Dorgan, Pomeroy urge judge to block Trump’s attempt to withhold Jan. 6 records

WASHINGTON (KVRR) – Two former members of Congress from North Dakota are among 66 former lawmakers urging a federal judge to reject former President Donald Trump’s attempt to block investigators from obtaining White House records connected to the Jan. 6 insurrection investigation.

Former U.S. Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND) and former Rep. Earl Pomeroy (D-ND) signed a 32-page brief that was filed in U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C.

The document was signed by 42 Democrats and 24 Republicans.

“Mr. Trump’s public and private actions—some of which are now known, but others of which surely remain unknown—came far closer to blocking a peaceful transfer of power and imperiling the lives of Senators, Representatives, and the Vice President of the United States than amici, with their over 850 combined years of congressional service, could have ever imagined” the document says.

The brief refers to the Jan. 6 incident at the U.S. Capitol as “unimaginable” and says Trump and his aides “personally orchestrated a multifaceted assault on the peaceful transition of presidential power.”

“Mr. Trump and his allies in the command center—including some on White House payroll, some within the Department of Justice, and a cast of other Trump supporters…plotted, inspired, and carried out an election subversion campaign that led to the deaths of several people, put at risk the lives of “anyone [the mob] got their hands on,” including the Speaker of the House and the Vice President, 19 and terrorized Members of Congress.”

The document says that the Watergate investigation, which led to the resignation of President Nixon, “is almost quaint” as compared to “the often baffling effort to overturn the 2020 election.”

“No personal interests of Mr. Trump or disputed and unresolved questions of executive privilege could possibly tilt the scales against disclosing these records to the Select Committee.”

Trump earlier said in a statement that he would “fight the Subpoenas on Executive Privilege and other grounds, for the good of our Country.”