On Thursday's edition of CNN's "OutFront", former federal prosecutor Shan Wu weighed in on the House January 6th Committee's new threat to hold former Trump chief of staff Mark Meadows in contempt of Congress — and the implications given that former White House adviser Steve Bannon's contempt referral still hasn't been acted on by the Justice Department.
"Let's just talk about the January 6th Committee," said anchor Erin Burnett. "They want to go ahead and maybe move to try to slam Mark Meadows with contempt if he doesn't show up tomorrow and speak, and there's no indication that he's going show up tomorrow and speak. So do you think there's teeth to what they say, given that the DOJ hasn't yet said anything about going ahead with a charge on Bannon?"
"I think there is teeth to what they say, Erin," said Wu. "You know, they can't control what DOJ does. They can make a criminal referral, and they should in this case. Or they could make the request for the civil referral, but that would be pretty slow going for them. So I don't think they're going to consider whether the AG has acted yet."
"The important thing to remember, I think, we often forget is that he's got to show up," added Wu. "He can show up and assert privileges, but this idea that he can just sit back and say, I'm not going to show up because I'm listening to the former president, that's obviously contempt of Congress, so they definitely should refer that."
Watch below:
Shan Wu on Mark Meadows' possible contempt of Congresswww.youtube.com