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Supreme Court ruled on former President Donald Trump’s request for the House Select Committee to review its records request of January 6 .
After having denied President Trump’s emergency request to block the transfer of White House records from the National Archives to a House select committee, the court issued a brief unsigned order without comment.
Yahoo News reports that the court decided against the former president, meaning that the National Archives will provide the documents to the Select Committee.
The court’s decision to formally reject Trump’s appeal follows its Jan. 19 order that led to the documents being handed over to the House of Representatives investigative committee by the federal agency that stores government and historical records.
The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on Dec. 9 upheld a lower court ruling that Trump had no basis to challenge President Joe Biden’s decision to allow the records to be handed over to the House of Representatives select committee. Trump then appealed to the Supreme Court
Trump and his allies have waged an ongoing legal battle with the House select committee seeking to block access to documents and witnesses. Trump has sought to invoke a legal principle known as executive privilege, which protects the confidentially of some internal White House communications, a stance rejected by lower courts.
The House committee has said it needed the records to understand any role Trump may have played in fomenting the violence that unfolded on Jan. 6, 2021. His supporters stormed the Capitol in a failed bid to prevent Congress from formally certifying Biden’s 2020 presidential election victory over Trump.
Records of phone conversations, logs of visitors, and written correspondences between the former president and his advisors were requested from the Archives by the House Select Committee.
Joe Biden decided that the records should not be considered executive privilege because they belong to the Executive Branch.
President Trump has fought back and has asked the Supreme Court to intervene and prevent White House documents from being handed over to the House Select Committee on January 6.
The move comes after the District of Columbia Circuit Court of Appeals ordered that the National Archives provide the requested paperwork to the committee, it was reported by the Daily Mail.
It now puts the constitutional challenge before the high court, where Trump nominated three of the nine sitting justices and represents a last-ditch effort to shield the documents from the committee that has interviewed hundreds of witnesses in its effort to reconstruct the events leading up to the Capitol riot.
Earlier this month, a three-judge panel – two judges appointed by Barack Obama and one by Biden – unanimously upheld a lower court’s ruling denying Trump a preliminary injunction to stop the release of records.
Trump’s lawyers filed an emergency appeal to meet a deadline imposed by the lower court.
The January 6th Committee has sought records, logs, photographs, and calendars as it probes Trump’s election overturn effort and the Capitol riot on the day Congress met to count the electoral votes that made Biden president.
As Trump’s attorneys stated, “both the Constitution and the Presidential Records Act give former Presidents a clear right to protect their confidential records from premature dissemination. This case presents a clear threat to that right.”
According to them, the Appeals Court decision is “troubling,” they said because it “lacks any meaningful or objective limiting principle. In an increasingly partisan political climate, such records requests will become the norm regardless of what party is in power.”
The appeals court determined that the former president could not protect the documents under executive privilege because Biden did not allow it.
“On the record before us, former President Trump has provided no basis for this court to override President Biden’s judgment and the agreement and accommodations worked out between the Political Branches over these documents,” wrote the court.
Last week a judge ordered that Trump and his two eldest children must testify in the investigation into the family’s business practices by the New York attorney general.
Judge Arthur Engoron of the New York State Supreme Court ruled Thursday that Donald Trump, his eldest son Donald Jr. and his eldest daughter Ivanka’s argument for trying to quash subpoenas for testimony and evidence “completely misses the mark.”
Depositions for the Trumps must be taken within 21 days of being granted permission by the judge.
During the course of the criminal probe, the Manhattan District Attorney’s office issued subpoenas to the attorney general’s office for its civil investigation. This was deemed inappropriate by the Trumps.
“This argument completely misses the mark. Neither OAG nor the Manhattan District Attorney’s office has subpoenaed the New Trump Respondents to appear before a grand jury,” Engoron said in his decision. “The New Trump Respondents’ argument overlooks the salient fact that they have an absolute right to refuse to answer questions that they claim may incriminate them.”
Source: The Republic Brief