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WASHINGTON Investigators from both the Department of Justice and the House Jan. 6 committee appear to be edging closer to former President Donald Trump and his immediate family for their roles in the events leading up to that days violent assault on the Capitol.

In a federal court filing Tuesday, lawyer Bilal Essayli said prosecutors asked his client, Jan. 6 defendant Brandon Straka, about his connections to Trump personally.

The government was focused on establishing an organized conspiracy between defendant, President Donald J. Trump, and allies of the former president, to disrupt the joint session of Congress on January 6, Essayli wrote.

Straka, who spoke at a Stop the Steal rally in Washington the day before the Capitol attack, is awaiting sentencing for his involvement in the January 2021 insurrection, an attempt to overturn Trumps 2020 election loss. He was originally charged with a felony for egging on rioters to take away a police officers shield and to enter the building itself, but was allowed to plead to a misdemeanor disorderly conduct charge in exchange for his cooperation.

Meanwhile, the Jan. 6 committee on Tuesday issued subpoenas to three of Trumps lawyers involved in spreading his lies that he had actually won the election and suggesting extraconstitutional and possibly illegal means of remaining in power. Among them is personal lawyer Rudy Giuliani.

And the committee has also subpoenaed the phone call and text message logs of middle son Eric Trump, who spoke at the pre-insurrection rally near the White House and told the audience that Democrat Joe Biden had not actually won the presidency.

Eric Trump, through a spokeswoman for the family business, said Wednesday that he had nothing to conceal. The witch-hunt continues. This partisan committee is welcome to review my phone records, Eric Trump said in a statement. I have absolutely nothing to hide.

Bill Clark via Getty Images

In fact, the House committee is bipartisan, with two Republican members, although House Speaker Nancy Pelosi would not permit two other Republicans who had helped spread Trumps election lies from serving on the panel.

CNN and ABC have both reported that the committee has also subpoenaed the phone records of Kimberly Guilfoyle, the girlfriend of eldest son Donald Trump Jr. He, Guilfoyle and Eric Trumps wife, Lara Trump, also spoke at the Jan. 6 rally, as did Giuliani.

The former president capped off that event with a 72-minute speech in which he repeated his false claims that the election had been riddled with fraud and that he had actually won, and then urged the tens of thousands in attendance to march on the Capitol to pressure lawmakers and his own vice president to install Trump for a second term. We fight like hell. And if you dont fight like hell, youre not going to have a country anymore, he told them.

While federal prosecutors have charged some 700 Trump supporters in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack, the filing by Strakas lawyer is the first clear indication that investigators are looking for a link to Trump personally, and appears to back up a pledge by Attorney General Merrick Garland to pursue the investigation wherever it may go.

The Justice Department remains committed to holding all Jan. 6 perpetrators, at any level, accountable under law, whether they were present that day or were otherwise criminally responsible for the assault on our democracy, Garland said on the eve of the insurrections first anniversary. We will follow the facts wherever they lead.

And House Jan. 6 committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, in a statement accompanying the subpoenas of Trumps lawyers, said the panel is seeking to understand the pressure campaign to overturn the election. The four individuals weve subpoenaed today advanced unsupported theories about election fraud, pushed efforts to overturn the election results, or were in direct contact with the former president about attempts to stop the counting of electoral votes, said Thompson, a Mississippi Democrat.

A year ago, Trump became the first president to refuse to turn over power peacefully to his successor. He spent weeks attacking the legitimacy of the November 2020 contest that he lost. Hours after polls closed and it appeared that Biden would be the winner, Trump stated that he had really won in a landslide and that his victory was being stolen from him. Those falsehoods continued with a string of failed lawsuits challenging the results in a handful of states.

After the Electoral College voted on Dec. 14, making Bidens win official, Trump instead turned to a last-ditch scheme to pressure his own vice president into handing Trump the election during the pro forma congressional certification of the election results on Jan. 6.

Trump asked his followers to come to Washington that day and told the thousands who showed up that they should march to the Capitol to intimidate Mike Pence into doing what Trump wanted. When you catch somebody in a fraud, youre allowed to go by very different rules, Trump said.

Having a mob presence at the Capitol was key to two possible scenarios Trump and his allies were pushing: One, pressuring Congress and Pence into declaring Trump the winner notwithstanding the actual election results, or, two, delaying the certification vote long enough for GOP lawmakers in states won by Biden to send their own slate of Trump electors.

The mob of supporters stormed the building and chanted Hang Mike Pence when the vice president did not do Trumps bidding. The riot left five people dead, including a Capitol Police officer, and four other officers took their own lives in the following weeks and months.

Though the House impeached Trump for inciting the attack, all but seven Senate Republicans, led by Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, chose not to convict him thereby letting Trump continue his political career even as he is the subject of several investigations.

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Both DOJ And Jan. 6 Committee Closing In On Trump And His Family, New Filings Show - HuffPost

Hang Mike Pence! was the chilling chant of the mob at the US Capitol on 6 January 2021. Can the same constituency be persuaded to vote Mike Pence on 5 November 2024? He, for one, appears to think so.

The former vice-president this week travelled across New Hampshire, host of the first-in-the-nation presidential primary elections, to meet local activists, raise money and deliver a speech attacking potential opponent Joe Biden.

Pence, who has nursed White House ambitions since his teens, has also paid recent visits to the early-voting states Iowa, South Carolina and Nevada, implying that a run is more likely than not. But there is one problem.

Donald Trump.

The ex-president, whom Pence served faithfully or obsequiously, in the eyes of critics has not forgiven him for ignoring his plea to overturn the result of the 2020 election. That Pence, presiding over the Senate at it certified Bidens victory, had no such power has become irrelevant at this stage.

Pences continued insistence that he did his constitutional duty on 6 January has done little to assuage the sense of betrayal among livid Trump supporters. In June he was heckled as a traitor during a speech to a gathering of religious conservatives in Orlando, Florida hardly a positive omen.

His biggest challenge is the people that hes going to need to vote for him the Republican primary base are also the people who wanted to hang him on January 6, said Kurt Bardella, an adviser to the Democratic National Committee. I dont see how you overcome that.

Yet the former Indiana governor appears to be playing a long game, perhaps betting that Trumps influence over the party will wane over the next three years. He may also be calculating that the stand he made for democracy on 6 January a day on which he refused to flee the Capitol, taking cover in an underground car park will resonate with moderate Republicans and independents.

Mike Murphy, a Republican strategist in Indiana, said: Hes doing everything he needs to set himself up to run and, if Trump is not the nominee or is not running, I think hes clearly the frontrunner.

I think people are realising that he was an unlikely hero on January 6. In the end, even for people who disagree with him for many other policy positions hes taken, whether it was as a governor or as a vice-president, he did the right thing when the pressure was on on January 6.

Pences visit to New Hampshire was his second to the state, which has a huge say in choosing the party nominee, since leaving office. He attended holiday parties, raised money for state Republicans and posed for photos at at the Simply Delicious bakery in Bedford.

In a speech hosted by Heritage Action, a conservative policy advocacy organisation, the 62-year-old accused Biden of fuelling inflation and lambasted the presidents social and environmental spending plan, warning: Keep your hands off the American peoples pay cheques.

As is customary at this stage of an election cycle, Pence did not confirm or deny whether he was running for president, insisting that his priority was next years midterm elections for Congress.

He told the Associated Press: To be honest with you, all of my focus is on 2022 because I think weve got a historic opportunity for not just a winning election, but a realignment election. So Im dedicating all of my energy to the process of really winning back the Congress and winning statehouses in 2022. And then in 2023, well look around and well go where were called.

The campaign-style tour did not go unnoticed by Trump, who released a statement that said: Good man, but big mistake on not recognizing the massive voter fraud and irregularities in the 2020 election. There is no evidence of any such fraud or irregularities.

Pence, however, may choose to borrow from the playbook of Glenn Youngkin, who recently won election as governor of Virginia by keeping Trump at arms length without overtly denouncing him, thereby reaping the best of both worlds: the party establishment and Make America Great Again (Maga) base.

There are already signs of Pence having his cake and eating it too. In a radio interview on Wednesday he repeated a now familiar line that he and Trump may never see eye to eye on the events of 6 January, but he also told several news outlets there were irregularities that happened at the state level in the election. He also insisted that he parted with his boss on good terms.

This Trump-lite approach might do just enough to satisfy the former presidents followers while promising other Republicans a lower political temperature.

Michael DAntonio, a Pence biographer, said: Whats weird is he earned his bona fides with Trump by being so craven in his loyalty and then he expressed his independence in that one moment when it really mattered. So he could make a play in both directions and say, Look, Im Donald Trump but without the violence.

There are signs of the Maga core cooling off or losing interest in politics, DAntonio added. I also knew a number of Trump voters who chose him in 2016 because of Pence. So Pence may have built up a lot of credibility with people. And I guess the last point is, you dont need to win 50% to get the nomination.

Some Republicans, including former UN ambassador Nikki Haley, have said they will not contest the primaries if Trump throws his hat in the ring. Others, such as ex-New Jersey governor Chris Christie, have rejected the idea that a Trump candidacy should prevent others running.

Florida governor Ron DeSantis, South Carolina senator Tim Scott and former secretary of state Mike Pompeo are seen as potential contenders to be party standard bearer. Pence, however, might hope that his status as a former vice-president would count in his favor, just as it did for Biden last year.

Clues to his intentions include the fact he is writing a book and recording a regular podcast: in the latest episode of American Freedom, the devout Christian says we hope and pray the supreme court will overturn Roe v Wade, its 1973 decision upholding a womans constitutional right to abortion.

Should he secure the nomination, however, Pence would be hard pushed to win over millions of Trump critics who have not forgotten how he failed to speak out or take a principled stand during four years of chaos. There are countless hours of footage of him giving speeches in which he mentions President Trump over and over again, praising his leadership and calling him my friend.

Bardella, a former Republican congressional aide, said: Mike Pence will be regarded for what he is, which is a coward void of any real moral conviction or principles.

The fact that he is turning around now, still trying to court the hearts and minds and votes of the very people who perpetrated the domestic terrorist attack on our country illustrates that he is the worst kind of political figure because, even though he may not believe these things, hes still pandering and catering to those elements. I dont believe that history will look back on him kindly at all.

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Pence appears to set up a presidential run can he win ...

Former US Vice President Mike Pence delivers a China policy speech at The Heritage Foundation, a conservative think tank, in Washington, DC, USA, 14 July 2021 (EPA)

Former Vice President Mike Pence purportedly refused to get into a vehicle with secret service agents amid the 6 January riots out of fear there was a conspiracy to vindicate the insurrection.

The claims come in an extract of Washington Post journalists Carol Leonnig and Philip Ruckers new book I Alone Can Fix It: Donald J Trumps Catastrophic Final Year, released this week.

According to the journalists, Mr Pence refused to evacuate the Capitol a number of times on 6 January as pro-Trump rioters stormed the building in a bid to prevent the certification of the 2020 election results.

Amid the riots Mr Pence was evacuated from the Senate chamber to his ceremonial office, where he remained protected by secret service agents alongside members of his family, the books account recalls.

However, his security reportedly thought Mr Pence was vulnerable because the second-floor office had windows that could be breached.

Tim Giebels, the lead special agent in charge of the former vice presidents protective detail, reportedly twice asked Pence to evacuate the Capitol to which Mr Pence refused, The Post said.

Im not leaving the Capitol, he reportedly told Mr Giebels. The last thing the vice president wanted was the people attacking the Capitol to see his 20-car motorcade fleeing. That would only vindicate their insurrection.

As the chaos continued to unfold, Mr Pence was said to have been ordered to leave the office and was escorted to a subterranean area that rioters couldnt reach and towards an armoured limousine.

Mr Pence then reportedly outright refused to get into the vehicle, saying his security detail would ignore his demand not to leave the building and would instead take off against his wishes.

Im not getting in the car, Tim, Mr Pence replied. I trust you, Tim, but youre not driving the car. If I get in that vehicle, you guys are taking off. Im not getting in the car.

According to RawStory, MSNBC host Nicolle Wallace said that sources with knowledge of the day said Mr Pence feared a conspiracy, feared that the Secret Service would aid Trump and his ultimate aims that day.

Story continues

She added: This is the most harrowing version of Mike Pences day Ive seen reported.

During the insurrection, Mr Pence was made a target of rioters fury following inflammatory statements by Donald Trump, with many heard shouting Wheres Mike Pence? and Hang Mike Pence.

Mr Trump and his supporters were angry at the vice president for refusing to block the electoral certification, a power he did not possess.

Mr Trump called on Mr Pence to overturn the results only hours before their certification saying: All Mike Pence has to do is send them back to the States, AND WE WIN. Do it Mike, this is a time for extreme courage!

On the afternoon of 6 January the former president Tweeted: Mike Pence didnt have the courage to do what should have been done to protect our Country and our Constitution.

Mr Pence and the other lawmakers who had been evacuated later returned to the Senate chamber to see out the certification of the election results.

The Independent has contacted Mr Pences political advocacy group, Advancing American Freedom, for comment.

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Mike Pence refused to get in car amid 6 January riots ...

Mike Pence has equated Democratic efforts to pass voting rights protections with the 6 January attack on the US Capitol, writing in a staggeringly misleading and inaccurate op-ed that both were power grabs which posed a threat to the US constitution.

As vice-president to Donald Trump, Pence refused to overturn the 2020 election, rebuffing pressure to reject valid slates of electors at the Capitol on 6 January 2021.

Such an effort would have amounted to a coup dtat, the rightful winner of the presidential election Joe Biden denied the Oval Office.

Some rioters chanted Hang Mike Pence as they roamed the halls of Congress. Others erected a gallows outside.

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But in the Washington Post on Friday, Pence argued that Democratic proposals to expand voter access such as requiring mail-in ballot drop boxes, loosening voter ID requirements and allowing for same-day registration and voter access were just as unconstitutional as an attempt to upend constitutional procedure with violence.

The other Democratic proposal Pence said was akin to the Capitol siege was a proposal to restore a key piece of the Voting Rights Act of 1965 that required places with a history of voting discrimination to get changes approved by the federal government before they go into effect.

Their plan to end the filibuster to allow Democrats to pass a bill nationalizing our elections would offend the founders intention that states conduct elections just as much as what some of our most ardent supporters would have had me do one year ago, Pence wrote.

The notion that Congress would break the filibuster rule to pass a law equaling a wholesale takeover of elections by the federal government is inconsistent with our nations history and an affront to our constitutions structure.

The characterization was inaccurate. The US constitution explicitly gives Congress a role in setting the rules for federal elections.

Article I, Section IV reads: The Times, Places and Manner of holding Elections for Senators and Representatives, shall be prescribed in each State by the Legislature thereof; but the Congress may at any time by Law make or alter such Regulations.

Pence also falsely wrote that Democratic proposals would require states to adopt universal mail-in voting, a term typically used to describe the process in states like Colorado and Washington that automatically mail ballots to registered voters.

Legislation proposed by Democrats would require states to allow anyone who wants to vote by mail to be able to request a ballot, but would impose no requirement that states automatically send them to all voters.

The former vice-president has previously downplayed the Capitol attack by saying there was too much focus on one day in January. In his column for the Post, he said: Lives were lost and many were injured.

Seven people, law enforcement officers among them, died in connection with the attack. More than 100 officers were injured.

More than 700 people have been charged in connection with the attack. On Thursday, 11 members of the Oath Keepers militia were charged with seditious conspiracy.

Democrats charge that elections laws passed in Republican-run states since 6 January 2021 seek to restrict voting by groups liable to vote Democratic, African Americans prominent among them.

Biden has spoken forcefully on the issue, saying federal voting rights protections are needed to counter such racist moves. Republicans have protested the presidents rhetoric.

Republican legislators have also sought to make it easier to overturn election results, while Trump allies seek to fill key elections posts from which they would control the counting of votes in future elections.

Voting rights bills proposed by Democrats would increase protections for election officials who have faced an unprecedented wave of harassment over the last year. They would also prevent partisan actors from removing elections officials without cause and make it easier for voters to go to court to ensure valid votes are not rejected.

In short, Democrats aim to put in place legal standards to guarantee that no other vice-president is put in the position Pence was on 6 January 2021.

While Biden has made a strong push in support of the voting rights legislation, its prospects look dim. Kyrsten Sinema and Joe Manchin, staunch defenders of the filibuster, the 60-vote rule required to advance most legislation in the Senate, said on Thursday they would not vote to amend the requirement.

Because no Republicans support doing away with the filibuster, the Democratic voting rights bills cannot pass right now.

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Mike Pence equates voting rights protections with Capitol attack - The Guardian

As the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol rushes to gather evidence and conduct interviews, how far it will be able to go in holding former President Donald J. Trump accountable increasingly appears to hinge on one possible witness: former Vice President Mike Pence.

Since the committee was formed last summer, Mr. Pences lawyer and the panel have been talking informally about whether he would be willing to speak to investigators, people briefed on the discussions said. But as Mr. Pence began sorting through a complex calculation about his cooperation, he indicated to the committee that he was undecided, they said.

To some degree, the current situation reflects negotiating strategies by both sides, with the committee eager to suggest an air of inevitability about Mr. Pence answering its questions and the former vice presidents advisers looking for reasons to limit his political exposure from a move that would further complicate his ambitions to run for president in 2024.

But there also appears to be growing tension.

In recent weeks, Mr. Pence is said by people familiar with his thinking to have grown increasingly disillusioned with the idea of voluntary cooperation. He has told aides that the committee has taken a sharp partisan turn by openly considering the potential for criminal referrals to the Justice Department about Mr. Trump and others. Such referrals, in Mr. Pences view, appear designed to hurt Republican chances of winning control of Congress in November.

And Mr. Pence, they said, has grown annoyed that the committee is publicly signaling that it has secured a greater degree of cooperation from his top aides than it actually has, something he sees as part of a pattern of Democrats trying to turn his team against Mr. Trump.

For the committee, Mr. Pences testimony under oath would be an opportunity to establish in detail how Mr. Trumps pressuring him to block the certification of Joseph R. Biden Jr.s victory brought the country to the brink of a constitutional crisis and helped inspire the storming of the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.

It could also be vital to the committee in deciding whether it has sufficient evidence to make a criminal referral of Mr. Trump to the Justice Department, as a number of its members have said they could consider doing. The potential charge floated by some members of the committee is violation of the federal law that prohibits obstructing an official proceeding before Congress.

The combination of the pressure brought to bear on Mr. Pence and Mr. Trumps repeated public exhortations about his vice president If Mike Pence does the right thing, we win the election, he told supporters on the Ellipse just before they marched to the Capitol could help the committee build a well-documented narrative linking Mr. Trump to the temporary halting of the vote certification through rioters focused, at his urging, on Mr. Pence.

A criminal referral from the committee would carry little legal weight, but could increase public pressure on the Justice Department. The department has given little indication of whether it is seriously considering building a case against Mr. Trump.

Attorney General Merrick B. Garland said last week that federal prosecutors remained committed to holding all Jan. 6 perpetrators, at any level, accountable under law whether they were present that day or were otherwise criminally responsible for the assault on our democracy. But he did not mention Mr. Trump or indicate whether the department considered obstruction of Congress a charge that would fit the circumstances.

There are nonetheless some early indications that federal prosecutors working on charging the Capitol rioters are looking carefully at Mr. Trumps pressure on Mr. Pence and his efforts to rally his supporters to keep up that pressure even after Mr. Pence decided that he would not block certification of the Electoral College results.

In plea negotiations, federal prosecutors recently began asking defense lawyers for some of those charged in Jan. 6 cases whether their clients would admit in sworn statements that they stormed the Capitol believing that Mr. Trump wanted them to stop Mr. Pence from certifying the election. In theory, such statements could help connect the violence at the Capitol directly to Mr. Trumps demands that Mr. Pence help him stave off his defeat.

Gina Bisignano, a Beverly Hills beautician who helped her fellow Trump supporters smash at a window at the Capitol, noted in court papers connected to her plea that she had marched on the building specifically after hearing Mr. Trump encourage Mr. Pence to do the right thing.

While in the crowd, the papers say, Ms. Bisignano filmed herself saying, We are marching on the Capitol to put some pressure on Mike Pence. The papers also note that once Ms. Bisignano reached the building, she started telling others what Pences done, and encouraged people carrying tools like hatchets to break the window.

Similarly, Matthew Greene, a member of the Central New York chapter of the Proud Boys, said in court papers connected to his own guilty plea that he had conspired with other members of the far-right group to send a message to legislators and Vice President Pence who were inside the Capitol certifying the final stage of the election.

Greene hoped that his actions and those of his co-conspirators would cause legislators and the vice president to act differently during the course of the certification of the Electoral College vote than they would have otherwise, the papers said.

Mr. Trumps pressure campaign on Mr. Pence has been well established in news reports and books over the past year. Mr. Trump, aided at times by a little-known conservative lawyer, John Eastman, repeatedly pressured Mr. Pence to intervene in Congresss certification of the 2020 presidential election, saying he had the power to delay or alter the outcome.

Mr. Pence consulted a variety of people in weighing what to do, and when he ultimately refused, Mr. Trump attacked him with harsh words.

Once the mob stormed the Capitol, with some rioters chanting for Mr. Pence to be hanged, Mr. Trump initially brushed aside calls from aides and allies to call them off.

In the last week, around the anniversary of the Jan. 6 riot, both the chairman of the committee, Representative Bennie Thompson, Democrat of Mississippi, and its vice chairwoman, Representative Liz Cheney, Republican of Wyoming, have suggested they want Mr. Pence to testify voluntarily.

On Friday, Mr. Thompson told NPR that the committee might issue Mr. Pence a formal invitation as soon as the end of the month. That same day, another committee member, Representative Adam B. Schiff, Democrat of California, underlined Mr. Pences importance in a television interview, saying he viewed him as an indispensable person to talk to.

A refusal by Mr. Pence to cooperate could lead the committee to take the highly unusual move of subpoenaing a former vice president, setting up a potential court fight that could delay a resolution for months as the committee tries to wrap up its work before the election.

Mr. Pences personal lawyer, Richard Cullen, began discussions this summer with the top investigator on the House Jan. 6 committee, Timothy Heaphy, a former federal prosecutor. Mr. Cullen had worked alongside Mr. Heaphy at the same law firm several years ago.

Mark Meadows. Mr. Trumps chief of staff, who initially provided the panel with a trove of documents that showed the extent of his rolein the efforts to overturn the election, is now refusing to cooperate. The House voted to recommend holding Mr. Meadows in criminal contempt of Congress.

Scott Perry and Jim Jordan. The Republican representatives of Pennsylvaniaand Ohioare among a group of G.O.P. congressmenwho were deeply involved in efforts to overturn the election. Both Mr. Perryand Mr. Jordanhaverefused to cooperatewith the panel.

Michael Flynn. Mr. Trumps former national security adviser attended an Oval Office meeting on Dec. 18 in which participants discussed seizing voting machines and invoking certain national security emergency powers. Mr. Flynn has filed a lawsuitto block the panels subpoenas.

Phil Waldron. The retired Army colonelhas been under scrutiny since a 38-page PowerPoint documenthe circulated on Capitol Hill was turned over to the panel by Mr. Meadows. The document contained extreme plans to overturn the election.

John Eastman. The lawyer has been the subject of intense scrutinysince writing a memothat laid out how Mr. Trump could stay in power. Mr. Eastman was present at a meeting of Trump allies at the Willard Hotelthat has becomea prime focus of the panel.

Since then, the committee has declined to formally ask Mr. Pence for an interview and Mr. Cullen has told the committee he is unsure what Mr. Pence will do. Both sides hoped that, given Mr. Cullens relationship with Mr. Heaphy, they could work out some sort of agreement.

Complicating the negotiations, Mr. Cullen, who helped Mr. Pence navigate the Russia investigation without being called as a witness, will have to step aside as Mr. Pences lawyer because he will become a top adviser to Virginias incoming governor, Glenn Youngkin, when Mr. Youngkin is sworn in this week.

In the absence of Mr. Pences cooperation, the committee is trying to learn how Mr. Pence handled the pressure from Mr. Trump. Last fall, the committee interviewed J. Michael Luttig, a former federal judge who found himself coming to Mr. Pences aid in the two days leading up to the Jan. 6 attack. Mr. Luttig, in response to a request from Mr. Cullen, a longtime friend, put out a statement that said Mr. Pence had no ability to stop the certification of the election, which Mr. Pence ultimately used as political and legal cover in his decision to buck Mr. Trump.

In their questioning, committee investigators asked Mr. Luttig if Mr. Pence was wavering about what to do in the two days before Jan. 6. Mr. Luttig told the committee that he thought Mr. Pence had decided what to do.

In recent weeks, the committee has moved to question Mr. Pences former chief of staff, Marc Short, and his former chief counsel, Greg Jacob, who are considered the two key Pence witnesses.

Mr. Short and Mr. Jacob were both closely involved in Mr. Pences consideration of whether to go along with Mr. Trumps assertions that he could act to block the certification of the Electoral College results. Three days before the Jan. 6 riot, the two men met with Mr. Eastman, a lawyer then advising Mr. Trump, about Mr. Eastmans memo setting out a case for why Mr. Pence had the power to hold off the certification.

Media reports and a statement from at least one committee member have given the impression that Mr. Pences team has provided significant cooperation, and some of his former aides have spoken with the committee. But Mr. Short, arguably the most important witness from the team, publicly attacked the panels credibility three weeks ago.

I cant have a lot of confidence that this committee is going to provide some sort of impartial analysis, Mr. Short said on Fox News. I think that when the Democrats rejected the people that Kevin McCarthy put forward to make it a more bipartisan commission, I think it went down more of a political show-trial path.

Although Mr. Short was subpoenaed by the committee, he has yet to testify and has refused to commit to cooperating with it. His lawyer, Emmet Flood; committee lawyers; White House lawyers; and the National Archives are negotiating over what topics Mr. Short can discuss and whether any are covered by executive privilege.

If Mr. Pence rebuffs the panels request to testify voluntarily, it will be forced to decide whether to subpoena a former vice president, a move that Congress is believed to have not taken since it subpoenaed John Tyler, a former president and vice president, in 1846.

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Mike Pence Seen as Key Witness in Jan. 6 Investigation - The New York Times