The House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol will soon move to interview Ginni Thomas, the wife of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, according to several media reports.
CNN, citing those familiar with the plans, said Monday that the House panel will likely ask Ginni Thomas to testify voluntarily, although lawmakers have not ruled out issuing subpoenas to compel testimony from important witnesses.
“We want to hear from everybody who has something to say,” Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), a member of the nine-person bipartisan committee, told CNN. He added that Thomas “obviously interacted frequently with the president’s chief of staff and was actively involved with the effort to overturn the election. So, speaking as one member, I think it’s important that we hear from her.”
The news follows last week’s reports by The Washington Post and CBS News that Thomas sent nearly two dozen text messages to former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows urging him to help overturn the 2020 presidential election. Meadows, who had replied to some of the messages, turned over the texts and hundreds of pages of other documents to the Jan. 6 select committee as part of its investigation.
Thomas sent the missives over a three-month period from November 2020 to January 2021, sharing conspiracy theories about voter fraud and pressing Meadows to reverse the presidential results.
“Help This Great President stand firm, Mark!!! ...You are the leader, with him, who is standing for America’s constitutional governance at the precipice,” she wrote in a Nov. 10 message, shortly after Democrat Joe Biden was projected to defeat then-President Donald Trump. “The majority knows Biden and the Left is attempting the greatest Heist of our History.”
The messages do not directly reference her husband’s work on the Supreme Court, but they show the powerful influence she holds in Washington. Legal scholars have said the texts raise serious conflict-of-interest concerns about Clarence Thomas’ work on the court, as he has voted on issues related to the Capitol riot.
The Jan. 6 committee could use its subpoena power to obtain other communications Thomas may have had with any additional White House officials. The New York Times added that some members of the panel were initially opposed to using a subpoena, calling her a minor player in the insurrection, but the news about the text messages has increased public pressure on the committee to speak with her.
Thomas also said earlier this month that she attended Trump’s “Stop the Steal” rally on Jan. 6, just hours before the deadly attack on Congress took place. She said she had no role in organizing the event and left early due to the cold weather.
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