They think it might be seen as partisan. Lol.
The Washington Post reports:
The leaders of the House committee investigating the Capitol attack have grown divided over whether to make a criminal referral to the Justice Department of former President Donald J. Trump, even though they have concluded that they have enough evidence to do so, people involved in the discussions said.
The debate centers on whether making a referral — a largely symbolic act — would backfire by politically tainting the Justice Department’s expanding investigation into the Jan. 6 assault and what led up to it.
Since last summer, a team of former federal prosecutors working for the committee has focused on documenting the attack and the preceding efforts by Mr. Trump and his allies to reverse his defeat in the 2020 election. The panel plans to issue a detailed report on its findings, but in recent months it has regularly signaled that it was also weighing a criminal referral that would pressure Attorney General Merrick B. Garland to open a criminal investigation into Mr. Trump.
But now, with the Justice Department appearing to ramp up a wide-ranging investigation, some Democrats are questioning whether there is any need to make a referral — and whether doing so would saddle a criminal case with further partisan baggage at a time when Mr. Trump is openly flirting with running again in 2024.
The shift in the committee’s perspective on making a referral was prompted in part by a ruling two weeks ago by Judge David O. Carter of the Federal District Court for Central California. Deciding a civil case in which the committee had sought access to more than 100 emails written by John C. Eastman, a lawyer who advised Mr. Trump on efforts to derail certification of the Electoral College outcome, Judge Carter found that it was “more likely than not” that Mr. Trump and Mr. Eastman had committed federal crimes.
The ruling led some committee and staff members to argue that even though they felt they had amassed enough evidence to justify calling for a prosecution for obstructing a congressional proceeding and conspiring to defraud the American people, the judge’s decision would carry far greater weight with Mr. Garland than any referral letter they could write, according to people with knowledge of the conversations.
The members and aides who were reluctant to support a referral contended that making one would create the appearance that Mr. Garland was investigating Mr. Trump at the behest of a Democratic Congress and that if the committee could avoid that perception it should, the people said.
I hate to break the news but any criminal indictment is going to be seen as partisan regardless. They are already saying that the judge who made the fining earlier is a hack because he’s a Clinton appointee from California, which might as well be Beijing as far s they’re concerned.
Will it happen? Who knows? Here’s a piece from the Guardian in which former DOJ officials discuss the pitfalls and possibilities:
The attorney general, Merrick Garland, is facing more political pressure to move faster and expand the US Department of Justice’s investigation into the January 6 Capitol attack and charge Donald Trump and some of his former top aides.
With mounting evidence from the January 6 House panel, court rulings and news reports that Trump engaged in a criminal conspiracy in his aggressive drive to thwart Joe Biden’s election win in 2020, Garland and his staff face an almost unique decision: whether to charge a former US president.
Ex-justice officials caution, however, that while there’s growing evidence of criminal conduct by Trump to obstruct Congress from certifying Biden’s win on January 6 and defraud the government, building a strong case to prove Trump’s corrupt intent – a necessary element to convict him – probably requires more evidence and time.
In an important speech in January this year, Garland said he would hold “all January 6 perpetrators, at any level” accountable, if they were present at the Capitol that day or not, who were responsible for this “assault on our democracy”, which suggested to some ex-prosecutors that Trump and some allies were in his sights.
But rising pressures on Garland to move faster with a clearer focus on Trump and his top allies have come from Democrats on the House panel investigating the Capitol attack.
Those concerns were underscored this past week when the House sent a criminal referral to the justice department charging contempt of Congress by two Trump aides, trade adviser Peter Navarro and communications chief Dan Scavino, who refused to cooperate after being subpoenaed.
“We are upholding our responsibility, the Department of Justice must do the same,” panel member Adam Schiff said. Likewise, Congresswoman Elaine Luria urged Garland to “do your job so we can do ours.”
About four months ago, the House sent a criminal contempt of Congress referral to the justice department for the former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, but so far he has not been indicted.
Some former top DoJ officials and prosecutors, however, say Garland is moving correctly and expeditiously in pursuing all criminal conduct to overturn Biden’s election in its sprawling January 6 inquiry.
“When people (including many lawyers) criticize the DoJ for not more clearly centering the January 6 investigation on Trump, they are expressing impatience rather than a clear understanding of the trajectory of the investigation,” the former justice inspector general Michael Bromwich told the Guardian.
“DoJ is methodically building the case from the bottom up. It is almost surely the most complex criminal investigation in the nation’s history, involving the most prosecutors, the most investigators, the most digital evidence – and the most defendants,” he added.
Bromwich added that “people view the scores of ongoing criminal prosecutions of participants in the January 6 insurrection as somehow separate from the investigation of Trump. They are not. He is the subject of the investigation at the top of the pyramid. People need to carefully watch what is happening, not react based on their impatience.”
The department’s investigation is the biggest one ever. More than 750 people have been charged so far with federal crimes, and about 250 have pleaded guilty.
Still, concerns about the pace of the investigation – and why charges have not been filed against Trump – have been spurred in part by a few revelations over the last couple of months.
Last month, for instance, federal judge David Carter in a crucial court ruling involving a central Trump legal adviser, John Eastman, stated that Trump “more likely than not” broke the law in his weeks-long drive to stop Biden from taking office.
“Dr Eastman and President Trump launched a campaign to overturn a democratic election, an action unprecedented in American history,” Carter wrote in a civil case which resulted in an order for Eastman to release more than 100 emails he had withheld from the House panel.
Similarly, the January 6 select committee made a 61-page court filing on 2 March that implicated Trump in a “criminal conspiracy” to block Congress from certifying Biden’s win.
On another legal front that could implicate Trump and some top allies, the deputy attorney general, Lisa Monaco, revealed in January that the DoJ was starting a criminal investigation into a sprawling scheme – reportedly spearheaded by Trump’s ex-lawyer Rudy Giuliani and Trump campaign aides – to replace legitimate electors for Biden with false ones pledged to Trump in seven states that Biden won.
Further, the Washington Post reported late last month that the DoJ had begun looking into the funding and organizing of the January 6 “Save America” rally in Washington involving some Trump allies. Trump repeated his false claims at the rally that the election was stolen.
“We won this election, and we won it by a landslide,” Trump falsely told the cheering crowd. “You don’t concede, when there’s theft involved,” he said, urging the large crowd to “fight like hell”, shortly before the Capitol attack by hundreds of his supporters that led to 140 injured police and several deaths.