(Washington) Donald Trump cannot prevent the transmission to Congress of White House documents that could implicate him in the January 6 attack on the Capitol, a federal appeals court ruled Thursday.
This decision paves the way for hundreds of pages of documents to be transferred to a parliamentary committee tasked with shedding light on the former president’s role in this attack. However, the court left him for fourteen days to appeal to the United States Supreme Court.
The Republican billionaire wants to keep these archives secret, including the lists of people who visited or contacted him that day, a parliamentary committee claimed.
This House “Special Committee” was formed to assess the role played by Donald Trump and his entourage in the partisan-led assault on the Congressional seat, when elected officials confirmed Joe Biden’s victory in the presidential election.
The former president, who denies any responsibility for the attack, has denounced a “political game” and refuses to cooperate. He took legal action in the name of the executive branch’s prerogative to keep his communications confidential, even in the event of a congressional subpoena.
After conflicting initial rulings, an appeals court ruled Thursday that it had no reason to oppose the decision of current White House tenant Joe Biden, who authorized the National Archives to turn over these documents to Congress.
“In this case, there is a rare and powerful set of factors that support making the documents in question public. […] “In light of the need to investigate and address the violent and unprecedented attack on Congress,” Judge Patricia Millett of the Federal Court of Appeals in Washington wrote.
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