After disobeying a subpoena from a House subcommittee probing the Jan. 6 attack on the US Capitol, former Trump White House adviser Peter Navarro was indicted on contempt charges on Friday.
Navarro is the second former Trump adviser to be charged with contempt of Congress for refusing to help with the investigation into the attack on Jan. 6, 2021. His arrest comes months after that of Steve Bannon, a former White House aide.
For failing to appear for a deposition before the House committee, Navarro, 72, was charged with one count of contempt. The second complaint is that you failed to deliver papers that were sought by the committee. He was apprehended by federal agents early Friday morning and was scheduled to appear in federal court in Washington later that afternoon.
The indictment confirms that the Justice Department is continuing to pursue criminal charges against Trump allies who have attempted to obstruct or stonewall congressional investigators investigating the countryâs most serious attack on democracy in decades.
The Justice Department and Attorney General Merrick Garland have been pressed to make a decision on whether or not to pursue other Trump advisers who have disobeyed House subpoenas.
The indictment claims that when Navarro was asked to give a deposition before the committee, he declined and instead informed the panel that âmy hands are tiedâ because Trump had invoked executive privilege.
According to the indictment, after committee staff assured him there were areas he could discuss without raising executive privilege issues, Navarro declined again, instructing the committee to deal directly with Trumpâs lawyers. On March 2, the committee held its scheduled deposition, but Navarro did not show up.
The charge came only days after Navarro announced in a court filing that he had been summoned to testify before a grand jury this week as part of the Justice Departmentâs wide-ranging investigation into the incident at the United States Capitol.
Navarro, who served as Trumpâs trade adviser, said the FBI issued the subpoena at his Washington, D.C., home last week. The subpoena was the first documented instance of prosecutors seeking testimony from a Trump White House official as part of their investigation into the attack.
In his lawsuit filed Tuesday, Navarro argues that the House select committee investigating the attack is unconstitutional, and that a subpoena it issued to him in February is consequently unenforceable.
He sued members of the committee, as well as Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and U.S. Attorney Matthew M. Graves, whose office is currently prosecuting him in a criminal case.
Navarro told The Associated Press this week that his lawsuitâs goal is much broader than the subpoenas themselves, and that itâs part of a larger effort to have âthe Supreme Court address a number of issues that have come with the weaponization of Congressâ investigative powersâ since Trump took office.
Members of the select committee wanted Navarro to testify about his public attempts to assist Trump win the 2020 presidential election, including a phone call attempting to get state legislators to join them.
One of the White House aides who backed Trumpâs accusations of widespread voter fraud was the former economics professor. In December 2020, he issued a report that he said had evidence of the alleged misbehavior.
In April, Navarro and fellow Trump aide Dan Scavino were found in contempt of Congress for refusing to participate with the committee. At this time, the Justice Department has not charged Scavino.
Scavino and Navarro were among only a few people who have refused the committeeâs requests and subpoenas for information, according to members of the committee.
The panel has spoken with over 1,000 witnesses regarding the uprising and is gearing up for a series of hearings that will begin next week.
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