On January 6, a mob of Trump supporters overran the seat of the US legislature as Congress was meeting to certify Biden's election victory [File: John Minchillo/AP Photo]​

Washington, December 10 (RHC)-- A United States appeals court has rejected an attempt by former President Donald Trump to hold back the release of White House records linked to the deadly January 6 insurrection at the U.S. Capitol.

A three-judge panel of the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Washington, DC said on Thursday that Trump had provided “no basis” for his request.  “Both branches agree that there is a unique legislative need for these documents and that they are directly relevant to the Committee’s inquiry into an attack on the legislative branch and its constitutional role in the peaceful transfer of power,” the judges wrote in their decision.

“The Committee is investigating a singular event in this nation’s history, in which there is a sufficient factual predicate for inferring that former President Trump and his advisors played a materially relevant role.”

The former Republican president had tried to exert “executive privilege” to block the release of the documents to a US House of Representatives committee investigating the Capitol riot.  But Joe Biden’s administration in October rejected that argument, prompting Trump to file a legal challenge.

On January 6, a mob of Trump supporters overran the seat of the US legislature as Congress was meeting to certify Biden’s election victory.

Trump, who delivered an incendiary speech just before the riot and had for weeks repeated false claims that the presidential election was stolen from him, was later impeached for “incitement of insurrection.”

The appeals court on Thursday gave Trump 14 days to file an emergency request to the Supreme Court to appeal its ruling.   The decision comes a day after Trump’s former chief of staff, Mark Meadows, sued the House committee investigating the riot, as well as Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, after the panel said it would recommend moving forward with contempt charges against him.  Meadows’s lawyer said this week that his client would stop cooperating with the committee.