A federal grand jury in Washington, D.C. turned down a Justice Department request to indict former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson over her testimony about the Jan. 6, 2021 insurrection, two people familiar with the matter told The Washington Post on Tuesday.
At a brief hearing, a department lawyer told a magistrate judge the grand jury “had not concurred” in a proposed indictment. He didn’t say who the defendant was, but the sources confirmed it was Hutchinson.
The outcome is a fresh setback for the department’s pursuit of President Donald Trump’s critics. Grand juries almost never decline to indict because prosecutors need only probable cause. In February, a different D.C. grand jury also refused to charge six Democratic lawmakers over remarks to servicemembers.
The probe followed referrals from Republican Reps. Jim Jordan (R-OH) and Barry Loudermilk (R-GA), who said her testimony was false. The department’s Civil Rights Division brought the case to the grand jury, which The Post calls unusual for a false-statements investigation.
Hutchinson told the House Jan. 6 committee in 2022 that Trump urged supporters to head to the Capitol despite knowing they were armed, and that he lunged at a Secret Service agent in his SUV. The vehicle’s driver later disputed that, and no other witness backed it up, though several said Trump was clearly angry.
The Justice Department, which set a potential indictment of Hutchinson in motion earlier this month, didn’t immediately comment.
The post DOJ suffers humiliating defeat as grand jury rejects bid to charge ex-Trump aide appeared first on Raw Story.
