Thread by @SethAbramson

BREAKING THIS AFTERNOON: Congress Has Enough Evidence to Refer Former President Donald Trump to the Department of Justice for Federal Criminal Indictment and Prosecution—But Is Split on Doing So for Reasons That Only a Politician Would Ever Find Compelling nytimes.com/2022/04/10/us/…

PS/ Keep in mind that DOJ has a long and *illustrious* history—including under Merrick Garland specifically—of ignoring criminal referrals from Congress. So the idea that if Congress issues a referral and then DOJ indicts Trump it’ll seem like Congress made it happen is DERANGED.

PS2/ The amount you have to be up your own butt—thinking of optics, not *justice*—to say that a congressional referral would “politicize” a constitutionally mandated oversight function Congress has had since the 1700s is EXTRAORDINARY.

No one outside the Beltway thinks this way.

PS3/ My only reaction to every single word of this New York Times report is DO YOUR JOB.

My response to the first paragraph? DO YOUR JOB. The fifth paragraph? DO YOUR JOB. The one after that? DO YOUR JOB. The final paragraph of the article? DO YOUR JOB.

*DO YOUR JOB*, Congress.

PS4/ This is a bipartisan, duly appointed House Select Committee that seems to think it must apologize for every sneeze and cough because it might offend the *violent insurrectionists* who don’t want a bipartisan, duly appointed committee to scrutinize their God-Emperor’s crimes.

PS5/ A congressional referral has *no* impact on DOJ—DOJ remains the entity with responsibility for investigating January 6 for future criminal prosecutions. What a referral *does* do is say that 1 of the 3 branches of government looked at January 6 and found presidential crimes.

PS6/ DOJ is in the executive branch. When DOJ investigates a POTUS, it investigates itself—the executive branch investigating the executive branch. As we’ve seen, that causes political snafus and hand-wringing about “executive power.” We *want* the legislative branch weighing in.

PS7/ When the *third* branch of our government—the judicial branch—weighed in on whether Trump had committed crimes by saying (via a federal judge) that it was more likely than not he did, we *welcomed* that even though it *still* didn’t take the power to prosecute away from DOJ.

PS8/ What Americans want is for our government to do its job, tell the truth, and uphold rule of law—*especially* when it’s politically difficult to do it *or* when demagogues might be able to make hay from government doing its job, telling the truth, and upholding rule of law.

PS9/ So yes, when a government body tasked with doing a job, being honest about that job—and its results—no matter what, and in such honesty and hard work upholding the rule of law says “Oh, but maybe we should keep our mouths shut because far-right criticism?” it boils my blood.

PS10/ #DOYOURJOB, Congress. If you have evidence to refer the former President of the United States to DOJ for federal crimes, you issue that referral because it is YOUR JOB to do so. So go DO YOUR JOB.

DO YOUR JOB. /end