House January 6th Select Committee Chair Bennie Thompson told Punchbowl’s John Bresnahan on Tuesday the committee will not be referring Trump or anyone else to the Justice Department.
We’ve said it before that this is the smart move for two reasons. First, a criminal referral for anything other than contempt of Congress does not carry a requirement for the Department of Justice to investigate, so sending a referral of Trump has the same effect of filling out a tip form on the FBI website. Second, the DOJ’s already investigating Trump and his minions, so why waste the time on having Jim Jordan spit and scream in the House chamber before a party-line vote?