"The thing most upsetting to me as a liberal Democrat and civil libertarian is how hard they're searching for a crime". This is what Alan Dershowitz has said in reference to the attempt by the Congressional committee on the Capitol assault to find a reason to convict former President Donald Trump.
The lawyer has given an exclusive interview to Just the News in which he assesses the work being done by the committee in this regard. Says Dershowitz, "It reminds me of Lavrentiy Beria saying to Josef Stalin, 'Show me the man, and I'll show you the crime'" Beria was Stalin's man in the powerful Soviet secret service, NKVD.
A one-sided story
The Jan. 6 committee is investigating the assault on Capitol Hill on the day Congress was counting the electoral votes that would give Joe Biden the presidency. It is chaired by Democrat Bennie Thomson and Republican Liz Cheney, who is highly critical of former President Trump. The remaining members are Democrats.
On the other hand, he does not believe that the Justice Department can initiate a prosecution against the former president based on the testimony collected by the January 6 committee. Dewshowitz alleges "There was no cross examination ... It was a corrupt process for eliciting evidence. Never before have we seen a hearing like this where the other side was excluded and we only got a one-sided story".
"Stretch the law"
Among the accusations leveled against Trump is that he attempted to assassinate Vice President Mike Pence. He is also accused of having attempted to paralyze the counting of electoral votes. He has also been accused of having summoned the mob that stormed Congress, and even of knowing that they came armed to the building that houses it.
"What all these arguments have in common is they stretch the law however it needs to be stretched in order to get Trump". And he warns that the same thing could happen to other people or organizations: "Today they're targeting Trump. Tomorrow it could be Black Lives Matter, or union organizers, or even a progressive president when the roles are flipped".
