WASHINGTON — Rudolph W. Giuliani, who helped lead President Donald J. Trump’s efforts to overturn the outcomes of the 2020 election as his private lawyer, sat on Friday for a prolonged interview with the Home committee investigating the Jan. 6 assault on the Capitol, based on folks accustomed to the closed-door interview.
Mr. Giuliani’s interview, which was digital, lasted for greater than seven hours, the folks mentioned. The interview was transcribed, and he was below oath. He took a break in the course of it to host his hourlong afternoon radio present.
It was unclear what Mr. Giuliani advised the committee, however his centrality to Mr. Trump’s numerous makes an attempt to subvert the election made him a probably pivotal witness for the panel, with data of particulars about interactions with members of Congress and others concerned within the plans.
Mr. Giuliani, whose interview was reported earlier by CNN, had negotiated with the panel about testifying for months, and he reached an settlement to talk about issues aside from his conversations with Mr. Trump or another matter he believed was lined by attorney-client privilege.
Earlier this month, he abruptly pulled out of a scheduled interview with the committee after the panel refused to let him file the session. He later dropped that objection and agreed to testify after the panel threatened to make use of its “enforcement choices,” an implied referral to the Justice Division for prison contempt of Congress, the folks mentioned.
The committee has interviewed greater than 1,000 witnesses and has really helpful prison contempt of Congress costs in opposition to 4 of Mr. Trump’s closest allies, who’ve refused to cooperate totally.
Mr. Giuliani was one of many final main witnesses the committee had pressed to interview within the last weeks earlier than it begins holding public hearings in June. Others embody greater than a half-dozen Republican members of Congress, akin to Consultant Kevin McCarthy of California, the minority chief.
The panel has not but made last choices about whether or not to name Mr. Trump, former Vice President Mike Pence or Virginia Thomas, a right-wing activist who pushed to overturn the 2020 election and who’s the spouse of Justice Clarence Thomas. The chairman of the panel, Consultant Bennie Thompson, Democrat of Mississippi, just lately indicated the committee may not finally summon any of the three.
Mr. Giuliani was a key determine in Mr. Trump’s makes an attempt to stave off electoral defeat and was concerned in plans to disrupt the conventional workings of the Electoral School by persuading lawmakers in contested swing states to attract up alternate slates of electors displaying Mr. Trump as victorious in states truly gained by Joseph R. Biden Jr.
Mr. Giuliani was additionally instrumental in vetting a plan to make use of the Division of Homeland Safety to grab voting machines and study the info housed inside them for supposed proof of fraud. At Mr. Trump’s route, Mr. Giuliani requested a high homeland safety official if the division might legally take management of the machines — a notion the official shot down. Mr. Giuliani later opposed an much more explosive proposal to have the army seize the machines.
Mr. Giuliani was subpoenaed with different members of a authorized workforce that billed itself as an “elite strike power” and pursued a set of lawsuits on behalf of Mr. Trump by which they promulgated conspiracy theories and made unsubstantiated claims of fraud within the election.
The committee’s subpoena sought all paperwork that Mr. Giuliani had detailing the strain marketing campaign that he and different Trump allies initiated focusing on state officers, the seizure of voting machines, contact with members of Congress, any proof to help the conspiracy theories he pushed and any preparations for his charges.
On Jan. 6, talking to a crowd of Trump supporters earlier than a pro-Trump mob attacked the Capitol, Mr. Giuliani referred to as for “trial by fight.” Later, after the constructing was below siege, each he and Mr. Trump referred to as lawmakers in an try to delay the certification of Mr. Biden’s victory.
