The congressional committee that investigated last year's attack on the US Capitol recommended that criminal charges be filed against former president Donald Trump.

The House panel unanimously urged on Monday the Justice Department to pursue Trump for inciting an insurrection, obstruction of an official proceeding, conspiring to defraud the US government and making false statements.

"The committee has developed significant evidence that president Trump intended to disrupt the peaceful transition of power under our Constitution," Representative Jamie Raskin said as he outlined the panel's findings.

"We believe that the evidence described by my colleagues today, and assembled throughout our hearings, warrants a criminal referral of former President Donald J. Trump," Raskin said.

The committee's recommendations to the Justice Department will end up with a special counsel appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland to look into Trump's role in the Capitol riot and his efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election won by Democrat Joe Biden.

'Fake charges'

Donald Trump accused House lawmakers of recommending "fake charges" against him as part of an attempt to prevent him from running for the White House again.

"The fake charges made by the highly partisan Unselect Committee of January 6th have already been submitted, prosecuted, and tried in the form of Impeachment Hoax #2," Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform. "I WON convincingly."

"This whole business of prosecuting me is just like impeachment was -- a partisan attempt to sideline me and the Republican Party," he said.

Source: TRT World 

BDST: 1305 HRS, DEC 20, 2022
MN