Pelosi Concedes On Proposal For January 6 Commission, But GOP Leaders Say They Haven’t Heard From Her

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) conceded on certain aspects of her proposal to create a 9/11-style commission to look into the violent events that took place at the Capitol on January 6, but negotiations are still taking place as Republicans want the commission to investigate more political violence that occurred over the past year.

Earlier this week, CNN reported that Pelosi planned to change parts of her proposal for the commission. She decided to allow an even number of people on the independent panel — with equal parts Republican and Democrat. She also granted fair subpoena powers to both Democrats and Republicans, changing “the way subpoenas would be issued, requiring a joint decision by the chair and the vice chair or after a majority vote,” as reported later by NBC News. The original proposal would have given Democrats the ability to appoint 7 out of the 11 seats on the commission and given them unilateral subpoena power.

Republicans want Pelosi to include other situations of political violence in the investigations of the commission, including last year’s protests, CNN reported.

Pelosi discussed her proposal at a news conference Thursday and confirmed that changes had been made to it. She said, “If we can come to agreement on the first two, well, why would they object to the scope, which is to find the truth of what happened on January 6th when an insurrection descended upon the Capitol.”

She said, “Our purpose is to find the truth for that, it’s not about investigating one thing or another that they may want to draw into this.” She said that she is optimistic, but there are other options she does not want to use because she wants it to be bipartisan.

She added that it is a process, “because at the end of the day, you weigh the equities…‘is this a path to the truth?’ And that’s what we’ll find out and I’m optimistic that we can.”

Last week, CNN reported that Pelosi said in a letter to colleagues she had “once again sent a proposal for such a Commission to the Republicans, modeled after the 9/11 Commission.”

On Thursday, Pelosi said that some Republicans have heard from her, but NBC News reported, “Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., and House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., have not received a proposal from Pelosi with these changes, spokesmen for the two Republican leaders said.”

On Tuesday, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) showed that he was ready to negotiate, but that he had not heard about any alterations to the proposal.

“Number one, the commission needs to be balanced,” McConnell said. “And number two, the scope of it needs to deal with a little bit broader than just January the sixth. We’ve also had a number of violent disturbances around the country last year, and I think we ought to look at this broader scope, and with a totally balanced, 9/11-style commission. If she were willing to put that forward, I think it would enjoy broad bipartisan support.”

At his own news conference on Thursday, House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) confirmed that he has not heard from Pelosi, saying, “she hasn’t even responded to us or talked to us so it’s still a long way away. I think if anything is going to have to happen, she’s going to have to talk with us instead of saying she’s talking to some Republicans. We don’t even know if they’re elected, who she’s talking to.”

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