WASHINGTON – President and Executive Director of the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, Damon Hewitt, issued the statement below following the Select Committee on the January 6 Attack’s decision to recommend criminal charges against individuals involved in the insurrection, including Former President Trump:
“The Capitol insurrection was a brazen attempt to overthrow our democratic institutions. Those who conspired or incited the attack bear no less responsibility than those who physically stormed the building in Washington, D.C. Throughout the January 6th Select Committee’s hearings, committee members took great care to present the facts, which made clear how determined the insurrectionists were in their illicit efforts to stage a coup in broad daylight. We thank them for their leadership, their service, and their nonpartisan work. We urge the Department of Justice to take the Select Committee’s criminal referrals seriously. There must be accountability for this kind of violence and terrorism. We should have a whole-of-society response to delegitimize the violence we witnessed. The Lawyers’ Committee will continue its work, which includes a federal civil rights lawsuit filed on behalf of Capitol Police officers who were on the frontlines of that fateful day, to hold members of the insurrectionist plot to account. We must all remind anti-democratic actors and would-be authoritarians that there is a cost for their actions.”
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About the Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law – The Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights Under Law is a nonpartisan, nonprofit organization, formed in 1963 at the request of President John F. Kennedy to mobilize the nation’s leading lawyers as agents for change in the Civil Rights Movement. Today, the Lawyers’ Committee uses legal advocacy to achieve racial justice, fighting inside and outside the courts to ensure that Black people and other people of color have the voice, opportunity, and power to make the promises of our democracy real. For more information, please visit https://link.edgepilot.com/s/93cd1b53/NDjcKYw2Ik_G-CAbiS5njQ?u=https://lawyerscommittee.org/.
