President Joe Biden’s White House is reportedly leaning towards giving Congress information on what former President Donald Trump and his aides were doing during the January 6 Capitol riot.

The Biden administration’s apparent inclination comes despite Trump objecting to the details being released, the Washington Post reported on Thursday.

Trump has said he would point to ‘executive privilege’ – which has long shielded presidents and their aides from Congress – to counter House select committee information requests.

However, the Biden administration is leaning toward allowing the information to be disclosed because of how massive the insurrection was, two people with knowledge on the talks told the newspaper.

Asked about the potential information release, Biden spokesman Michael Gwin said the president considers the riot ‘a dark stain on our country’s history’ and is ‘deeply committed to ensuring that something like that can never happen again, and he supports a thorough investigation’.

The committee investigating the deadly riot argues that Trump is not subject to executive privilege since he is no longer president. Committee members want Biden’s White House to set aside concerns about breaching executive privilege in order to help them with the probe.

‘It’s not really relevant because there’s no president involved – there’s no such thing as a former president’s executive privilege,’ Rep Jamie Raskin, a committee member and constitutional law instructor, told the Post.

‘That’s extremely dilute and not really relevant.’

Trump has criticized the committee’s effort as partisan in nature and fought release of any of the information.

‘The highly partisan, Communist-style “select committee” has put forth an outrageously broad records request that lacks both legal precedent and legislative merit,’ Trump spokesman Taylor Budowich said in a statement obtained by the newspaper.

‘Executive privilege will be defended, not just on behalf of President Trump and his administration, but also on behalf of the Office of the President of the United States and the future of our nation.’

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at [email protected].

For more stories like this, check our news page.

Source: Read Full Article