Jan. 6 panel wants answers from trio of Republicans

WASHINGTON — Three more House Republicans received requests Monday to voluntarily appear before the congressional committee investigating the U.S. Capitol insurrection and answer questions about their involvement in the effort to overturn Donald Trump’s 2020 election loss.

The committee sent letters to GOP Reps. Mo Brooks of Alabama, Andy Biggs of Arizona and Ronny Jackson of Texas — three members of the ultra-right House Freedom Caucus that have in recent years aligned themselves with Trump. Jackson quickly ruled out cooperating.

The nine-member panel is asking for the members of Congress to testify about their involvement in meetings at the White House, direct conversations with then President Trump as he sought to challenge his loss in the 2020 presidential election, and the planning and coordination of rallies on and before Jan. 6, 2021.

“The Select Committee has learned that several of our colleagues have information relevant to our investigation into the facts, circumstances, and causes of January 6th,” committee chairman Bennie Thompson, D-Miss., and vicechair Liz Cheney, R-Wyo., said in a statement. “We urge our colleagues to join the hundreds of individuals who have shared information with the Select Committee to get to the bottom of what happened on January 6th.”

Since launching its investigation last summer, the Jan. 6 panel has been slowly gaining new details about what lawmakers said and did in the weeks before the insurrection. Members have already asked three GOP lawmakers — Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio, Rep. Scott Perry of Pennsylvania and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy of California — to testify voluntarily. All have refused.

So far, the Jan. 6 committee has refrained from issuing subpoenas to lawmakers, fearing the repercussions of such an extraordinary step. But in recent days, Thompson and other committee members have hinted that subpoenaing their colleagues may not be completely off the table.