In another sign of the Justice Department’s increasing scrutiny of former President Donald Trump’s attempt to overturn the 2020 election, it was revealed on Wednesday that a federal grand jury issued a subpoena to the National Archives for all of the records it provided to the House Select Committee to Investigate the Jan. 6 Attack on the U.S. Capitol.
A copy of the subpoena was first obtained and reported by The New York Times.
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The subpoena was first sent to the National Archives this May. According to the Times, it requested “all materials in whatever form” the agency had provided to the select committee, including White House records like Trump’s daily schedule, phone logs, and a draft copy of the speech Trump delivered at the Ellipse on Jan. 6, 2021. Files and other correspondence tied to Trump’s former Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, his Senior Adviser Stephen Miller, and White House Counsel Patrick Philbin are also included. The subpoena would seem to cover an entire cache of records featuring about 770 pages Trump previously tried to shield.
Beyond the schedule, phone logs, and draft speech, it is unclear exactly what else may be included in the batch of records subpoenaed, but regardless, as the Times noted, this move by prosecutors indicates they believe the records may contain evidence of a crime.
Important to note: This grand jury subpoena and its underlying investigation are not connected to the Justice Department’s probe of Trump’s handling of presidential records and the FBI's search of Mar-a-Lago.
Trump previously tried to shield these records from the select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack but failed after a lengthy legal battle that led all the way to the U.S. Supreme Court.
The select committee first asked that the National Archives produce Trump’s presidential records in August 2021 but Trump stepped in, arguing the transfer should not be approved because the documents were protected by executive privilege.
But the high court disagreed, issuing an 8-1 decision affirming that the public interest outweighed Trump’s push to keep the select committee’s eyes off his records.
A grand jury subpoena was also recently sent to former White House counsel Eric Herschmann that was tied to the Justice Department’s investigation of the U.S. Capitol attack. Herschmann had intimate insights into the former president’s push to appoint bogus electors. He wasn’t alone in receiving a subpoena, either. At least four other former White House officials have been asked to testify to a grand jury about Jan. 6, including former White House attorney Pat Cipollone; his deputy Patrick Philbin; Greg Jacob, the counsel for former Vice President Mike Pence Greg; and Pence Chief of Staff Marc Short.
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