Jeffrey Clark is a relatively big fish in the ocean of people already called before the Jan. 6 select committee. And it would be a huge mistake to offer him any kind of immunity.
,” which allows prosecutors to still charge a defendant as long as they don’t use anything they learned from the immunized defendant’s testimony, sounds great in a law school classroom, but not in a courtroom. If select committee members think they can get Clark to cough up his cohorts — maybe even a former president – and still expect DOJ to charge Clark, then they should check out the case law.
In the infamous Iran-Contra arms for hostages case against Lt. Col. Oliver North, who served in the Reagan administration, a federal judge after special prosecutor Lawrence Walsh conceded he couldn’t prove that North’s convictions weren’t influenced by North’s immunized congressional testimony. Walsh blamed Congress.More recently, and in the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals, a judge dismissed charges against members of the private security firm Blackwater because prosecutorsby testimony provided by immunized defendants.
Third, and perhaps most importantly, Lofgren’s public pondering of immunity for Clark raises serious concerns about the current state of communication between the committee and DOJ, and DOJ’s willingness to hold higher-ups accountable. Whilein return for testimony, any prosecutive decisions are made by the DOJ. It’s DOJ that would have to live with the undesirable results of Congress granting immunity to Clark.
There is one potential ray of light in this otherwise gloomy forecast. It’s possible that the committee and DOJ are somehow convinced that Clark holds the key to directly implicating Trump and they believe he’s willing to turn that key. It’s a long-shot bet that isn’t worth the risk of effectively jeopardizing holding Clark accountable. If Clark holds the Trump key, then he’s much more likely to use it if he’s staring at a criminal indictment instead of immunity.
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