DEMOCRATS’ JAN. 6 COMMITTEE PROBLEM. “People care about getting pissed off every time they buy a tank of gas,” a Republican strategist said recently, pointing to the importance of inflation as an issue in the midterm elections. “You know what they don’t care about? Jan. 6.” With that, the GOP pol succinctly pointed out the political problem facing House Democrats. They created a committee to investigate the Jan. 6 Capitol riot in part so they could use it as an issue in the midterm elections. What if it doesn’t work?
Polls support the Republican strategist. It’s not that the public thinks Jan. 6 was no big deal. Significant majorities believe it was a terrible event and that those who took part in the violence should be prosecuted. Many blame former President Donald Trump for inciting it. The problem, for Democratic campaign hopes, is that voters simply do not place Jan. 6 very high on the list of problems they care about most. With inflation, crime, the war in Ukraine, COVID, the mess at the U.S.-Mexico border — with all those, plus traditional issues such as healthcare and the environment, most voters simply do not think Jan. 6 belongs anywhere near the top of their priorities list.
That has House Democrats worried. So now there is word they are searching for ways to add drama and pizzazz to the Jan. 6 committee’s report. “The House January 6 committee has tried to recruit high-profile journalists to write its report about the attack on the Capitol, hoping to build a narrative thriller that compels audiences and is a departure from government reports of yore,” reported the Washington Post.
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Democrats are not trying to hide the political role of the committee. The Washington Post said committee Democrats face the challenge of trying to make people look anew at Jan. 6, an event “many Americans feel they already understand.” How to do that? “They’ll attempt to do so this spring through public hearings, along with a potential interim report and a final report that will be published ahead of the November midterms — with the findings likely a key part of the Democrats’ midterm strategy,” according to the Washington Post. That’s pretty clear.
So when Republicans accuse Democrats of politicizing the Jan. 6 investigation — they’re right. Indeed, House Democrats want to make the committee’s findings a “key part of the Democrats’ midterm strategy.” Noted one House Republican aide in a text exchange Friday morning: “With rising inflation, crime, and illegal border entries under their watch, Democrats know they have nothing to run on, so it’s no surprise that they’re going to rely on a committee that has operated explicitly to attack their political opponents.”
The Democrats’ strategy is reminiscent of their plans during the Robert Mueller investigation, when the party hoped to make the Trump-Russia special counsel’s report and impeachment part of its 2020 political strategy. But how to do that? Mueller had produced a 400-plus-page report in legal language that would capture no one’s imagination. So Democrats looked back to their greatest hit ever, the Watergate investigation. The Senate Watergate committee held dramatic televised hearings that helped create enormous interest in the scandal. Maybe in 2019 Democrats could do the same thing with Trump-Russia!
“Put Mueller in a Capitol Hill hearing room jammed with lawmakers and journalists, cameras rolling, and a Trump-Russia impeachment proceeding would become something the nation would want to watch,” I wrote in my book Obsession, summarizing the Democrats’ thinking. “Not everybody is reading the book, but people will watch the movie,” a House Judiciary Committee official told Politico Playbook.
That was the idea, at least. Of course, it didn’t work. Mueller was unable to establish that collusion ever occurred and then had a difficult time during his testimony at the show hearings. The whole thing was a flop.
Of course, Jan. 6 is different from the Trump-Russia investigation. For one thing, there are hours of dramatic video of rioters battling police in and around the Capitol. There are more than 700 criminal cases against participants. There are the personal accounts of members of Congress, the Capitol Police, and the staff who experienced the riot. That is a lot of material. The Washington Post reported the Jan. 6 committee is “seeking to compile dramatic videos, texts and emails in a digital format that is easy to understand — and easy to share on social media. And they want to put together blockbuster televised hearings that the public actually tunes into.”
Maybe it will work. But the problem is, the story has been told before — many times and at great length. And people have reached conclusions about what happened. They have seen Trump impeached for the riot and hundreds of people prosecuted. And that will likely make it difficult for the Jan. 6 committee to mount the “blockbuster” campaign of its dreams.
But the Democrats’ biggest problem is that the midterm elections will not be about Jan. 6. They are about President Joe Biden’s and the Democratic House and Senate majorities’ handling of the problems facing America in the last two years. If the polls are to be believed, and they are extensive, then people are ready to change control of the House, and perhaps the Senate. Their opinion of Biden’s job performance, with an approval rating currently in the low 40s, will be a part of their decision-making process. And one thing that very likely will not be a part of that decision-making is the work of the Jan. 6 committee.
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