if they do that, the big decision will come down to merrick garland. adam schiff, by the way, has been putting pressure on merrick garland. a lot of pressure on him. now, if you look at the history, will merrick garland charge, on the one hand. yes, it is a federal crime, punishing by up to one year. minimum of one month. however, if we look at the history, it's been over 50 years since doj has criminally charged anyone for this. in the last decade or so, we have seen both parties get contempt referrals. barr and wilbur ross under the trump administration. learner and holder under the obama then station. we will see if merrick garland recognizes we are in new territory here >> there is also a civil track. >> absolutely. they could go to court and try to compel the witnesses to testify and compel documents. we will have a battle in the courts over executive privilege. joe biden has said, i'm not asserting executive privilege. meaning those documents can go over to the committee. unless donald trump objects, he has made noises that he will object, but no

garland could intervene if he wants to. historically, most people don't actually go to trial after their cases are referred to doj. even if steve bannon is ultimately charged here, any prosecution could take a while and he could obviously appeal. so there is a long road ahead here. >> laura, separate from this, very connected, former president trump sued the january 6th committee and national archives to try to keep the records from his presidency a secret. these records that they have specifically requested. what is going on here? >> right. this fight is all about what the former president was doing and saying leading up to the riot on january 6th. the problem for him is he isn't president anymore and doesn't have the records he wants to keep secret. they live in the national archives. the man who is president, president biden, is standing by his decision not to assert executive privilege over these materials. in a new statement late last night, more forceful in tone, trump's actions are called a unique and existential thr

garland will appoint a special counsel to look at this. because the evidence is so clear for a massive watergate style attempt to destroy the process of electing a president. >> a massive watergate style attempt to destroy the process of electing a president. how deep does it go? because one of the things liz cheney suggested yesterday was that the president's assertion of executive privilege in and of itself was some kind of an indication that he had either knowledge of or was involved in the planning of the insurrection itself. >> well, when you string it all out, and you just look at his tweets, i mean, he says, you know, in his tweet on december 30th, january 6th, see you in d.c. he is actually talking about january 6th. and then he tweets in a -- there is no ambiguity in this, he says in a tweet, just hours before. i mean, this is 1:00 a.m. on january 6th, the day of the insurrection, if vice president mike pence comes through for us, we will win the presidency. many states want to direct -- believe they want to decertify the mistake