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WASHINGTON — After the House Jan. 6 committee referred criminal charges against former President Donald Trump to the Department of Justice in their final meeting, Alaska Republican Sen. Lisa Murkowski said Monday she supported its conclusions.
Murkowski — one of seven Republicans who voted to convict Trump on an impeachment charge of inciting an insurrection in 2021 — said she will be reading the committee’s final report with the rest of the country, but approved of the committee’s outcome Monday.
“I think that they came to an appropriate conclusion, it was the same conclusion that I arrived at with my impeachment vote,” Murkowski said.
The monthslong congressional probe into Trump’s role in the Jan. 6 insurrection concluded with four criminal referrals to the DOJ: inciting an insurrection, conspiracy to defraud the United States, conspiracy to make a false statement and obstruction of an official proceeding. The panel held Trump responsible for the attack on the U.S. Capitol in a report released Monday.
“That evidence has led to an overriding and straight-forward conclusion: the central cause of January 6th was one man, former President Donald Trump, who many others followed,” the committee wrote in a summary of its final report. “None of the events of January 6th would have happened without him.”
Alaska Democratic Rep. Mary Peltola said that she trusts the Justice Department to handle the case.
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“I have the upmost respect for our federal law enforcement officials and the federal judiciary system,” she said in a statement. “I have full confidence that they will review this case and see it to an appropriate conclusion.”
A spokesperson for Alaska Republican Sen. Dan Sullivan reiterated a statement the senator made on Jan. 6, 2021 calling the day one of “the sadder and more dispiriting days in our country’s history.”
“As Sen. Sullivan has said repeatedly: Those who perpetrated that violence should be brought to justice,” his spokesperson said in a statement. “The world witnessed our Capitol under siege during the day, but by the evening, members of Congress fulfilled their constitutional duties, thus demonstrating the resiliency of American Democracy.”
Murkowski is currently pressing to pass legislation before the end of the year aimed at preventing another Jan. 6, co-sponsoring a bipartisan effort to reform the Electoral Count Act of 1887. The measure is said to be included in the must-pass FY2023 government spending package that Congress will consider this week.
On Jan. 6, 2021, Trump and his congressional allies argued that objections to the electoral vote count could allow then-Vice President Mike Pence to reject some states’ results during the Electoral College certification process, citing the Electoral Count Act. Trump capitalized on the ambiguities in the bill, holding a rally that became a violent insurrection.
The Electoral Count Reform Act would clarify the vice president does not have the power to solely determine disputes over electors. It also requires 20% of the Senate or House of Representatives to lodge an objection to electors.
Murkowski said last week she is crossing her fingers that the measure remains in the omnibus spending bill and is signed into law.
“It’s a good work product that a bipartisan group of us worked on for months and months,” Murkowski said in an interview. “We’ve got strong support from leaders in both sides which I think is very promising, and I am absolutely hopeful that it stays in.”