WASHINGTON — Facing criticism from Democrats and a few Republicans to hold former President Donald J. Trump accountable for his role in inspiring the riot at the Capitol, Attorney General Merrick B. Garland vowed on Wednesday that the Justice Department would pursue wrongdoing “at any level,” saying he would defend democratic institutions from attack and threats of violence.
“The Justice Department remains committed to holding all Jan. 6 perpetrators, at any level, accountable under law — whether they were present that day or were otherwise criminally responsible for the assault on our democracy,” Mr. Garland said in a speech to commemorate the anniversary of the riot, when Mr. Trump’s supporters ransacked the Capitol in a bid to stop the certification of Joseph R. Biden Jr.’s election victory.
The remarks, delivered at the department’s headquarters, come as Mr. Garland is under pressure from Democrats to more aggressively investigate any role that Mr. Trump and his allies may have played in encouraging the violence.
The attorney general also obliquely addressed critics who have urged him to disclose more about the department’s inquiry, including whether investigators are scrutinizing Mr. Trump.
Mr. Garland reiterated that the department would not share details about its findings even as investigators have issued 5,000 subpoenas and search warrants, inspected over 20,000 hours of video footage and sifted through an estimated 15 terabytes of data. “I understand that this may not be the answer some are looking for,” he said. “But we will and we must speak through our work. Anything else jeopardizes the viability of our investigations and the civil liberties of our citizens.”
Understand the Jan. 6 Investigation
Both the Justice Department and a House select committee are investigating the events of the Capitol riot. Here’s where they stand:
While the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack has signaled an openness to making a criminal referral to the department if it comes across evidence that Mr. Trump or others broke the law, Mr. Garland did not mention Mr. Trump or any specific investigation the department might be pursuing.
Mr. Garland has never given any substantive public indication of whether or how aggressively the department might be building a case against Mr. Trump or his advisers, and it is not clear what charges they could be subject to.
Some Democrats have openly pushed Mr. Garland to make clear that he intends to act.
Last month, former Senator Claire McCaskill, Democrat of Missouri, said Mr. Garland would either “rise to the occasion or go down in infamy as one of the worst attorney generals in this country’s history” if he did not prosecute Mr. Trump for actions he took before and during the attack.
Department officials have pointed out that the agency’s Jan. 6 inquiry, among the largest investigations in its history, has already produced results. It has led to more than 700 arrests, and more than 275 people have been charged with obstructing Congress’s duty to certify the election results. The F.B.I. asked the public on Wednesday for help in identifying hundreds of additional suspects, and the government estimates that as many as 2,500 people could face federal charges.
Addressing criticism that many guilty pleas obtained by the department have been for misdemeanors, which come with little jail time, Mr. Garland said complex cases often first yielded charges that were “often less severe than later charged offenses” because investigators needed time to collect and examine more evidence.
Mr. Garland also connected the investigation to broader efforts by the department to prosecute threats of political violence and fight voting restrictions, pledging to “protect the cornerstone of our democracy: the right to every eligible citizen to cast a vote that counts.”
He added, “In a democracy, people must not employ violence or unlawful threats of violence to affect that outcome.”
And hanging over the investigation is the question of whether and how the Justice Department would build criminal cases against Mr. Trump, his top allies in Congress and former administration officials who worked to publicly undermine the results of the election and prevent Mr. Biden from taking office. Those include Mark Meadows, the former White House chief of staff, and Jeffrey Clark, a former Justice Department official.
Key Figures in the Jan. 6 Inquiry
Mark Meadows. Mr. Trump’s chief of staff, who initially provided the panel with a trove of documents that showed the extent of his role in the efforts to overturn the election, is now refusing to cooperate. The House voted to recommend holding Mr. Meadows in criminal contempt of Congress.
Fox News anchors. Laura Ingraham, Sean Hannity and Brian Kilmeade texted Mr. Meadows during the Jan. 6 riot urging him to persuade Mr. Trump to make an effort to stop it. The texts were part of the material that Mr. Meadows had turned over to the panel.
Michael Flynn. Mr. Trump’s former national security adviser attended an Oval Office meeting on Dec. 18 in which participants discussed seizing voting machines and invoking certain national security emergency powers. Mr. Flynn has filed a lawsuit to block the panel’s subpoenas.
John Eastman. The lawyer has been the subject of intense scrutiny since writing a memo that laid out how Mr. Trump could stay in power. Mr. Eastman was present at a meeting of Trump allies at the Willard Hotel that has become a prime focus of the panel.
Mr. Trump and his inner circle made specious claims that the election was fraudulent, even after administration officials said Mr. Trump had lost. They pushed state and federal officials to falsely insist that they had found fraud, and they worked with lawyers to try to invalidate the Electoral College results in key swing states. And, when all else failed, they asked Mr. Trump’s supporters to come to Washington on Jan. 6 to “stop the steal.”
Legal experts have suggested that such acts could have violated federal voting laws or prohibitions against obstructing Congress from performing its official duties.
Mr. Trump’s critics have accused him of encouraging his supporters to use force to intimidate whose who would not challenge the Electoral College results, including former Vice President Mike Pence.
But as federal prosecutors weigh the possibility of a case against Mr. Trump or his allies, they would need evidence strong enough to move through the federal courts. Given that Congress has impeached, but never removed, three presidents, the idea that such politically charged cases would sail through a system that has a higher bar for conviction is very unlikely.
“If a case is on the bubble and can’t hold up to district court, an appeal and Supreme Court scrutiny, the department will need to use prosecutorial discretion,” said Norman Eisen, a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution who worked as counsel to House Democrats during Mr. Trump’s first impeachment over whether he had improperly pressured the president of Ukraine to falsely say he was investigating Mr. Biden.
Given the largely public nature of the acts committed by Mr. Trump, and the lies he continues to peddle since leaving office, Mr. Garland risks fostering the idea that presidents and their allies cannot be held accountable for behavior that undermines democracy, should the Justice Department be unable to publicly respond, experts said.
“You don’t want a president and administration — current or former — to be viewed as above the law by the people,” said Barbara Perry, a presidential historian at the University of Virginia’s Miller Center. “Politics will have trumped the law.”