Former advisers to former President Donald Trump were told in a letter on Thursday not to comply with a request from the select committee investigating the events of Jan. 6, The Washington Post reports.
Those on the list include Mark Meadows, Trump’s former chief of staff; Dan Scavino, the former deputy chief of staff for communications; Kash Patel, a former Defense Department official; and former Trump adviser Steve Bannon, according to the Post. Congressional investigators requested that documents be submitted by midnight Thursday.
Trump intends to exert executive privilege, according to his lawyers, which could prevent his former staffers from testifying. They say in the letter that records and testimony related to Jan. 6 are protected “from disclosure by the executive and other privileges, including among others the presidential communications, deliberative process, and attorney-client privileges.”
The four former staffers had not responded to the Post’s requests for comment on Thursday afternoon, and it was not clear whether they would follow Trump’s lawyers’ directive.
The “outrageously broad records request … lacks both legal precedent and legislative merit,” Trump spokesperson Taylor Budowich said in a statement, the Post reported.
“Executive privilege will be defended, not just on behalf of President Trump and his administration, but also on behalf of the Office of the President of the United States and the future of our nation,” Budowich said.
