Mo Brooks tells Jan. 6 committee he will testify under certain conditions

U.S. Rep. Mo Brooks, in a letter dated Thursday to the congressional committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, siege of the U.S. Capitol, said he would give testimony if a series of conditions have been met.

Brooks said in the letter that he has not been served a subpoena to appear before the Jan. 6 select committee, though the committee weeks ago said it had issued one.

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The conditions outlined by Brooks are similar to demands he made last month when the committee first sent him a letter requesting his cooperation. Those conditions include giving testimony in a public setting and be questioned by the congressional members of the committee and not their underlings.

Brooks accused the committee of attempting to damage his campaign for Senate by asking to speak with him during the campaign’s final weeks. Brooks lost in the Republican runoff Tuesday to Katie Britt.

Brooks said he also wanted questions confined to the events of Jan. 6. In its initial letter to the Huntsville congressman, the committee said it wanted to ask Brooks about statements he made in March about former President Donald Trump asking him for assistance in rescinding the results of the 2020 election and removing President Joe Biden from office.

Brooks said while Trump made that request on multiple occasions, Brooks always responded that he could not do that because there was no legal path for such action.

“Quite frankly, I don’t believe I have knowledge of January 6 events that are not already known or that add to what the Committee already knows,” Brooks said in the letter. “As the Committee knows, I have already made multiple, lengthy sworn statements in the Eric Swalwell lawsuit in federal court and made multiple, lengthy written and oral statements elsewhere. Presumably, the Committee has already obtained and reviewed these statements.”

Brooks was dismissed as a defendant from the Swalwell lawsuit earlier this year after a federal judge ruled Brooks had no role in the Capitol siege.

Other stipulations Brooks put on his testimony before the committee were that the committee must provide him at least a week’s notice about “any content of any prior statements, electronic communications, written communications, or the like, for which there is electronic or written documentation” so “I can refresh my memory of its contents.”

And Brooks said he will be available to the committee only on days in which he already plans to be in Washington.

“I will voluntarily appear before the Committee to give sworn testimony providing the five requirements mentioned above are met,” Brooks said in concluding his letter. “However, if the committee rejects these basic requirements, then I hereby incorporate by reference all objections of each congressman who has objected to and contested committee subpoenas and, by this letter, hereby assert those objections to this committee should this committee properly serve a subpoena on me.”

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