New Jan 6 riot hearings promise fresh drama

WASHINGTON－A new round of hearings this week by the congressional committee probing the US Capitol riot promises further drama, with one member saying former vice-president Mike Pence might be subpoenaed.

As the House of Representatives panel worked to focus attention on what it said was an illegal scheme backed by Donald Trump to overturn the results of the 2020 elections, a new poll shows that most people in the United States believe the former president should face charges.

In three earlier hearings into the Jan 6, 2021, riots, a series of Trump advisers said they had warned him of the illegality of attempting to overturn Joe Biden's victory by persuading Pence to block a normally pro forma process.

Committee member Adam Schiff told CNN on Sunday that subpoenaing Pence was "certainly a possibility". "We're not excluding anyone or anything at this point," he said.

Pence faced intense pressure from Trump to break with history and refuse formal certification of Biden's victory.

But even after Trump supporters violently stormed the building, with some chanting "Hang Mike Pence", he refused to leave the complex and returned to the Senate chamber late at night to carry out the certification.

The committee would be keenly interested to hear from Pence exactly what pressure Trump had placed on him in their private conversations. If Pence is ultimately deposed, however, it could be weeks or months away.

While the conservative Pence was never a favorite of the Democrats, "on that day he was a hero for resisting all the pressure campaigns", committee member Jamie Raskin told NBC's Meet the Press.

The pressure campaign, Schiff said, "put the vice-president's life in danger".

The committee, in hearings on Tuesday and Thursday, will also explore how a similar pressure campaign directed against state and local elections officials put their lives in danger.

Another key witness

Trump, in a taped call, famously called Georgia secretary of state Brad Raffensperger and asked him to "find" enough votes to overturn Biden's victory in that key southern state.

Raffensperger, who refused to do so, will be among the committee's witnesses this week.

Trump remains as divisive a political figure as ever, inspiring furious loyalty among followers and equally passionate disdain from his critics.

The public's division came through starkly in a new ABC News/Ipsos poll about the committee's work.

The poll, taken on June 17 and 18, found that 58 percent of respondents believed Trump should be charged with a crime for his role in the Jan 6 events, up from 52 percent in April.

It also found that 60 percent of respondents believed the committee was conducting a fair and impartial inquiry, up substantially from 40 percent in April.

But while nearly all Democrats said Trump bore considerable responsibility for the Jan 6 riot, only a quarter of Republicans agreed.

And significantly, only 9 percent of respondents said they were following the hearings very closely.

Agencies via Xinhua