Byron York in dailyherald: Jan. 6 committee is running out of time to support transparency in all its findings
Republicans take control of the House of Representatives this week. When that happens, the Jan. 6 committee, with all its members selected by outgoing Speaker Nancy Pelosi, will go out of existence. Now, as the clock ticks down, it appears the committee's demise will leave some significant unanswered questions.
Now the issue is: Will the videos and transcripts and notes of the more than 1,000 interviews be released? Here's the most important thing to remember: The committee can do what it wants. The chairman, in this case Democratic Rep. Bennie Thompson of Mississippi, decides what records the committee will archive and what records it will destroy.
by signing up you agree to our terms of service One thing is clear, and that is the committee's public disclosure has gotten off to a slow start. On Dec. 21, at the same time it released its final report, the committee released transcripts of 34 interviews. On Dec. 22, it released five more. On Dec. 23, it released 46 more. That is 85 transcripts, meaning that are at least 900, and perhaps as many as 1,100, more to be released in the next week.
So far, the committee has only released Hutchinson's two transcripts from September. It has released nothing from Hutchinson's original testimony, nor has it released any record of her interview with Cheney that led to the June 28 special hearing. Also, her account obviously leads to questions about testimony from Ornato and Engel. What did they say? That's pretty important. Each has conducted multiple interviews with the committee that have not yet been released.