January 6 committee issues subpoena to Kimberly Guilfoyle

The House select committee investigating the January 6 attack on the Capitol on Thursday issued a subpoena to Kimberly Guilfoyle in the panel's latest attempt to compel testimony from former President Donald Trump's closest allies. 

Guilfoyle and her lawyers met with the committee over video conference last week, but abruptly ended the meeting after learning that some lawmakers who sit on the committee were present. In a statement, Guilfoyle's attorney Joseph Tacopina said the committee violated an agreement that Guilfoyle would meet only with counsel for the panel, and he accused the members present of leaking details of the meeting. 

"Because Ms. Guilfoyle backed out of her original commitment to provide a voluntary interview, we are issuing today's subpoena that will compel her to testify," Congressman Bennie Thompson, the committee's chair, said in a statement.

Thompson wrote in a letter to Guilfoyle Thursday that the panel wants to talk to her about the role she played on the Trump campaign leading up to and on January 6. Guilfoyle, who is engaged to Donald Trump, Jr., was with the former president and members of his family in the Oval Office on the morning before the attack, Thompson wrote. 

Guilfoyle also spoke at the rally at the Ellipse on January 6 ahead of the riot and was photographed backstage with members of the Trump family and administration. According to Thompson's letter, she also boasted to a rally organizer that she had raised money for it. 

Thompson said in January that the committee had issued a subpoena for Guilfoyle's and Eric Trump's phone records. 

The panel hopes to finish conducting depositions by April 1 and to restart public hearings that month, Thompson said this week. He said the committee will try to issue an interim report in June. 

As of Wednesday, the committee has publicly issued more than 90 subpoenas, targeting witnesses that span members of Trump's inner circle to January 6 rally organizers and rightwing extremists. But two top Trump allies who refused to appear before the committee, Steve Bannon and former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, have been held in contempt of Congress,, and the Justice Department has charged Bannon. Both said they are following instructions from Trump, who has claimed executive privilege.  

Also on Wednesday, the House January 6 committee for the first time said it had evidence that Trump and his allies engaged in a "criminal conspiracy." But committee member Congressman Adam Kinzinger said the committee is not "not here for criminal charges. Ours is just to get to the bottom of the question in terms of getting the documents we need."

The House created the select committee last year to investigate the January 6 attack, when thousands of Trump supporters descended on the Capitol as Congress counted the electoral votes, a largely ceremonial final step affirming Mr. Biden's victory. Lawmakers were sent fleeing amid the riot, which led to the deaths of five people and the arrests of hundreds more. Trump, who encouraged his supporters to "walk over" to the Capitol during the rally at the Ellipse before the electoral vote count, was impeached by the House one week later for inciting the riot but was later acquitted by the Senate.