A Letter from Austin #8: The Little Insurrection That Couldn’t
The Sullen Ex-President Feuds with Congress as Cronies Fade the Heat
We’ve had lots of political news here in Austin this week, most of it good. Texas Senator Ted Cruz, patron saint of bad PR, lost a fight with the Sesame Street character Big Bird over vaccination messaging. Meanwhile, the United States Supreme Court heard a challenge to Texas’s terribly drafted new abortion law, and federal district judge Lee Yeakel blocked Governor Abbott’s order prohibiting school districts from requiring masks. The adults have stepped in to supervise, in other words, and Abbott, indicted Attorney General Paxton, and Lt. Governor Dan Patrick will have to put their clothes back on and sit at the grow-up table for at least a little while.
But bigger than these domestic dramas has been the saga of the Little Insurrection That Couldn’t — NOT an insurrection, some say, just a “riot” — and Donald Trump’s desperate efforts to ward off a congressional select committee investigation into what, exactly, was supposed to happen on January 6; what actually did happen; and why it was allowed to happen for so long. Many Democrats say Trump and his allies knowingly stoked unrest with their Big Lie about the 2020 election being “stolen” and “fraudulent,” except in races where Republicans won, and used the falsehoods to manipulate their more gullible followers into trying to derail a constitutionally mandated procedure. Some Republicans by contrast say Trump and his advisors had nothing to do with agitating several hundred demonstrators to the point where, at the conclusion of a rally at which Trump spoke, they stormed the Capitol and tried to stop certification of the electoral college vote that memorialized Biden’s presidential victory.
So far the ex-president and several of his cronies — Big Lebowski-like New Nationalist Steve Bannon and button-down yes man Mark Meadows being the most prominent — are refusing to cooperate with Congressional inquiries. Both of them say they are waiting to see what happens to the Big Don’s legal attempts to keep his deliberations on and about January 6 “privileged” — that is, secret from the people he was supposed to be working for.
Call me conspiratorial, but I suspect the reason Trump wants to keep these materials secret is that they are embarrassing — if Trump can actually be embarrassed at this point — and politically damaging. The situation calls up memories of Special Prosecutor Leon Jaworski’s 1974 struggle to get copies of President Nixon’s secret audio tapes back in order to ascertain, as they say, what Nixon knew about the Watergate burglary and when he knew it. In order to gum up the works in the matter at hand, Trump filed a lawsuit with the intention of preventing the National Archives from turning over some 800 pages of his visitor logs, emails, memos, and other documents related to January 6 to the investigating committee. The former president’s stated justification for wanting to keep the records secret is to protect the authority and prerogatives of the chief executive, who needs to be able to obtain full and frank analysis and suggestions from third parties without those parties having to worry about disclosure of their counsel later.
Unfortunately for Trump, and despite the fact that he likes to ignore the fact, he is no longer the chief executive, and it’s unclear whether a former president has standing to make the privilege argument when the current president, Joe Biden, disagrees with him on whether the documents should be kept secret. Unsurprisingly, Biden has declined to protect the material. On November 10, a federal district court judge ruled that the records should be turned over to Congress, and Trump and his lawyers promptly filed an appeal, asking for a “do-over” of sorts, a reshuffling of the judicial deck. Given the novelty of the issues presented, the matter may well end up in the Supreme Court.
Trump is no stranger to secrecy. Indeed, he seems to have become an expert at it. Despite indicating in 2016 that he would disclose his tax returns if elected, a traditional way for presidential candidates to demonstrate they have nothing to hide from the voting public, Trump’s returns remain hidden. Trump is also said to have destroyed or confiscated notes taken during a meeting or meetings he held with homicidal Russian strongman Vladimir Putin in 2017 and 2018. So at least he’s consistent. And given the judicial appeal options open to him, he will doubtless be able to keep the National Archive material confidential for many more months.
In the meantime, Trump’s lieutenants, both inside and outside of government, will take the heat for their boss’s disregard for public scrutiny. On November 12, Steve Bannon was indicted by a federal grand jury on two counts of criminal contempt of Congress. Mark Meadows, who previously failed to show up to testify at a deposition related to the congressional inquiry, may face similar charges in the near future. And the congressional select committee has vowed to keep pushing forward, in hopes of someday peering behind the curtain of executive privilege to give us a better picture of that grim chaotic day.
