The House Select Committee investigating the January 6th Capitol riots is due to release its final report in the coming weeks, and veteran Politico legal reporter Kyle Cheney thinks it will amount to a criminal referral against former President Donald Trump.
Writing on Twitter, Cheney breaks down the significance of whether the report includes actual criminal referrals against the former president and his allies for their attempts to illegally cling onto power after losing the 2020 election.
Overall, Cheney says that a technical criminal referral to the United States Department of Justice matters much less than the evidence the committee presents.
"The committee can (and I expect they will) conclude crimes were committed in their final report," he writes. "Calling it a ‘referral,’ which is not an actual recognized process, is not necessary to conclude crimes were committed."
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Cheney also argues that the committee's report will simply be added to criminal investigations into Trump and his allies that have been ongoing for several months.
"Prosecutors have been clamoring for the committee’s evidence since April," he notes. "They’re going to pore over every word of it and compare it to their own witness interviews to make prosecutorial judgments. Referrals don’t change that calculus."