| President Donald Trump tried to hide what he did on the most shocking day of his presidency — Jan. 6, 2021, the day of the attack on the Capitol. He battled the Jan. 6 congressional committee in court to avoid handing over records of his activities that day and the days leading up to it. (He lost at the Supreme Court.) Now Congress has the records, but a large chunk of time appears unaccounted for. The Washington Post's Bob Woodward and CBS's Robert Costa reported today that 7½ hours are missing from the official White House call log from Jan. 6., hours that span when the attack happened and when Trump came under criticism even from Republicans for not acting quickly or forcefully to stop it. We know Trump talked to people during the riot. Reporting has revealed Trump called or received messages from lawmakers as they were hiding in the Capitol from the attackers. We don't know why these logs are missing. Perhaps they were reported incorrectly. Or perhaps the logs got destroyed — Trump destroyed plenty of other documents while in office. Or, a committee member suggested, perhaps Trump used a private cellphone or even a burner phone to avoid being tracked. Why the Justice Department could be hesitant to prosecute Trump aides  Attorney General Merrick Garland (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post) | The committee's next approach is to piece together what happened from people who were by Trump's side on Jan. 6. But a number of those aides have avoided talking to the committee, despite receiving a legally binding subpoena from Congress. Frustratingly for the committee, President Biden's Justice Department hasn't prosecuted most people who ignored their subpoenas. "This committee is doing its job. The Department of Justice needs to do theirs," Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-Calif.), a committee member, said Monday as the committee voted to hold two more Trump advisers in contempt. Here are some reasons the Justice Department might be hesitant to punish people for ignoring congressional subpoenas. 1. Trump has claimed executive privilege over his former aides. The only person prosecuted for ignoring the Jan. 6 committee has been Steve Bannon. Though he was briefly part of the Trump administration, he was a private citizen on Jan. 6. Others ignoring congressional subpoenas were all in the White House on and around Jan. 6: Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, trade director Peter Navarro and communications chief Dan Scavino. The Justice Department has long been wary of stepping on a protection that benefits its branch of government. There are at least two Justice Department opinions that say executive privilege claims should stop prosecution, the New York Times reports. "The DOJ knows such nonsense would gut Executive Privilege and the critical role it plays in effective presidential decision making," Navarro said in a statement this week indicating he's pretty confident he won't be prosecuted. 2. Maybe there's not enough evidence to convict them. Barbara McQuade, a federal prosecutor in the Obama administration and, briefly, in the Trump administration, said that "a conviction requires proof that the person acted willfully, that is, that he knew his conduct was illegal." These aides could argue that they weren't willfully bucking a subpoena, that they were instead bound by executive privilege from their boss not to talk. 3. It's a potential slippery slope. Attorney General Merrick Garland has said the Justice Department would investigate those involved in the Jan. 6 riot "at any level." But if the Justice Department is investigating Trump, we don't know about it. The Justice Department seems wary of using its powers to prosecute a former president, because what kind of abuse of power could that lead to in the future? That logic could apply to some of his top aides as well. 4. The Justice Department could have something else in mind. McQuade said that if the Justice Department is investigating Jan. 6 in any great detail, it could want to use these men as witnesses. So prosecutors might keep that contempt charge in their back pockets, in the hopes it will motivate people such as Meadows to talk to them. How coal influences Joe Manchin's energy politics  Sen. Joe Manchin III (D-W.Va.). (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post) | Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) is rich off coal. He owns a coal company, and investigations by The Post and Politico and a new one by the New York Times underscore how he has rather unabashedly used his power as a politician to keep that business going. (He says his son runs it now.) In December, Manchin single-handedly tanked Democratic social-safety-net legislation that would have significantly addressed climate change. It's part of his long history standing against legislation that would give the federal government greater control over coal. Suddenly, he's open to revisiting President Biden's climate policies. He wants the United States to have an "all of the above" energy policy, The Post reports. That is code for wanting policies that don't phase out coal, but Manchin says he's open to tax credits for clean energy and a fee on methane emissions. A climate activist recently told me that Manchin's success in politics underscores the fossil fuel industry's hold on the government: A West Virginian coal businessman chairs the Senate Energy Committee, which oversees climate change policy. But as Manchin likes to point out to frustrated Democrats, if they didn't have him, they'd almost certainly have a Republican senator from West Virginia. | 
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