Lofgren on Trump criminal referral: Justice Department ‘has to make its own decision’

Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), a member of the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021 attack on the Capitol, argued on Sunday that it is not the role of Congress to make prosecutorial decisions as the Department of Justice (DOJ) faces mounting pressure to file charges against former President Trump in connection with the rioting.

When asked by moderator Margaret Brennan on CBS’s “Face the Nation” if the committee is laying a roadmap for the DOJ to prosecute Trump, Lofgren said the committee’s scope is limited to “laying out facts” and proposing legislative remedies.

“The Department of Justice has to make its own decision,” Lofgren said. “We’re laying out facts, they can see it. But I’m sure they have access to other information, because they’ve got grand juries, meeting with various defendants.”

The panel’s chair, Rep. Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.), last Monday said the panel would not be issuing formal criminal referrals to the Justice Department, but Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), the panel’s vice chair, soon after said the question of referrals remained unresolved.  

Meanwhile, more Democrats watching from the sidelines are calling on the committee to make a criminal referral for Trump to the Justice Department.

“It’s not the role of Congress to decide who gets prosecuted,” Lofgren said on Sunday, however.

Tensions between the Justice Department and the House Jan. 6 select committee last week slipped into public view amid the panel’s public hearings.

The heads of the Justice Department’s national security and criminal divisions and the U.S. attorney for D.C. sent a letter to the committee on Wednesday criticizing the panel for not releasing the transcripts for their witness interviews.

“We were surprised by that, frankly,” Lofgren said on Sunday. “And we will engage, we’re not going to be an obstacle to the Department of Justice.”

Thompson told reporters on Thursday that he did not intend to disrupt his own investigation by accelerating the timeline for releasing the transcripts, which the committee has said it will do publicly in September.

Lofgren on Sunday said the committee’s staff was already working “incredibly hard” but the panel would work to “be helpful” to the Justice Department.

“We will get particular information that they need over to them in an orderly way, certainly by the beginning of next month,” Lofgren said.