House Speaker Nancy Pelosi launched another attack against Donald Trump on Sunday, effectively daring the onetime president to testify before the Jan 6 committee.
She made the comments during an interview with MSNBC’s Jonathan Capehart, predicting that Mr Trump would attempt to fight the January 6 panel’s subpoena for his testimony by whatever means possible.
Asked both whether Mr Trump would testify and what it would mean for the country if he didn’t, Ms Pelosi responded: “I don’t think he’s man enough to show up”.
The answer appeared not have been audible for Mr Capehart, as evidenced by the moment of silence before he himself cut in.
She then reiterated: “I don’t think he is man enough to show up. I don’t think his lawyers will want him to show up because he has to testify under oath.”
The answer seemed to surprise Mr Capehart, but comes just after it was revealed by the January 6 committee that Ms Pelosi had threatened to punch the president out during the Capitol riot had he shown up, as planned, to lead the mob of his supporters.
That committee voted to subpoena Mr Trump last week; Steve Bannon, a top ally of the former president, meanwhile was handed a prison sentence and fine for his own defiance of the committee.
Mr Trump remains under several criminal investigations. One into his retention of documents from the White House last month resulted in an FBI raid of Mar-a-Lago, his Palm Beach, Florida, residence.
The Jan 6 committee cannot itself prosecute Mr Trump for any crimes related to the attack on the Capitol, but may issue a recommendation that the Justice Department does so. Meanwhile, the DoJ remains embroiled in its own investigation related to January 6 which in recent months has seen testimony from at least one high-ranking White House aide while hundreds of individual riot participants have been tried and convicted for their involvement.
