Information pour vous : Justice Department Subpoenas Top Trump White House Lawyers in Jan. 6 Probe

The subpoenas are the clearest sign yet that federal prosecutors are examining Mr. Trump’s own actions, not just those of his allies, in efforts to overturn his 2020 election loss, including before and during the attack on the Capitol by his supporters.

Prosecutors in recent days have also pressed witnesses, including two top aides to former Vice President

Mike Pence,

about Mr. Trump’s push to stay in office, The Wall Street Journal reported, though the questioning doesn’t necessarily mean that prosecutors are pursuing a criminal case against the former president.

Mr. Cipollone is the highest ranking former Trump White House official known to have been called to testify in the widening federal probe. He was in the White House as rioters stormed the Capitol and sat in on several meetings before the attack in which Mr. Trump’s allies sought ways to overturn the election. Mr. Cipollone has said that he and others repeatedly opposed those efforts. Both he and Mr. Philbin were witnesses to Mr. Trump’s activity in his final days in office.

The subpoenas were earlier reported by ABC News and CNN. Messrs. Cipollone and Philbin didn’t respond to requests for comment. A spokeswoman for the Justice Department declined to comment.

Mr. Trump has denied wrongdoing and said the Justice Department should be focusing on election fraud.

Given their roles as White House lawyers, they are expected to assert attorney-client and executive privilege in declining to answer some of prosecutors’ questions, the people said. Mr. Cipollone also negotiated such claims of privilege before he sat, under subpoena, for a videotaped interview before the House committee investigating the Jan. 6 attack. Privilege claims are expected to be at the heart of discussions with the Justice Department that could end in court.

The Justice Department has added prosecutors and resources to its investigation as the related congressional hearings have shed new light on Mr. Trump’s role in attempts by his allies to alter the election outcome.

During widely televised hearings, lawmakers showed clips of Mr. Cipollone describing how he pushed back against efforts by Mr. Trump and his allies to undo President Biden’s win.

In one example, Mr. Cipollone said he wasn’t happy that allies of Mr. Trump, including attorneys

Sidney Powell

and

Rudy Giuliani

and former national security adviser

Michael Flynn,

had sought a Dec. 18, 2020, meeting with the president to discuss their baseless claims of election fraud. He and other White House lawyers confronted the group in the Oval Office and dismissed the fraud claims as unfounded.

Mr. Cipollone also said he opposed a plan to name Ms. Powell to the position of special counsel to investigate allegations of voter fraud in the election. “I didn’t think she should be appointed to anything,” he told the committee.

He also said that he rejected a recommendation by a group of Trump allies and attorneys to seize voting machines.

“That’s not how we do things in the United States,” he said in his recorded testimony. Mr. Trump dropped the idea.

Mr. Cipollone was in contact with Mr. Trump on Jan. 6 as rioters stormed the Capitol, telling the president he needed to do more to stop the attack.

“I think I was pretty clear there needed to be an immediate and forceful response, statement, public statement, that people need to leave the Capitol now,” Mr. Cipollone said.

Two senior advisers to the former vice president, Mr. Pence’s chief of staff Marc Short and legal counsel Greg Jacob, have in recent days appeared before a grand jury under subpoena in Washington in connection with the federal investigation.

The investigators asked questions about conversations with Mr. Trump, his lawyers and other allies who sought to thwart the certification of Mr. Biden’s victory, the people said.

Investigators have also obtained phone records of key figures in the Trump administration, including his former chief of staff

Mark Meadows,

the people said. They seized the records in April.

Prosecutors have charged more than 850 people in connection with the Jan. 6 violence, including more than a dozen members of right-wing groups charged with engaging in a seditious conspiracy against the U.S.

In recent months, they have focused on two discrete prongs beyond the violence of that day, including the submission of false ballots for Mr. Trump.

Prosecutors earlier issued subpoenas seeking information about the unauthorized pro-Trump electors and communications with nearly 30 people, including lawyers John Eastman and Mr. Giuliani and other conservative activists, according to a copy of the subpoena reviewed by The Journal.

Subpoenas were also sent to Arizona state senators

Kelly Townsend

and

Karen Fann,

both Republicans, seeking correspondence with Trump advisers and state-level activists about the electors. The subpoenas to Ms. Townsend and Ms. Fann were disclosed through a public-record request.

—Alexa Corse contributed to this article.

Write to Sadie Gurman at sadie.gurman@wsj.com