Brennan Center Comments on Excerpt from January 6 Committee Report

For Immediate Release
December 19, 2022

Today the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6 Attack on the United States Capitol held its final public meeting and released the executive summary of its report, including criminal referrals of former President Donald Trump, former Trump advisor John Eastman, and others. 
 
Michael Waldman, president of the Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law, had the following comment:
 
“The January 6 committee’s investigation has documented an extraordinary assault on our constitutional order. It is still shocking. The committee has assembled the most damning evidence of domestic political lawlessness since the Senate Watergate hearings half a century ago. Back then, reform followed outrage, on a bipartisan basis. It will be a test of our political system whether we can act again. 
 
“The committee’s findings are now in the hands of the Department of Justice and the House Ethics Committee, but Congress as a whole still has much more to do. The reform to the Electoral Count Act now in the federal budget bill, along with federal money to protect the safety of election workers, would be a terrific first step. Congress should follow with national minimum standards to prevent manipulation of elections and protect voting rights, the reestablishment of protections against racial discrimination in elections, and reforms that establish safeguards against abuse of emergency powers.
 
“Through its hearings and now its report, the January 6 committee has told us how the insurrectionists could do so much damage. We need to seal up the openings they exploited – the holes in our system that election denialists continue to use.”

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Brennan Center Resources:

• Lessons for Our Elections from the January 6 Hearings by Lauren Miller, Harry Black, Wendy Weiser, and Daniel Weiner (Dec. 2022)
• Reform the Electoral Count Act by Michael Waldman (Nov. 2022)