Republicans look to probe some who received last-day Biden pardons

Congressional Republicans are looking to press on in scrutinizing some of those who received pardons from former President Biden in the last hours of his presidency.

“Implication is that they needed the pardons… So, let’s call them all before Congress and demand the truth,” Rep. Chip Roy (R-Texas) posted on the social platform X, in response to the pardons for members of the House select committee that investigated the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot; Anthony Fauci; and retired Gen. Mark Milley. “If they refuse or lie — let’s test the constitutional ‘reach’ of these pardons with regard to their future actions.”

Other observers, such as President Trump’s former first-term chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, suggested that the pardons would remove any reason to refuse to answer questions by invoking a Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination.

Rep. Barry Loudermilk (R-Ga.) — who has long led a House GOP investigation into the Jan. 6 Capitol attack and probe into the Jan. 6 select committee that originally investigated it — indicated that Congress could call Jan. 6 select committee members in for questioning in light of the Biden pardons.

Asked if there is now an incentive to bring in the Jan. 6 select committee members for questioning, Loudermilk told The Hill: “I think definitely, this is a situation that we still got to dig a little deeper.”

But whether Loudermilk actually does so will depend on the form his investigation takes in the new Congress. While Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) has said the House will continue to investigate the former select committee, the specifics of that potential probe are unknown. Loudermilk has been asking Johnson to create a new select committee to investigate the old select committee and Jan. 6 matters.

“I know President Trump is 100 percent behind it. He's told me himself that he wants us to continue the investigation and continue to expose the truth,” Loudermilk said.

“It's also interesting, I think, to look at those he didn't pardon,” Loudermilk added, mentioning star Jan. 6 select committee witness Cassidy Hutchinson.

The Jan. 6 select committee had subpoenaed a number of GOP lawmakers in its probe — including Reps. Scott Perry (Pa.), Jim Jordan (Ohio) and Andy Biggs (Ariz.), who did not comply. It had also asked Loudermilk to appear voluntarily to explain a tour he gave in the Capitol complex on Jan. 5, 2021, which Loudermilk said was in support of a “false narrative.”

In a joint statement Monday, former Jan. 6 select committee Chair Bennie Thompson (R-Miss.) and former Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) said they had faced "specific threats of criminal prosecution and imprisonment by members of the incoming administration, simply for doing our jobs and upholding our oaths of office.”

“My intention is to fully and aggressively pursue getting to intelligence failures. That's one thing we're still looking at — who knew what and when?” Loudermilk added.

But not all those who Biden pardoned on Monday should expect to get a congressional request for testimony.

Biden also granted preemptive pardons to his siblings James Biden, Valerie Biden and Frank Biden and some of their spouses in the last minutes of his presidency.

House Oversight and Accountability Committee Chair James Comer (R-Ky.) told The Hill that the move “validates everything we found” in his investigation in the last Congress into the Biden family’s business dealings — but he brushed off the prospect of bringing in the Biden family members for more interviews.

“We finished our investigation, we published a very detailed report, and I think the pardons validate everything in that report,” Comer said.

“Now it’s Pam Bondi’s,” he added, referring to Trump’s attorney general nominee.

Comer’s investigation tracked millions of dollars that flowed from foreign business deals into the hands of the Biden family and their associates, but it largely fizzled with the report's release.

A House GOP impeachment inquiry report asserted that Biden engaged in “impeachable conduct” because it was “inconceivable” that Biden was ignorant of how his family members allegedly used their connection to the then-vice president to boost their business deals in Ukraine, China and elsewhere.

But parts of the report were disputed, and the House never considered articles of impeachment.

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