawmakers make their first public attempt to arrange an interview with a Trump family member. In the letter, the committee chairman, Rep. Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., said Ivanka Trump was in direct contact with her father during key moments on Jan. 6, 2021, when Trump supporters stormed the Capitol in an effort to halt the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s presidential win. The committee says it wants to discuss what Ivanka Trump knew about her father’s efforts, including a telephone call they say she witnessed, to pressure then-Vice President Mike Pence to reject those results, as well as concerns she may have heard from Pence’s staff, members of Congress and the White House counsel’s office about those efforts. The other requests in the letter to Ivanka Trump concern conversations after Donald Trump’s tweeted, “Mike Pence didn’t have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution.” The committee said White House staff and even members of Congress requested Ivanka Trump’s help in trying to convince her father that he should address the violence and tell rioters to go home. “We are particularly interested in this question: Why didn’t White House staff simply ask the President to walk to the briefing room and appear on live television — to ask the crowd to leave the capital?” Besides the subpoenas issued this week, the committee had a victory Wednesday when the Supreme Court rejected a bid by Trump to block the release of White House records sought by lawmakers.