Rep. Matt Gaetz, R-Fla., proffered an unusual tactic on Tuesday — call former President Donald Trump to testify as a whistleblower before any House panel and grant him immunity from the prosecution of special counsel Jack Smith.
Gaetz floated the idea during an interview on "The Charlie Kirk Show."
Gaetz insisted that Congress, especially the GOP controlled House, has to "exert its equities" to combat what it believes to be the political persecution of Trump. One way to do that — call Trump as a witness.
"You can actually bring President Trump in to give testimony to the Congress and in doing so, immunize him," Gaetz told Kirk, adding there are layers of immunity but full immunity would require a supermajority vote of the House.
"But if you had a supermajority vote of a committee, like Speaker [Kevin] McCarthy could set up a select committee tomorrow that can bring Trump in, and immunize him," Gaetz said. "And then we could proceed with the very legitimate investigative work that we're doing of the Bidens and the corrupt DOJ."
Gaetz could not give Kirk examples of how or when this tactic has been used in the past, conceding "it hasn't been used recently."
"But obviously we're aware of the ability for any person to plead the Fifth. You can dissolve someone's ability to plead the Fifth if you immunize them. And so Congress has this ability that's been recognized," Gaetz went on. "We're giving you immunity for anything you say to us and anything that that would lead to.
"And so, for example, if President Trump came in and said, 'I'm here to give you testimony about the witch hunt, the abuse of criminal process,' that Congress has a legitimate oversight equities to resolve. And if he were to say things to us, we could immunize him for that conduct that he were to discuss."
Gaetz said you have to think about it almost like granting "whistleblower protections."
"Trump, the ultimate whistleblower, potentially, the beneficiary of Congressional immunity," Gaetz said, adding that it's not as easy as Trump testifying to the federal charges against him in order to neuter special counsel Jack Smith's prosecution.
"I think the areas where we could offer the broadest immunities for President Trump would be around the conspiracy charges, the deprivation of rights charges — it's almost hard to say with a straight face — that Jack Smith has brought," Gaetz said.
Gaetz said there's always a downside when you bring anyone in to testify — they could say something that "can create a cascade of follow-on charges."
But Gaetz said "in this case, I think we misunderstand the fight that we are in."
"It's never something you typically think of as a first step, try to bring people in before the Congress to give testimony cause it's not typically something people enjoy a great deal," he said.
"Right now you have the Department of Justice acting as the enforcement wing of the Democratic party," he said. "Often times these are left wing often times Soros-aligned and trained killers and they're coming after our people, our movement, and our president, and I think that if Congress just accepts this premise that it's an ongoing matter and thus we shouldn't be involved, then you underscore the legitimacy of that very matter."
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