Pelosi makes new bid for bipartisan panel to investigate riot
WASHINGTON — House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is renewing her push for a bipartisan commission to investigate the U.S. Capitol insurrection, floating a new proposal to Republicans that would evenly split the panel’s membership between the two parties.
Pelosi first proposed a commission in February that would have had four Republicans and seven Democrats to “conduct an investigation of the relevant facts and circumstances relating to the domestic terrorist attack on the Capitol.” Republicans rejected it as inadequate.
The speaker said last week in a letter to colleagues that she had sent a new offer to Republicans and “we are determined to seek the truth” of Jan. 6, when hundreds of former President Donald Trump’s supporters broke into the Capitol and interrupted the certification of President Joe Biden’s victory.
A person familiar with the new proposal said it would create a commission evenly split between Republicans and Democrats, similar to the panel that investigated the 9/11 terrorist attacks more than 15 years ago. The person was granted anonymity to discuss the text of the offer, which Pelosi presented to her leadership team this week but has not publicly released.
It’s unclear if the two sides will ever agree. Some Republicans allied with Trump have downplayed the severity of the insurrection and think the probe should look more broadly at unrest in the country. It’s a symptom not just of the partisan tensions that run high in Congress, but of a legislative branch reeling from the Trump era, with lawmakers unable to find common ground.
Pelosi and House Republican leader Kevin McCarthy haven’t even been able to agree on whether the Republicans have been sent the proposal. Pelosi said in her letter Friday that “we have once again sent a proposal for such a Commission to the Republicans,” but a spokesman for McCarthy said neither the Republican leader nor his staff have received Pelosi’s latest proposal.
“Hopefully the Speaker has addressed our basic concerns of equal representation and subpoena authority” for Republicans, McCarthy’s office said.