January 6 committee issues 10 more subpoenas, including to Stephen Miller and Kayleigh McEnany
By Annie Grayer, Zachary Cohen, Ryan Nobles and Whitney Wild, CNN
The House committee investigating the deadly January 6 riot at the US Capitol announced on Tuesday a new batch of 10 subpoenas to former White House officials under President Donald Trump, as the panel charges ahead in seeking testimony and documents from witnesses relevant to its probe.
The subpoenas follow six others that were announced Monday. Tuesday’s recipients are being asked to turn over documents to the committee on November 23, and depositions are scheduled throughout December. They are:
- Nicholas Luna, former President Donald Trump’s personal assistant
- Molly Michael, Trump’s special assistant to the President and Oval Office operations coordinator
- Ben Williamson, Trump’s deputy assistant to the President and senior adviser to then-chief of staff Mark Meadows
- Christopher Liddell, former Trump White House deputy chief of staff
- John McEntee, Trump’s White House personnel director
- Keith Kellogg, national security adviser to then-Vice President Mike Pence
- Kayleigh McEnany, former White House press secretary under Trump
- Stephen Miller, Trump senior adviser
- Cassidy Hutchinson, special assistant to the President for legislative affairs
- Kenneth Klukowski, former senior counsel to Assistant Attorney General Jeffrey Clark.
These new subpoenas build on efforts by the committee to reach more senior leadership within the Trump White House and target some former rank-and-file White House officials who had close relationships with Trump.
The chairman of the select committee, Democratic Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi said his panel “wants to learn every detail of what went on in the White House on January 6th and in the days beforehand. “
“We need to know precisely what role the former President and his aides played in efforts to stop the counting of the electoral votes and if they were in touch with anyone outside the White House attempting to overturn the outcome of the election,” Thompson said in a statement issued Tuesday.
The committee is pushing ahead with issuing subpoenas even though the Justice Department has not yet indicated whether prosecutors will pursue criminal contempt charges against Trump ally Steve Bannon for defying his congressional order to appear and provide testimony.
Stephen Miller
The committee notes in its letter to Miller that he, by his own account, “participated in efforts to spread false information about alleged voter fraud in the November 2020 election, as well as efforts to encourage state legislatures to alter the outcome of the November 2020 election by appointing alternate slates of electors.”
Miller and his team also helped prepare for Trump’s remarks at the Ellipse on January 6 prior to the riot, was at the White House that day, and was with the former President when he spoke at the “Stop the Steal” rally, the committee added.
Kayleigh McEnany
The committee’s subpoena of McEnany shows a specific interest in her public statements related to spreading misinformation about the 2020 election results. As press secretary, McEnany served in one of the most highly visible roles in the Trump administration. She spoke not only from the White House lectern, but also from the campaign headquarters as a spokesperson.
The committee specifically pointed to many of her public statements as contributing to the belief there was something wrong with the election.
McEnany “made multiple public statements from the White House and elsewhere about purported fraud in the November 2020 election. For example, in the first White House press conference after the election, Ms. McEnany claimed that there were ‘very real claims’ of fraud that the former President’s reelection campaign was pursuing, and said that mail-in voting was something that ‘we have identified as being particularly prone to fraud.’ At another press conference, Ms. McEnany accused Democrats of ‘welcoming fraud’ and ‘welcoming illegal voting,’ ” the panel said. In addition, McEnany was reportedly present at times with the former President as he watched the January 6 attack.
This story has been updated with additional developments Tuesday.
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