The House panel investigating the Jan. 6 insurrection is seeking information from former House Speaker Newt Gingrich about his communications with senior advisers to then-President Donald Trump in the days leading up to the 2021 attack on the Capitol.
The committee's chairman, Rep. Bennie Thompson, D, Miss., wrote in a letter sent to Gingrich on Thursday that the panel has obtained emails Gingrich exchanged with Trump's associates about television advertisements alleging voter fraud in the 2020 election.
Thompson wrote that Gingrich also appeared to be involved in efforts to appoint alternate electors and emailed Trump's chief of staff, Mark Meadows, about those efforts on the evening of Jan. 6, after the Capitol breach.
The request for Gingrich to cooperate voluntarily comes as the committee has been quietly continuing its investigation and preparing for a new set of hearings next month. Lawmakers and staff have been interviewing witnesses and compiling a final report in recent weeks after a series of hearings in June and July.
If he cooperates, Gingrich will be one of more than 1,000 witnesses interviewed by the committee, including dozens of Trump allies. The committee's eight hearings this summer featured not only live witness testimony but also clips of video interviews with some of the former president's closest aides, Cabinet secretaries and even family members. The panel is expected to resume the hearings in September, ahead of the midterm elections.