Rep. Kinzinger accepts Pelosi’s invite to join Jan. 6 committee after McCarthy pulls his five picks

Adam Kinzinger accepted on Sunday Nancy Pelosi’s offer for him to serve on the committee probing the January 6 riot after Kevin McCarthy withdrew all five of his picks.

‘Today, I was asked by the Speaker to serve on the House Select Committee to Investigate January 6th and I humbly accepted,’ the Illinois congressman wrote in a statement Sunday afternoon.

‘I’m a Republican dedicated to conservative values,’ he continued, ‘but I swore an oath to uphold and defend the Constitution—and while this is not the position I expected to be in or sought out, when duty calls, I will always answer.’

Pelosi revealed Sunday morning she was planning to tap Kinzinger as the second Republican on the select committee. Liz Cheney was part of the original eight members Pelosi selected for the panel earlier this month.

Kinzinger will join the other members at the committee’s first hearing on Tuesday.

House Minority Leader McCarthy last week pulled his five picks, which were given to the leader when Pelosi created the group. The move came after the speaker rejected two of McCarthy’s picks – Representatives Jim Jordan and Jim Banks.

Pelosi told ABC News on Sunday morning the duo would ‘jeopardize the integrity of the investigation.’

Kinzinger agreed that the panel needed a ‘serious, clear-eyed non-partisan approach’.

‘I will work diligently to ensure we get to the truth and hold those responsible for the attack fully accountable,’ he said in his Sunday statement.

Both Cheney and Kinzinger voted for Trump’s impeachment following the January 6 riot.

Kinzinger, who became a vocal Trump critic despite voting with him 90 per cent of the time, was the first Republican House member to call for the then-president’s removal from office by invoking the 25th Amendment.

It is not clear if Pelosi will tap any more people to serve on the committee, but she did say ‘other Republicans’ have expressed interest in joining the panel. 

When asked by ABC on Sunday morning, ‘Will you be appointing more Republicans to the committee like Congressman Adam Kinzinger?’, Pelosi responded: ‘That would be my plan.’

ABC This Week host George Stephanopoulos pushed Pelosi on when she will make an announcement.

‘Perhaps after I speak to Adam Kinzinger. But I’m not going to announce it right this minute,’ she said just moments before approaching the Illinois Republican.

‘You can say that that’s the direction I would be going on,’ she continued with a chuckle. ‘He and other Republicans have expressed an interest to serve on the select committee.’ 

Pelosi said she ‘wanted to appoint three of the members that Leader McCarthy suggested, but he withdrew their names.’

‘The two that I would not appoint are people who would jeopardize the integrity of the investigation. And there’s no way I would tolerate their antics as we seek the truth,’ she told ABC News on Sunday morning.

Pelosi, as House speaker, was able to veto two of House Minority Leader Kevin McCarhty’s – Representatives Jim Jordan of Ohio and Jim Banks of Indiana.

In response, Republicans warn there will be ‘endless retaliation’, according to a Sunday report, as the House becomes further divided.

‘I didn’t think things could get more partisan in the House than they already were,’ a top Republican aide told the Washington Examiner. ‘But Speaker Pelosi’s decision to remove Republicans from the January 6th Committee just took things to an entirely new level.’

‘When Republicans take back the House, expect endless retaliation,’ the aide said.

The House currently sits at a 220-211 divide with Democrats holding the majority, but Republicans are putting all their efforts into flipping the body back to red in the 2022 midterms.

The Senate is split 50-50 with Vice President Kamala Harris holding the tie-breaking vote.

McCarthy picked five Republicans for Pelosi’s committee earlier this month – Representatives Jordan, Banks, Troy Nehls of Texas, Kelly Armstrong of North Dakota and Rodney Davis of Illinois. 

Jordan, Banks and Nehls all voted against certifying the 2020 election for Joe Biden by citing fraud in certain states on January 6.

But Pelosi, last week, vetoed Banks and Jordan’s appointment to the committee. She did not reject Nehls.

This caused McCarthy to pull all five of his picks.

‘Unless Speaker Pelosi reverses course and seats all five Republican nominees, Republicans will not be party to their sham process and will instead pursue our own investigation of the facts,’ McCarthy said at a press conference Wednesday.

‘Pelosi has broken this institution,’ he continued, while accusing the House speaker of an ‘egregious abuse of power.’

Pelosi on Thursday defended her decision to reject Jordan and Banks, saying their ‘antics’ were in danger of getting in the way of finding the truth behind what happened on January 6.

She said both lawmakers had a history of making statements that would have made it impossible for them to display ‘balanced judgment,’ including blaming the Biden administration for events that unfolded before it had even formed.

‘It is my responsibility as Speaker of the House, to make sure we get to the truth on this, and we will not let their antics stand in the way of that,’ she said during her weekly press briefing.

The panel is due to hold its first hearing next week into violence that left five people dead after supporters of former President Donald Trump stormed the U.S. Congress as they moved to certify the Electoral College results.

It will hear from law enforcement officers who battled protesters.

Under the terms of the select committee, Pelosi was able to name eight members and McCarthy had five picks.

Among Pelosi’s picks was one Republican – Representative Liz Cheney, who broke ranks with her party, repeatedly voiced her disapproval of Trump and in May lost her Republican Conference chairwomanship.

Pelosi accepted three of the Republican nominations but rejected Jordan and Banks.  

The two Republicans are outspoken allies of former President Trump, leading to accusations that Pelosi was embarked on a witch hunt. McCarthy then withdrew all five of his nominations.

McCarthy expressed his outrage during a Thursday news conference. He questioned why Pelosi would object to Afghanistan veteran Banks but not Democratic Rep. Benny Thompson who dropped a lawsuit against Trump over the Jan. 6 riot in order to take up the committee’s chairmanship. 

‘It doesn’t matter today what she does with that committee, because it’s not going to change the outcome of what seems like a pre determined or already written report,’ he said.

Earlier Pelosi hit back against critics who accused her of being intent on taking down Trump.  

‘We’re there to get the truth, not to get Trump,’ she said spelling it out.

‘T-R-U truth. Trump that seems to be what the other side is obsessed with.

‘So as legislation allows I didn’t accept two of the five people were appointed, they had made statements and taken actions that I think would impact the integrity of the commission of the committee, the work as a committee,’ she said.

‘This is deadly serious. This is about our constitution, it’s about our country.’  

By way of example she cited a combative statement released by Banks on Monday evening in which he promised to use his role on the commission to investigate the response of the Biden administration to the riot.

‘There was no Biden administration on January so let’s not go into that,’ she said.

Republicans were prepared to focus their strategy on why Pelosi wasn’t more prepared for the attack.

‘There’s one fundamental question that I hope Democrats will actually answer and address and that is why wasn’t there a proper security presence that day?’ Jordan questioned after he was appointed by McCarthy.

‘And frankly, only the speaker can answer that question so let’s see if the Democrats bring that up,’ he added.

Pelosi’s spokesperson told DailyMail.com last Wednesday that the GOP strategy is ‘desperate’.

‘On January 6th, the Speaker, a target of an assassination attempt that day, was no more in charge of Capitol security than Mitch McConnell was,’ Drew Hammill said. ‘This is a clear attempt to whitewash what happened on January 6th and divert blame.’

He added: ‘I would hope the media would do better and treat this as the utter nonsense that it is.’

The GOP was also planning to highlight leftist political violence, including the 2020 summer riots and looting in response to police brutality.

‘The Democrats in the summer of 2020 normalized anarchy, they normalized rioting and looting,’ Jordan said. ‘So I think that’s an important element that we’ll have to point out.’

In his statement, after being named to the committee by McCarthy, Banks also promised to address questions being ignored by Democrats.

‘Even then, I will do everything possible to give the American people the facts about the lead up to January 6, the riot that day, and the responses from Capitol leadership and the Biden administration,’ he said. 

‘I will not allow this committee to be turned into a forum for condemning millions of Americans because of their political beliefs.’

Two days later he accused Pelosi of running from the facts.

‘I’m a sitting member of Congress and served my country in Afghanistan and the Speaker knows how hard I will fight for my country,’ he said.

‘We said all along that this was a purely partisan exercise by the Democrats and Nancy Pelosi’s rejection of me and Jim Jordan shows once again she is the most partisan figure in America today.’ 

The panel has been beset by partisan wrangling from the off. Last month, all but two Republicans opposed the select committee in a House vote.

Source: Daily Mail