The Inside Story of Donald Trump During the January 6, 2016 Insurrection: CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360° View of the Fort McNair Capitol
Unlike previous hearings, which focused on specific aspects of Mr. Trump’s attempts to overturn the election, members will attempt to portray the entire arc of the plan, demonstrating Mr. Trump’s involvement in every step — even before Election Day.
Many thousands of pages of documents were received by us. Thanks to the tireless work of our members and investigators, we’ve left — we have left no doubt, none, that Donald Trump led an effort to up end American democracy that directly resulted in the violence of January 6th. He tried to take away the voice of the American people in choosing their president and replace the will of the voters with his will to remain in power.
Still, the subpoena marks a notable escalation in taking on Trump directly. Congressional subpoenas are rare for sitting and former presidents. If Trump does not comply, the committee will be able to say that it made a formal attempt to get Trump to speak, only to have him refuse.
Liz Cheney is the panel’s top Republican and she said that they are obligated to seek answers directly from the man who made it happen. The answers will help us act to protect our republic.
He’s at the center of the story, so we want to hear from him. The committee needs to ensure that nothing like January 6th ever happens again because it needs to tell the most complete and accurate story possible. It’s important to get a full context for the evidence we’ve obtained with being fair and thorough.
That’s because if Republicans take back control of the House, which they’re favored to do, the January 6 committee as it’s currently constructed will cease to exist – giving the panel less than three months to issue a final report of its findings.
CNN has obtained additional footage from Fort McNair that wasn’t shown by the committee. The exclusive footage will air on CNN on Thursday night at 8 p.m. ET, during a special edition of “Anderson Cooper 360°.” The video shows the congressional leaders after leaving the Capitol trying to find out what was going on at the capitol and begging for help as they tried to quell the insurrection.
The president watched the Fox News attack unfold from his dining room, and members of Congress and other government officials came into the void he created. What you’re about to see is previously unseen footage of Congressional leaders, both Republicans and Democrats, as they were taken to a secure location during the riot.
There were two phone calls between Pelosi and the Vice President, who took on an impromptu leadership role on January 6, coordinating the emergency response.
In this video, you just saw Senator Chuck Schumer urging Acting Attorney General Jeff Rosen to get President Trump to call off the rioters. Many other officials took action to defend the government, as did the acting AG. But Congressional leadership recognized on a bipartisan basis that President Trump was the only person who could get the mob to end its violent siege of the Congress, leave the Capitol and go home.
CNN stated in August that the wife of Senate Minority LeaderMitch McConnell had met with the committee. But after condemning the attack in her resignation letter in early 2021, Chao has largely stayed out of the national spotlight, with her recent comments to the committee providing fresh insight into her thinking on the deadly attack.
The Secret Service’s response to the Capitol attacks on January 6th: What do we know and what do we have to do about it?
I believe in this country. I believe in a peaceful transfer of power. I believe in democracy. I made the decision on my own. Continue the videotape.
Mr. Cipollone’s testimony is corroborated by multiple other White House staff members, including Cassidy Hutchinson. Ms. Hutchinson said what she heard from Mark. Start the videotape.
I looked at Mark, and I said, “Mark, he can’t possibly think we’re going to pull this off.” Like, that call was crazy.’ He just started shaking his head when he looked at me. And he’s like, ‘No, Cass, you know, he knows it’s over. He knows he lost. But we’re going to keep trying,’” Hutchinson told the committee.
Hutchinson also said that she witnessed a conversation between Meadows and Trump where he was furious the Supreme Court had rejected a lawsuit seeking to overturn the election result.
In an audio clip, Gen. Mark Milley, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said that while in the Oval Office, Trump said something to the effect of “We lost, we need to let that issue go to the next guy.”
The Secret Service has cooperated more with us since our last hearings. Nevertheless, Secret Service text messages from this period were erased in the days and months following the attack on the Capitol, even though documents and materials related to January 6th had already been requested by the Department of Justice and Congress.
In the days leading to January 6th, President Trump’s pressure campaign may have focused upon Vice President Pence, as he was one of the protectees. The day before the joint session, on January 5th, Secret Service was aware of increased chatter focused on Vice President Pence, in particular whether he would do what President Trump wanted him to do, reverse the results of the election in the joint session the next day, January 6th. On the morning of the 6th, agents received alerts of online threats that Vice — Vice President Pence would be “a dead man walking if he doesn’t do the right thing.” Another agent stated, “I saw that they will storm the Capitol if he doesn’t do the right thing.” The anger reflected in these postings was obvious, as the man at the center of the storm was President Trump.
The committee shared a text from Jason Miller, a communications adviser to Mark Meadows, that read: “I GOT THE BASE FIRED UP,” and sent a link to a webpage that had violent comments about Jan. 6.
Comments on Vice President Mike Pence and the Senators Timing the eve of the legislative session on Capitol Insurrection and the Final Hearing on Election Day
Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff said in Thursday’s hearing that that the Secret Service received alerts of online threats made against Vice President Mike Pence ahead of the Capitol insurrection, including that Pence would be “‘a dead man walking if he doesn’t do the right thing.’”
As you know, Mr. Bannon refused to testify in our investigation. He’s been convicted of criminal contempt of Congress and he’s awaiting sentencing. But the evidence indicates that Mr. Bannon had advance knowledge of Mr. Trump’s intent to declare victory falsely on election night, but also that Mr. Bannon knew about Mr. Trump’s planning for January 6th. On January 5th, the leader of the opposition, Mr. Stephen Bannon, talked. [Begin videotape]
Now following this conversation, Mr. Jacob drafted a memo to Mr. Short, which the Select Committee got from the National Archives. It was important that the public do not see the Vice President as having decided questions pertaining to electoral votes before the full development of all relevant facts, was advised in a memo sent on Election Day. A few days before the election, Mr Trump consulted with one of his outside advisers about the strategy for election night.
“It is essential that the Vice President not be perceived by the public as having decided questions concerning disputed electoral votes prior to the full development of all relevant facts,” the memo reads.
The committee revealed that Tom Fitton sent new emails to two Trump advisers days before the election. On Election Night, there is a draft statement in one email.
Committee members interviewed Ginni Thomas last month but ultimately her testimony was not featured as part of the panel’s last hearing before the midterm election.
The panel did use testimony from several high-profile witnesses who had been interviewed since the most recent hearing, but her absence was notable.
But as the panel wrapped up what was likely the last of its evidentiary hearings on Thursday, it was not at all clear that it had persuaded the jury. While Americans who blamed Mr. Trump came away from four months of jaw-dropping hearings with more proof for their belief, those who started out in his camp largely remained there.
It is amazing how tight a hold the Trump administration has on politics even though people are concerned with feeding their families and paying rent. And Trump’s campaign of lies is having a damaging impact. Even after Republicans won the House last month, a new CNN/SSRS poll published Monday found that only 34% of Republican-aligned adults are even somewhat confident that elections reflect the will of the people – down from 43% in October.
As a result, a former president who tried to overturn a demonstrably free and fair election to hang onto power in defiance of the voters, the Constitution and nearly two and a half centuries of democratic tradition remains the dominant figure in his political party and the odds-on favorite to win its nomination to run again. While the committee extensively documented the plot for history’s sake, it could not enforce accountability for it.
In his opening remarks, committee Chairman Bennie Thompson said that the panel’s business meeting would include presenting evidence as well as a vote on further investigative actions.
After the vote on his Truth Social platform, Trump criticized the committee for not asking him to testify sooner and called it a total bust.
Another close associate of Donald Trump knew what he was going to do. Roger Stone is a political operative with a reputation for dirty tricks. In November 2019, he was convicted of lying to Congress and other crimes and sentenced to more than three years in prison. He was in constant communication with President Trump throughout the year. Roger Stone was pardoned by Mr. Trump on December 23rd, 2020. The Select Committee had obtained footage of Mr. Stone from a subpoena, which came after the election.
The time to concede the election was up in the air: Trump’s adviser Steve Bannon’s plan to declare defeat in the U.S. Senate
“I really do suspect it will still be up in the air,” Stone said. “When that happens, the key thing to do is to claim victory. Possession is nine-tenths of the law. No, we did not win.
The committee also played audio from another Trump adviser, Steve Bannon, who refused to testify before the committee and is awaiting sentencing for contempt of Congress. In the audio, a plan to declare the election invalid is described.
Steve Bannon said that the former president would declare victory, which didn’t mean he was victorious, but he would say he was. He predicted that Trump will do some crazy shit if Biden is re-elected.
In mid-December 2020, President Trump’s senior advisers told him the time had come to concede the election. Donald Trump knew the courts had ruled against him. He had all of this information, but still he made the conscious choice to claim fraudulently that the election was stolen, to pressure state officials to change election results, to manufacture fake electoral slates, to attempt to corrupt our Department of Justice, to summon tens of thousands of supporters to Washington.
Communications Director Alyssa Farah recalled this comment from Trump: “I popped into the Oval just to give the president the headlines and see how he was doing. He was looking at the TV and he said he had lost to a guy.
The Call to Trump in the White House: Kevin McCarthy’s “Current Particles” In a White House Without a X-Ray Machine
“I vaguely remember him mentioning that he was a professor, and then essentially he turned the call over to Mr. Eastman, who then proceeded to talk about the importance of the RNC helping the campaign gather these contingent electors in case any of the legal challenges that were ongoing changed the result of any of the states,” McDaniel said.
Later on the evening of January 5th, the Secret Service learned during an FBI briefing that right-wing groups were establishing armed QRFs or quick reaction forces readying to deploy for January 6th. The Oath Keepers were standing by should the president use the Insurrection Act.
The crowd that arrived on Jan. 6 was heavily armed, and many wouldn’t enter the Ellipse because they would have to go through an x-ray machine.
Do you think it’s true? There was a moment when House Speaker Nancy Pelosi told the House Majority Whip that there was a threat of a security risk on the floor.
Another agent reported the dramatic impact of Trump’s anti-Pence tweet on his followers. He lacked courage, as evidenced by over 24,000 likes in under 2 minutes. Employees at Twitter were nervously monitoring the situation. They were aware that some users were rioting at the Capitol and were using social networking tool to spread the word.
Mick Mulvaney confirms GOP Rep’s account of McCarthy’s call to Trump. GOP Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler of Washington had previously shared details of a conversation between Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy and Trump on Jan. 6, in which McCarthy asked Trump to call off his supporters as his staff was “running for their lives.”
He said, “Kevin, they’re more upset about the election, you know, theft than you are.” And that’s — you know, you’ve seen widespread reports of Kevin McCarthy and the President having a — basically a swearing conversation. The President said, “No, I’m!” before the swearing in. I’m okay with this.
‘Trump was central player’. During the hearing it was learned that after losing the election, then- President Trump continued to seek avenues to overturn the results.
The Trump administration embarked on a systematic “multi-part” plan, as Chairman Bennie Thompson said, to overturn the election. The rally, and the violence, of January 6 were just one piece of a much bigger strategy.
Donald Trump was better informed about election fraud than any other American because he was in a unique position. There was no evidence to support the President’s claims. His own Justice Department appointees investigated the election fraud claims and told him point blank they were false.
The United States Capitol Attack: What We’ve Learned in Four Months of the Congress, and Why We Don’t Wanna See It
“Our nation cannot only punish the foot soldiers who stormed our Capitol,” she said. “With every effort to excuse or justify the conduct of the former president, we chip away at the foundation of our Republic.”
The United States Capitol attack will be investigated by the Select Committee. Without objection, the chair is authorized to declare the committee in recess at any point. Pursuant to House Deposition Authority Regulation 10, the chair announces the committee’s approval to release the deposition material presented during today’s hearing.
Good afternoon, and may God bless the United States of America. We started to present our findings to you, the American people four months ago. From the beginning, we understood that some people watching those proceedings would wrongly assume that the committee’s investigation was a partisan exercise.
Those who were skeptical of our work were asked to listen to the evidence, to hear testimony with an open mind and to let the facts speak for themselves. There was a plan led by former president Donald Trump to overturn the 2020 election, according to evidence collected over the course of these hearings.
Donald Trump’s actions after his election are something no president has done before. In a staggering betrayal of his oath, Donald Trump attempted a plan that led to an attack on a pillar of our democracy. It’s still hard to believe, but the facts and testimony are clear, consistent, and undisputed.
How do we know this? How have we been able to present such a clear picture of what took place? Because of the testimony we’ve heard and that we have presented to you through these proceedings, because of the documentary evidence we’ve gathered and also made available directly to you, the American people.
Most people cooperated with the investigation, and what we’ve shown you over the last few months has been based on the evidence from Republican witnesses. This investigation is not about politics as I stated in June. It’s not about partying.
Who has that been? Aides who’ve worked loyally for Donald Trump for years, Republican state officials and legislators, Republican electors, the chairwoman of the Republican National Committee, political professionals who worked at the highest levels of the Trump campaign, Trump appointees who served in the most senior positions in the Justice Department, President Trump’s staff and closest advisers in the White House, members of the — President Trump’s family, his own White House counsel.
The Speaker of the House Committee on Judicial Committee Hearings – John W. Graham’s January 6th Recommendation
The evidence shows that the testimony is not credible and the committee is looking at additional evidence from other sources. The results of online activity that the Secret Service was monitoring were being shared. They shared information about the joint session of Congress derived from social media and other sources.
There’s one more difference about today. The notice that was sent out prior to today’s proceedings stated that we would be convened as a formal committee business meeting so that we can potentially hold a vote on further investigative action based on the evidence presented.
According to public reporting, the Department of Justice has been very active in pursuing issues that were identified in prior hearings. Our committee may make a series of criminal referrals, but it is not our role to make decisions regarding prosecution.
According to the preamble, our Constitution is supposed to “establish justice.” And our nation’s judiciary and our US Department of Justice have that responsibility. The committee’s responsibility is to propose new legislation to prevent January 6th from happening again. The House amended the Electoral Count Act to make sure that no other plots to overturn an election can succeed.
He was personally and substantially involved in all of it. Exactly how did one man cause all of this? If we do not take necessary action to prevent January 6th, another one could happen if the president’s state of mind, intent, and motivation are not changed. As you view our evidence today, I would suggest a focus on the following points.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/10/13/1125331584/jan-6-committee-hearing-transcript
Where are we going? A key lesson from the investigation of Donald Trump’s actions against the election of January 5th, 2016 by Rudy Giuliani
Many of those who stepped forward to help, including Rudy Giuliani, knew they never had real evidence sufficient to change the election results. And on the evening of January 5th, they admitted they were still trying to find that phantom evidence. Of course, as a result of making intentionally false claims of election fraud, Mr. Giuliani’s license to practice law has now been suspended.
President Trump may not have gone to the Capitol on January 6th, but what he did from the White House cannot be justified. While congressional leaders worked with the Vice President to try and address the violence, President Trump refused to help anyone around him.
The Department of Justice, State Republican officials, White House staff and other people were involved in defeating Trump’s efforts to overturn the election.
These people aided in stopping Donald Trump. This leads us to a key question. Why would Americans assume our republic and our constitution are safe from another attack? Why would we assume that those institutions will not falter next time? A key lesson of this investigation is this.
Our institutions only hold when men and women of good faith make them hold regardless of the political cost. We have no guarantee that these men and women will be in place next time. Any future president inclined to attempt what Donald Trump did in 2020 has now learned not to install people who could stand in the way.
Every single person in our country is required to follow the law and respect the judgement of our courts. President Trump’s closest advisers held that view both then and now. [Begin videotape]
That breaks our republic. You must think about this as you view the evidence today. President Trump was told from reliable sources that his election fraud claims were false. He admitted he had lost the election. He took actions consistent with that belief. The claims that President Trump thought the election was stolen are false and a defense.
The courts rejected all of President Trump’s fraud and other allegations, but his Department of Justice appointees did the same. The President was aware of the truth. He heard what his experts and senior staff were telling him. He decided to ignore the courts, ignore the Justice Department, and ignore senior advisers because he knew he had lost the election.
Let me read from one judge’s statement given at a recent sentencing hearing. “High ranking members of Congress and state officials, who know perfectly well the claim of fraud was and is untrue and that the election was legitimate, are so afraid of losing their power, they won’t say so. It has to be crystal clear that it is not patriotism, it is not standing up for America to stand up for one man who knows full well that he lost instead of the Constitution he was trying to subvert.” Mr. Chairman, the violence and lawlessness of January 6th was unjustifiable, but our nation cannot only punish the foot soldiers who stormed our Capitol.
So, as we watch the evidence today, please consider where our nation is in its history. If we can survive another 246 years, is it possible? Most people in most places on Earth have not been free. America is an exception, and America continues only because we bind ourselves to our founders’ principles, to our Constitution.
Some principles are of more importance than any one American has ever lived, and we recognize that. Thank you for your support, Chairman. I yield back.
Counting the Absentee Ballots: Donald Trump, his advisers and the public opinion of the American public on the alleged fraud of the 2020 election
Thank you for being the Chairman. The meeting begins soon after the election, on November 3rd, 2020. We presented testimony about how the election results were to be arrived at. After the polls closed on Election Day, mail-in ballots are only counted in certain states.
It was not possible to know election results for a long time. Bill Stepien, the president’s campaign manager, had advised Donald Trump to encourage Republicans to vote in the election, but he did not do so. [Begin videotape]
People were arguing that mail in balloting could be a good thing for us since we had a very robust get out the vote effort.
I invited Kevin McCarthy to join the meeting, he being of like mind on — on the issue with me, in which we made our case for — for why we believed mail in balloting, mail in voting not to be a bad thing for his campaign, but, you know, the President’s mind was made up. End videotape.
So it was expected before the election that the initial counts in some states, in other words, those votes cast on Election Day, would be more heavily Republican and this would create the false perception of a lead for President Trump, a so-called red mirage. As the Absentee Ballots were counted, there could be some trends towards Vice President Biden.
Donald Trump was told by his advisers that he wasn’t given a factual basis to declare victory, and that he should wait for the remaining ballots to be counted. Bill Stepien is the campaign manager. Start the videotape.
It was not possible to make calls like that at this point. The ballots were still being counted. Ballots were still going to be counted for days. It was too soon to make that kind of announcement. I think it was my recommendation that votes were being counted. It’s too early to tell, too early to call the race.
This is a fraud on the American public. This is an embarrassment to our country. We were getting ready to win this election. Frankly, we did win this election. [applause] All of us want to stop voting. [End videotape]
I was told that the White House might declare victory before the election results are known, this is due to the fact that some people might push for it. He was trying to figure out a way of avoiding the Vice President being thrust into a position of needing to opine on that when he might not have enough information to do so. [End videotape]
Everyone knew that ballot counting would lawfully continue past Election Day, claiming that the counting on election night must stop before millions of votes were counted was as we now know a key part of President Trump’s pre-meditated plan. The President was contacted by Mr. Fitton just after 5 pm on Election Day.
A few days prior to the election, former Trump chief White House strategist and outside adviser to President Trump Steve Bannon talked to a group of his associates from China. Start the videotape.
I’m directing the Attorney General to shut down all ballot places in all 50 states. He’s not going out easy. Trump is going to do some crazy things if Biden wins. End the tape.
All hell is going to break loose tomorrow. It’s all converging and now we’re on, as they say, the point of attack, right, the point of attack tomorrow. I’ll tell you this, it’s not going to happen like you think it’s going to happen. Oh, ok. It’s going to be completely different. All I can tell you is that you need to strap in. You have made this happen and tomorrow it’s game day.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/10/13/1125331584/jan-6-committee-hearing-transcript
Defending Possession of the Law. Roger Stone, Donald Trump, and the Proud Boys: A January 6, 2019 Rehearing Subscript
I think it will be, I do think it will still be up in the air. When that happens, the key thing to do is to claim victory. Possession is 9/10 of the law.
Although we don’t yet have all the relevant records of Roger Stone’s communications, even Stone’s own social media posts acknowledge that he spoke with Donald Trump on December 27th as preparations for January 6th were underway. The post shows how Roger Stone talked about his conversations with the President.
He wrote that he told the President how to get a special counsel with full subpoena power to make sure anyone who attempts to steal the 2020 election through voter fraud are charged and convicted. The idea for a special counsel was not just an idea that was made up.
Roger Stone was connected to two groups that attacked the Capitol, the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers. Individuals from both of these organizations have been charged with the crime of seditious conspiracy. And what is seditious conspiracy?
As we all know now, the Oath Keepers did play a specific role in January 6th and had stashed weapons in Virginia for further violence that evening. The president’s speech at the Ellipse the next day was going to be guarded by the Secret Service. A Secret Service deputy chief instructed agents to add certain objects to the list of items that would be prohibited at the rally site, including ballistic vests, tactical vests, armored or not, and ballistic helmets.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/10/13/1125331584/jan-6-committee-hearing-transcript
A Conversation with Tarrio and the President of the U.S. Senate Over the Attack on January 6th, 2005 on “The Associated Particles of the Pedestrians”
The video evidence shows that Roger Stone had a link to the Proud Boys and that phone records have been obtained by the Select Committee. Tarrio, along with other Proud Boys, has been charged with multiple crimes concerning the attack on January 6th, including seditious conspiracy. During the attack, Tarrio sent a message to other Proud Boys claiming, we did that.
He also visited the White House on December 12th. Later that day, he posted a disturbing video claiming credit for the attack. A video was posted on January 6th that was apparently created before the attack. The President had a lie to tell the Americans that he had won the election. It was not accidental.
It was premeditated. There was no basis in the election results or any evidence of fraud affecting the results. It was a plan that was made in order to convince his supporters he won. And the people who seemingly knew about that plan in advance would ultimately play a significant role in the events of January 6. Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
The — I know that the President when the networks called it, of course, he was informed about the — the network decision. A few people went over to the President and said the odds of us prevailing in legal challenges were very small.
So we’re in the Oval and there’s a discussion going on. The President says it could have been the Secretary of State but he said words to the effect that we lost. We need to let the issue go to the next guy, that is President Biden.
I remember maybe a week after the election was called, I popped into the Oval just to like give the President the headlines and see how he was doing. And he asked if he could believe he lost to the effing guy, as he looked at the TV.
Jan 6 Committee Hearing Trascriptor: From Johnny McEntee to Douglas Macgregor: The President’s Task to Get US Forces Out of Afghanistan
Knowing that he had lost and that he had only weeks left in office, President Trump rushed to complete his unfinished business. President Trump ordered large-scale US troop withdrawals. Concerns about the effects on fragile governments in the battle against terrorists were brushed off by him.
Knowing he was leaving office, he acted immediately and signed this order on November 11th, which would have required the immediate withdrawal of troops from Somalia and Afghanistan, all to be complete before the Biden inauguration on January 20th. The clips you watch contain information about the national security adviser to the vice president and the chief of staff to the National Security Council.
Is there a memo the President reportedly signed on November 11, 2020 ordering troops to be out of Afghanistan?
I think you’ve seen memos from Johnny McEntee to Douglas Macgregor. It says, here’s your task, to get US forces out of out of Somalia, get US forces out of Afghanistan. When you first interviewed and met Colonel Macgregor, did you discuss the decision to withdraw from Afghanistan?
So on that same day, just so I’m clear, he responded back to you that day, meaning DOD leadership was not going to do — take any of those steps without an order.
I explained in language that should be in order while I was in the meeting with Mc Entee, and this was my answer to him. I told my client that the President has to write an order if he wants this to happen.
I made a drawing on the piece of paper for him to read. The President makes the decisions. You know, this is — what’s the right word — boilerplate language?
Mc Entee took it up and brought it to the President. The President signs the fax and it’s good to go. Kash Patel delivers it to me.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/10/13/1125331584/jan-6-committee-hearing-transcript
The Anatomy of the December 13th Session–Committee-Hearing-transcript — “The American Heart is Out of Afghanistan” [End videotape]
I told the PPO and Macgregor that if I ever saw that, I would do something physical. Because I thought what that was then was a tremendous disservice to the nation. By the way, that was not easy to resolve. People didn’t like the idea of getting out of Afghanistan.
So, I responded to that. It would have had grave consequences for the country for the department to be in politics this way. We may have spiraled out of control due to it. [End videotape]
Keep in mind the order was for an immediate withdrawal. It would have caused a lot of damage. And yet, President Trump signed the order. The actions of a President who knows his time in office will come to a close are highly consequential. At the same time that President Trump was acknowledging privately that he had lost the election, he was hearing that there was no evidence of fraud or irregularities sufficient to change the outcome.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/10/13/1125331584/jan-6-committee-hearing-transcript
The 2020 Presidential Election is Not Overturned Due to Election Fraud or Irregularities As Confirmed by a Federal Court in Michigan
I remember Mr. Meadows asking me if I was finding anything after my call with him. I told him that there wasn’t anything we could do to change the outcome in any of the states.
It would be our job to track it down and come up dry because the allegation didn’t prove to be true. And we’d have to, you know, relay the news Nothing came of it when someone told you about those votes or the fraud. It is not a fun job to tell the President about wild allegations, but it is an easier job to do as the truth-telling squad.
What was generally discussed on that topic was whether the fraud, maladministration, abuse or irregularities if aggregated and read most favorably to the campaign, would that be outcome determinative. I think all of the staff thought that outcome was not sufficient in determining the outcome. End videotape
The claims were not supported by any sufficient evidence of fraud or irregularities. They were baseless as judges continually recognized them. In none of these 62 cases was President Trump able to establish any viable claims of election fraud sufficient to overturn the results of the election. In those hearings, we shared with you the words used by judges around the country in rejecting the Trump campaign’s claims.
The language is critical of the lack of proof of election fraud in those lawsuits. For example, a federal appeals court in Pennsylvania wrote, quote, charges require specific allegations and proof. We don’t have either here. The former president lost his case after the court allowed him to make his case, according to a federal judge.
Another judge in Michigan called the claims, quote, nothing but speculation and conjecture that votes for President Trump were either destroyed, discarded or switched to votes for Vice President Biden. A federal judge in Michigan sanctioned nine attorneys, including Sidney Powell, for making frivolous allegations in an election fraud case, describing the case as a historic and profound abuse of the judicial process.
Recently, a group of distinguished Republican intellectuals lawyers, former judges and elected officials, issued a report confirming the findings of the courts. These prominent Republicans concluded in their report that the election challenge was lost not stolen. The 2020 Presidential election was not thrown out due to evidence of fraud or inaccurate results by Donald Trump and his supporters.
On December 11st, Trump’s allies lost a case in the US Supreme Court, which he considered to be his last chance of success. A newly obtained Secret Service message from that day shows how angry President Trump was about the outcome. Quote, just FYI, POTUS is pissed. The Supreme Court denied his lawsuit.
He is angry at the moment. Cassidy Hutchinson, an aide to chief of staff Mark Meadows, was present for that conversation and described it in this way. [Begin videotape]
The Supreme Court rejected that case on this day. We were in the White House residence for a Christmas reception. The President walked out of the Oval Office and across the colonnade towards the Rose Garden after we returned from the Christmas reception.
The President was fired up about the Supreme Court decision. And so I was standing next to Mr. Meadows, but I had stepped back. So I was probably two or three feet catty-cornered, diagonal from him. The President just raged about the decision and how wrong it is, and why did we not call more, it was just a typical angry rant.
The states certified their votes and sent them to Congress on December 14th. In my opinion, that was the end of the matter. I didn’t see — you know, I — I thought that this would lead inexorably to a new administration.
I told him that my personal viewpoint was that the Electoral College had met, which is the system that our country is — is set under to elect a president and vice president, and I believed at that point that the means for him to pursue litigation was probably closed.
Donald Trump and the Campaign to Overturn the 2020 Presidential Election: A Brief Call to the Secretary of Labor Gene Scalia, the Son of a Founding Attorney General,
Secretary of Labor Gene Scalia, the son of late Justice Scalia, visited President Trump in mid-December and explained the situation clearly. [Begin videotape]
So, I had put a call in to the president. I might have called that day. We spoke, I believe, on the 14th, in which I conveyed to him that I thought that it was time for him to acknowledge that President Biden had prevailed in the election. When the legal process is over and the people have voted, that is the point at which the outcome needs to be expected, I told the president.
I told him that I believed that if fraud had not been established that the election result would have been different, so it was time to concede the outcome. [End videotape]
Orchestration: The campaign to overturn the 2020 election was not a haphazard effort where Trump deployed a chaotic plan, desperate to keep power. Rather, key members of the administration, including the former president and key advisers, deliberately pushed to overcome electoral defeat. Roger Stone said that possession was nine tenths of the law. F–k you.
Donald Trump was the driver behind each part of this plan. He was personally and directly involved. Of course, a key element of the plan was continuing to convince tens of millions of Americans that he did not in fact lose. Again, he did this even though his own campaign advisers and his Justice Department officials told him his claims of fraud were wrong.
Dominion Voting Systems: What’s Happening in America, Where We Are and What We Don’t Know about Elections in America? A Case Study
I found the voting machines to be one of the most disturbing allegations, because I saw absolutely zero basis for them. I told them that it was — that it was crazy stuff and they were wasting their time on that, and it was doing a grave — grave disservice to the country.
We have a company that’s very suspect. Its name is Dominion. With the turn of a dial or the change of a chip, you could press a button for Trump and the vote goes to Biden. What type of system is this?
We talked about the county again. That was sort of done at that point because the hand recount had been done and all that. But we cited back to that to say, you know, this is an example of what people are telling you and what’s being filed in some of these court filings that are just not supported by the evidence.
In addition, there is the highly troubling matter of Dominion voting systems. In one county alone, 6,000 votes were changed from Trump to Biden, and the majority of states use the same systems.
I went into this and told him how ridiculous the allegations were and how crazy they were. And I’m talking about some of the ones like, you know, more votes — more absentee votes were cast in Pennsylvania than there were absentee ballots request — you know, stuff like that was just easy to blow up. There was never — there was never an indication of interest in what the actual facts were.
There were more votes than there were voters. Think of that. You had more votes than you had voters. That’s an easy one to figure, and it’s by the thousands.
He called it a big vote dump in Detroit. In the morning, people could see boxes coming in to the counting station. And I said, Mr. President, there are 630 precincts in Detroit. And unlike elsewhere in the state, they centralized the counting process so they’re not counted in each precinct.
With regard to Georgia, we looked at the tape. We interviewed the witnesses. There is no suitcase. The president kept fixating on this suitcase that supposedly had fraudulent ballots and that the suitcase was rolled out from under the table. And I said, no, sir, there is no suitcase. You can watch that video over and over.
There isn’t a suitcase. There is a wheeled bin where they carry the ballots, and that’s just how they move ballots around that facility. There’s nothing suspicious about that at all.
Election officials pulled boxes, Democrats, and suitcases of ballots out from under a table. You all saw it on television, totally fraudulent. [End videotape]
Bringing up the elephant in the room: what will the secretary of state tell us about the outcome of the 2016 midterm elections? An extraordinary request by the president
Prosecutors, investigators and lawmakers in Washington, DC, New York, Georgia, Florida and across the United States are among those who will be interested in what Trump has to say about the myriad legal issues facing the former president, his business and his allies.
All I want to do is this. I just want to find 11,780 votes, which is one more than we have, because we won the state. Look, we need only 11,000 votes. We have more than that at the moment. We’ll have more and more. What are we going to do here? I only need 11,000 votes.
I’m trying to find 11,780 votes. That’s an extraordinary demand by the president, especially since he already knew from the Justice Department there was no genuine basis for this request. No one could think it would be legal for the secretary of state to simply find the votes the president needed in order to win.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/10/13/1125331584/jan-6-committee-hearing-transcript
Reply to the Commission on ‘Donoghue, Rosen, and the United States Attorney General’: When the Department of Justice Forcedly Rejected Mr. Clark
That is the thing. You know, that’s a criminal — that’s a criminal offense. You can’t let that happen. That’s a big risk for you and Ryan, your lawyer. That is a big risk. [End videotape]
President Trump tried to install Jeff Clark as the acting attorney general because he wouldn’t do what others in the department would not do. We know that Trump was doing so for a specific purpose, so Clark could corruptly employ the Justice Department’s authority to help persuade the states to flip electoral votes.
For example, when Richard Donoghue and Jeff Rosen, both appointed by President Trump, learned of Mr. Clark’s proposal, here’s why they said they forcefully rejected it. [Begin videotape]
And I recall toward the end saying what you’re proposing is nothing less than the United States Justice Department meddling in the outcome of a presidential election. But more importantly, this was not based on fact. The facts were contrary to what the department investigations developed over the last several weeks and months.
The President ultimately relented only because the entire leadership of the Department of Justice as well as his White House counsel threatened to resign. Mr. Chairman, I yield back.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/10/13/1125331584/jan-6-committee-hearing-transcript
Speaker of the House Select Committee on ‘Fake Elections’: John Eastman and the Vice-President’s Counsel Explained what he had to say
The fake electors were a part of the President’s plan to replace Biden with Trump. As part of this plan, the false electoral slates were sent to the National Archives into the Capitol.
When I received the call — again, I don’t remember the exact date — it was — it was from the White House switchboard and it was President Trump who had contacted me.
President Trump said I had the right to overturn the election, but President Trump is wrong. I had no right to overturn the election. The American people have sole responsibility for the presidency. And frankly, there is no idea more un-American than the notion that any one person could choose the American President.
President Trump knew that what he was trying to do was against the law. He was informed of this repeatedly and specifically on January 4th. Even his lawyer John Eastman admitted in front of President Trump that this plan would break the law by violating the Electoral Count Act. [Begin videotape]
In writing, Dr. Eastman confirmed this. Recall this email written on January 6 in which Vice President Pence’s counsel asked Dr. Eastman; did you advise the President that in your professional judgment, the Vice President does not have power to decide things unilaterally? Dr. Eastman replied, he’s been so advised.
I apologize but do you remember what her father said when he called the Vice President?
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/10/13/1125331584/jan-6-committee-hearing-transcript
What Did President Trump Tell Us About the Capitol Attack In 2016? A Brief Report from Engel, the Secret Service, and the Federal Protective Service
In the end, all these people, Department of Justice officials, state elections’ officials, his own Vice President, stood strong in the face of President Trump’s immense pressure. But as we now know, President Trump had already summoned tens of thousands of his supporters to Washington on January 6 to take back their country.
Other agencies were also hearing predictions suggesting possible violence at the Capitol. The deputy secretary of defense was on a call with the president’s national security team in January of 2016 and warned that the Capitol would be hit by an attacker.
I only remember during the calls that he was almost like a prophet. During one of these calls, Norquist says the greatest threat is an assault on the Capitol. I’ll never forget it. The end of the videotape.
One agent emailed, possibly because they have stuff that couldn’t come through would probably be an issue with this crowd. Just a thought. There were more than 25,000 people outside at 9:30 that morning. An hour later, the Secret Service reported that the crowd was on the mall watching, but not in line.
The head of the President’s Secret Service protective detail, Robert Engel, was specifically aware of the large crowds outside the magnetometers. He passed that information along to Tony Ornato who worked for Mark Meadows in the chief of staff’s office. The documents we obtained from the Secret Service make clear that the crowd outside the magnetometers was armed and the agents knew it. Take a look at what they were seeing and hearing on the ground.
One report from the rally site at 7:58 a.m. said, some members of the crowd are wearing ballistic helmets, body armor, carrying radio equipment and military grade backpacks. Another from 9:30 a.m. said that there were possibly OC spray, meaning pepper spray, and/or plastic riot shields. At 11:23 a.m., agents also reported possible armed individuals, one with a glock, one with a rifle.
Over the hour, agents reported a man with an assault rifle on his person, a pistol on his hip, and a man with a gun who was in a tree.
Minutes before President Trump began his speech, members of the Federal Protective Service, an agency tasked with protecting federal buildings, were alerted about an arrest of a protester with a gun on his waistband. Weapons related arrests continued during the speech. The man with the rifle was arrested by Park Police at the World War II Memorial. The agents remarked on the number of firearms that had been seized and wondered if the situation could get worse.
If I had seen something like that, I would probably throw it to someone at the White House, or maybe we should flag it for the Secret Service. End the videotape.
The same day that Miller sent his text, agents got reports about a spike in activity on Parler. This is the day of December 30th. In this email, an agent received a report noting a lot of violent rhetoric on Parler directed at government people and entities, including Secret Service protectees.
On the evening of January 5th, President Trump gathered a few of his communications staffers in the Oval Office. The door was open, allowing the president and others assembled there to hear the sounds of the crowd gathered at Freedom Plaza, just a few blocks from the White House. President Trump could see that his supporters were upset. Judd Deere, a deputy White House press secretary, described the president’s reaction.
They were fired up, just that they were. They were angry. He said that they felt that the election was rigged and that they felt like the election was stolen. [End videotape]
The president knew the crowd was angry and he did nothing to alleviate that anger. He knew that they believed that the election had been rigged and stolen because he had told them falsely that it had been rigged and stolen. And by the time he incited that angry mob to march on the Capitol, he knew they were armed and dangerous, all the better to stop the peaceful transfer of power.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/10/13/1125331584/jan-6-committee-hearing-transcript
The Eleventh Committee on Hearing Transcript: The State of the Art, the Eighth Committee on Elections, and the First Appointment of the Secretary of State
The gentleman yields back. At this point our — in our meeting, we’ll take a brief recess. Pursuant to the order of the committee of today, the chair declares the committee in recess for a period of approximately 10 minutes. [In recess] The chair recognizes the gentleman from California, Mr. Aguilar, for an opening statement.
As the time for the Ellipse rally approached, an email was circulated among intelligence officials, including Secret Service intelligence official, attaching communications among rally goers that specifically contemplated violence. “Trump has given us marching orders,” one post on TheDonald.win wrote. “If you are east of the Mississippi, you can and should be there.”
He was angry that people were not allowed to use weapons in the mags, since the Secret Service deemed them to be weapons. The president said something about the effect of having weapons to the effect that I don’t care.
They’re not here to hurt me. Take the magazines away. Let my people in. They can march to the Capitol from here. Let the people in. Take the magazines away. The end of videotape.
And I’d love to have, if those tens of thousands of people would be allowed, the military, the Secret Service — and we want to thank you, and the police, law enforcement, great. You’re doing a great job. [Applause] But I’d love it if they could be allowed to come up here with us. Is it possible? Can you just let them come up, please?
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/10/13/1125331584/jan-6-committee-hearing-transcript
What happened when President Trump walked into the Capitol and was assaulted by the Capitol, when he walked out of the White House
There’s no scenario where that action is benign, and there’s no scenario where an American president should have engaged in that conduct. It did not matter whether President Trump believed the election had been stolen or not. This can’t be justified on any basis. You may also recall testimony from our summer hearings regarding Mr. Trump’s efforts to lead the mob to the Capitol himself and his angry altercation in the presidential SUV when the Secret Service told him it was far too dangerous for him to go. As we detailed in testimony from the Metropolitan Police and White House personnel during our July 21st hearing, information about the altercation was widely known, so widely known that one former White House employee with national security responsibilities explained that this information was in fact water cooler talk in the White House complex.
As that professional told us, they remember hearing in the days after January 6th how angry the president was when he was in the limo that afternoon. That professional also testified that they were specifically informed of the –president’s irate behavior in the SUV by Mr. Ornato in Mr. Ornato’s office. It was Mr. Engel, with Mr. Ornato in that office.
And I will also note this. The committee is looking into testimony regarding possible obstruction and advice not to tell the committee about the topic. We will discuss it in the report.
To be completely honest, we were all in a state of shock. Why? I think the idea of the physical impossibility of it and what that meant, was what we knew about the rally and what would happen if he did not walk to the Capitol.
I — I don’t know if you want to use the word insurrection, coup, whatever. We all knew that this would move from a normal democratic, you know, public event into something else. Why were we are alarmed?
When the president returned to the White House around 1:20, he entered the Oval Office and was told right then about the onset of violence at the Capitol. Thepresident stayed in the White House dining room attached to the Oval Office for two hours and 40 minutes to see the assault on the Capitol.
Here’s an exchange that the White House press Secretary had with the president as he arrived back at the White House. [Begin videotape]
So, to the best of my recollection, I recall him being — wanting to — saying that he wanted to physically walk and be a part of the march, and then saying that he would ride the beast if — if he needed to, ride in the presidential limo. End the videotape.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/10/13/1125331584/jan-6-committee-hearing-transcript
The Secret Service, the FBI, and the White House. The investigation of the mob assault on the Capitol on Wednesday (June 6, 2016)
The Select Committee obtained important new evidence from the Secret Service. It shows how frantic this hour must have been for the Secret Service, scrambling to get the president of the United States to back down from a dangerous and reckless decision that put people in harm’s way.
They were told by the president that he would be leaving for the Capitol in two hours. The president’s Secret service agent ordered them to stand down at 1:45 PM. “We are not doing an OTR to the Capitol.” Rioters were attacking the men and women in law enforcement who were trying to resist their mob when they entered the Capitol.
At 1:19, the president’s Emergency Operations Center sent an e-mail to Secret Service, national security, and military advisers, to the president and vice president informing them that “hundreds of Trump supporters stormed through metal barricades at the back of the Capitol building about 1:00 PM Wednesday, running past security guards and breaking fences.
I can’t talk about conversations with the president, but I can generically say that I said, you know, people need to be told — there needs to be a public announcement fast that they need to leave the Capitol.
Approximately when? Almost immediately after I found out people were getting into the Capitol or approaching the Capitol in a way that was — was violent.
I can’t remember anyone who didn’t want people to get out of the Capitol when the violence started. I mean —
Oh, I’m sorry. I’m. I apologize. You said who else was on the staff. I can’t reveal communications, but I think. End the videotape.
He said something to the effect of, “You heard him, Pat.” He doesn’t want to do anything more. He doesn’t think they’re doing anything wrong. The end of the videotape.
A former White House employee had an exchange with Mr. Cipollone about the mob assault on the Capitol. Mr. Herschmann spoke to Mr. Cipollone. He said that the president didn’t want anything done.
Some of the president’s most important allies and family begged him to tell his supporters to go home in the middle of this period. Among them were the president, his son, the House minority leader, others, and officials in the cabinet and the executive branch.
Did he stay in the private dining room the whole time that the Capitol attack was going on, or did he just go to the White House Situation Room?
Yeah. What were you told during the brief encounter you had with the president in the dining room? What do you remember? Everyone was watching the TV, so I think they were. Are you aware if he was watching TV in the dining room when you talked to him?
When you were in the dining room in these discussions, was that it — was the violence at the Capitol visible on the screen on the — in — on the television?
There was never-before footage showing Nancy Pelosi, the Speaker of the House, as well as other legislative leaders, scrambling to summon more police and national guard forces to repel the rioters on Capitol Hill.
We’re starting to be surrounded. They’re taking the north front scaffolding. Unless we get more munitions, we are not going to be able to hold. The people are getting into the Capitol after a door was broken.
We have to keep that sense that people have that government can function, and that they can vote for the president of the United States. Did we go back to business as usual?
We went back into session, but now everyone on the floor is wearing masks to protect themselves from tear gas. I’m trying to get more information.
I can’t. There’s a place for the House members. They’re all walking over now through the tunnel. Bring her out here. If you don’t bring her out, we’re going to come in.
I’m going to call up the f’ing secretary of DOD. Some senators are still in their hideaways. They need to replace huge personnel. Can you get the Maryland National Guard to come too?
I have something to say, Mr. Secretary. We’ll be calling the mayor of Washington DC to see what she can do to get more information from other police departments.
Governor, have a wonderful day. Nancy is here. Governor, I don’t know if you have been approached about the Virginia National Guard. Mr. Hoyer was connect — speaking to Governor Hogan, but I still think you probably need the Ok of the federal government in order to come in to another jurisdiction. Thank you very much.
All kinds of — it’s really that — they said somebody was shot. It’s horrendous. At the instigation of the president of the United States. Thank you, Governor. I am very appreciative of what you’re doing. I’d like to stay in touch if you don’t mind. Thank you. Thank you.
You know, I was just talked to Governor Northam, and what he said is they sent 200 state police and a unit of the National Guard. They’re breaking windows and going in, obviously ransacking our offices and all the rest of that. That’s not much. There is a concern about personal harm.
Personal safety is not restricted to any one area. But the fact is on any given day, they’re breaking the law in many different ways, and quite frankly, much of it at the instigation of the president of the United States. And now if he could — could — at least somebody.
Mr Attorney General, they should all leave the Capitol because of your law enforcement responsibilities.
The Capitol building — a counter point to get everybody out the next day or so that is the right time to go out with the general public and to look for solutions in case of emergency
I’m not going to say that the leadership is responsible for executing the operation. They’re the experts because they are meeting on the ground. It’s possible that the sound is whispered.
Just go and pretend that it was the Pentagon or the White House that was under siege. You can logistically get people there as you plan. We’re trying to figure out how we can get this job done today. We talked to Mitch about it earlier. He was with us earlier and said he wanted to expedite this, but he is not in the room right now. and hopefully they could confine it to just one complaint, Arizona, and then we could vote and that would be — you know, then just move forward with the rest of the state.
The overriding wish is to do it at the Capitol. It is being said that it will take a few days for the Capitol to be back to normal. We’ve gotten a very bad report about the condition of the House floor, defecation and all that kind of thing as well. I think it is not hard to clean up because it is security related, but it is more of a matter of how long it is going to take to get everyone out.
I said, we’ll, we’re getting a counter point that is — that could take time to clean up the poo poo that they’re making all over the — literally and figuratively in the Capitol, and that it may take days to get back.
Nancy, so I’m at the Capitol building. I’m literally standing with the Chief of Police of — you know, the US Capitol Police. He just informed me what you will hear through official channels, Paul Irving, your Sergeant-at-Arms, will inform you that their best information is that they believe that the House and the Senate will be able to reconvene in roughly an hour.
It was clear to everyone that only President Trump could end this. He was the only one who could. Former aides publicly begged him to do so. Loyal allies frantically called the administration. The President didn’t act quickly. He did not do his job. He didn’t take steps so federal law could be faithfully executed and order restored.
Mick Mulvaney, Donald Trump’s former chief of staff, has come forward and 888-492-0 888-492-0ed her account. [Begin videotape]
Kevin McCarthy, the Republican leader, told me that he called Donald Trump after I asked him about it. and he said, you have got to get on TV. You have to follow the person on the social media site. You have to call these people off. You know what the President said to him? This is as it’s happening.
The President is at fault for Wednesday’s attack on Congress. He should have denounced the mob when he saw it. President Trump must take immediate action on these facts. Accept his share of responsibility, quell the brewing unrest, and ensure President-elect Biden is able to successfully begin his term.
I want you to be clear, the President is responsible for everything he says and does, no ifs, ands or buts. I asked him today if he held responsibility for what happened. Does he feel bad about what happened? He told me that he needs to acknowledge the responsibility for what happened.
2:30 p.m. After knowing that the riot was about to hit his own Vice President, Trump went ahead and sent a message accusing him of cowardice for not rejecting the Electoral College votes of Joe Biden and handing Trump the presidency. The impact of that tweet was foreseeable and predictable.
As the afternoon progressed, the company detected a surge in violent hashtags on the platform, including lines of lethal incitement like, execute Mike Pence. Listen to this former Twitter employee, Anika Navaroli, who first came to the committee anonymously, but has now bravely agreed to be named because she wants to speak out about the magnitude of the threats facing our people.
Yes after in response to this. Because I think as many as Donald Trump’s have sent out, it fanned the flames. And it was individuals who were already constructing gallows, who were already willing, able and wanting to execute someone and looking for someone to be killed. Now, the individual was called upon then to begin this coup is now pointing the finger at another individual while they’re ready to do this.
Mike Pence Has Screwed Us, and I’m a Traitor! [End Videotape] President Trump’s Conduct that Day: An Immigrant at the Capitol
Mike Pence will not stick up for Donald Trump. Mike Pence was a traitor. Mike Pence has screwed us, in case you haven’t heard yet. What happened? How did this happen? I’m hearing that Vice President Mike Pence has hurt us. I’m hearing reports that Mike Pence has been bad for us. [End videotape]
President Trump’s conduct that day was so shameful and so outrageous that it prompted numerous members of the White House staff and other Trump appointees to resign. In prior hearings, you’ve heard Deputy National Security Adviser Matt Pottinger and Deputy White House Press Secretary Sarah Matthews explain why they felt compelled to resign on that day.
I was stunned by violence, and I was stunned by the President’s apparent indifference to the violence. The President needs to be presidential right now. I thought he failed at doing it. I thought he failed at a critical time to be the sort of leader that the nation needed.
I think the events at the Capitol, however they occurred, were shocking. I mentioned in the statement that it was something I couldn’t put aside. And at a particular point, the events were such that it was impossible for me to continue given my personal values and my philosophy. I arrived in this country as an immigrant.
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/10/13/1125331584/jan-6-committee-hearing-transcript
The President’s Decree about the Day of January 6 and that’s what we’re about to tell the world: I’m sorry, but we can’t help it
We are delivering a message. Everyone was asked by Donald Trump to go home. That’s our order. [Inaudible] He says, go home. End videotape.
The whole game is being given away, he said. Trump was telling us that the Vice President, the Congress, and all the injured and wounded cops, some of whom are with us today, got what was coming to us. According to Trump. January 6 should not be a day that lives in shame in infamy in our history, but rather in glory.
Remember this day forever, he wrote proudly, as if he were talking about D-Day or the Battle of Yorktown. Trump did nothing to stop the deadly violence for obvious reasons. He thought it was justified. He supported it after inciting it. [Begin videotape]
Would it have been possible at any moment for the president to walk down to the podium in the briefing room and — and tell — talk to the nation at any time between when you first gave him that advice at 2:00 and 4:17 when — the video statement? Would that have been possible?
Source: https://www.npr.org/2022/10/13/1125331584/jan-6-committee-hearing-transcript
The Fourth Amendment and the First Amendment: The Commission on the Investigation of the January 6th, 1861, New York City, United States, Including Insurrection and Rebellion
In numerous places, our Constitution is against insurrection and rebellion. Article I gives Congress the power to call forth the militia to suppress insurrections. Section 3 of the 14th Amendment disqualified from holding federal and state office anyone who has sworn an oath to defend the Constitution, but betrays it by engaging in insurrection or rebellion.
It was President Lincoln, at the start of the Civil War in 1861, who best explained why democracy rejects insurrection. Insurrection, he said, is a war upon the first principle of popular government, the rights of the people. American democracy must be shared by all of the American people. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The gentleman turns around. During this committee’s first hearing in July of last year, our witnesses were four police officers who helped repel the riots of January 6th. They asked us what they wanted the committee to do over the course of the investigation. The officer wanted to know why the rioters believed the election process was rigged.
Officer Fanone asked us to look into the actions and activities of the day. Officer Hodges was worried about who would be in charge. Officer Dunn put it simply, get to the bottom of what happened. We’ve been working for the last year to get those answers. We’ve conducted many interviews and depositions.
Report on Sessions with the U.S. Senate Major General Relatives and a Motion of the Committee to Investigate the Congressional Investigation into Donald Trump’s Corrupt Action
“Long-held precedent and practice maintain that separation of powers prohibits Congress from compelling a President to testify before it,” Trump attorney David A. Warrington said in a statement announcing Trump’s intentions.
That is why we want to take this step in full view of the American people because the subject matter at issue is so important and the stakes are so high for our democracy. The Vice Chair, Ms Cheney, offered a motion.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. Mr. Chairman, our committee now has sufficient information to answer many of the critical questions posed by Congress at the outset. There are enough information to consider criminal referrals for multiple individuals and to recommend legislative proposals to guard against another January 6th.
We must seek the testimony under oath of January 6th’s central player. A number of witnesses invoked their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination in our investigation in response to questions about their dealings with Donald Trump. Here are a few examples.
This is General Michael Flynn walking with Oath Keepers on December 12, 2020, and here is General Flynn’s testimony before our committee. Begin the videotape.
So is it your position that you can discuss in the media direct conversations you had with the President of the United States, but you will not discuss those same conversations with this committee.
The resolution is agreed to. The motion to reconsider is laid on the table without objection. The Chair requests that those in the hearing room remain seated until the Capitol Police have escorted members from the room. The committee is adjourned without objection.
CNN.com: Dramatic Moments of the January 6, 2021, Trump’s Attempt to Overturn the 2020 Election and the Road Map to Stop the Steal
The professor of History and public affairs at the University is also a CNN political analyst. He is the author and editor of 24 books, including “The Presidency Of Donald J. Trump: A First Historical Assessment.” You can follow him on the social networking site. The views expressed in this commentary are his own. View more opinion on CNN.
The bipartisan panel held public hearings during the past four months to learn who was responsible for the day’s events.
Unlike the Watergate scandal that brought down President Richard Nixon in 1974, one of the most distinctive elements of Trump’s campaign to overturn the 2020 election is that so much of it happened in broad daylight.
In order to fill out the story and show how dangerous it was, the committee gave us shocking evidence and details about how dangerous those months were.
On the day of the “Stop the Steal” rally, January 6, 2021, Trump knew that the protesters were armed and dangerous but did nothing to stop them. He wanted to go to Capitol Hill, but a Secret Service agent wouldn’t allow him to. The former president even lunged at a Secret Service agent and tried to steer the wheel of the car when he was told he couldn’t go, according to former aide Cassidy Hutchinson.
Trump and his attorneys, such as Rudy Giuliani, probed to see if various state officials would do their bidding. Arizona House Speaker Rusty Bowers, a staunch conservative who backed the administration, was unsettled as Giuliani and Trump pressured him during a phone call in late November 2020 to have the state legislature reconvene and invalidate the results in his state. The president’s lawyer John Eastman, who had written the road map for their attempted election steal, pressured Pence’s aides to have him reject the results.
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/10/14/opinions/dramatic-moments-january-6-hearing-zelizer/index.html
The 2018 January 6 Subcommittee Committee on the Campaign to Overturn Elections: The Case for the Exclusion of the Democratic Senator Lee Zeldin
January 6 was just one part of a much larger story. Although the panel is called the January 6 committee, it would be more accurate to call it a committee to investigate the campaign to overturn the 2020 election. Between November 2020 and January 2021, the reframing is necessary.
We have learned that Trump understood what was happening. He was warned a lot about how he was making claims that were false and how he was endangering himself. Advisers, lawyers and conservative media figures were urging him to stop.
The committee wanted to make clear that it is not over in 2022, in its crucial hearing Thursday. “There remains a clear and present danger to our electoral system and to democratic institutions,” Raskin said, “So, that is something that will come through in our final hearing. This is not ancient history we’re talking about; this is a continuing threat.” There is still a threat on many levels. Many Republican candidates are using the words election denialism to justify their votes during the upcoming elections.
The Republicans who subscribe to this agenda are also running for several key offices, ranging from gubernatorial positions to secretaries of state in key states like Pennsylvania and Arizona, all of which will have a crucial role in overseeing future elections. The former president is still the top contender for the Republican nomination.
The committee successfully unpacked the dark days that followed the 2020 election. They have been exposed in clear detail right in front of our eyes. Is it possible that our nation will simply move forward without demanding accountability, justice and reform?
On that day, when stunned lawmakers emerged from hiding and police were still counting the injured, Representative Lee Zeldin of New York walked into the Rotunda, posed for a picture and went live on Fox News.
The comments that blamed Democrats and rogue state actors didn’t draw a lot of attention when they were made. Mr. Zeldin joined 146 others in trying to overturn Joe Biden’s win in key states.
“This isn’t just about the president of the United States,” he said, referring to what prompted the riot that he condemned. “This is about people on the left and their double standards.”
The Mueller Investigation into the 2016 Capitol Attack Against the Ex-President Donald J.C.T. Trump vs. the House Appropriate
WASHINGTON — Donald Trump has sued the House committee to avoid giving testimony about the attack on the US Capitol.
The panel of the committee believed in pursuing a political path and left President Trump with no choice but to involve the third branch, the judicial branch.
The committee declined to comment on the filing, which comes days before the the deadline set by the committee for Trump to begin cooperating. But the suit likely dooms the prospect of Trump ever having to testify, given that the committee is expected to disband at the end of the legislative session in January.
The scope of the committee’s request was expansive — pursuing documents from Sept. 1, 2020, two months before the election, to the present on the president’s communications with the groups like the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys — as the panel looks to compile a historical record of the run-up to the Capitol attack, the event itself and the aftermath.
“I think he has a legal obligation to testify but that doesn’t always carry weight with the president,” Cheney said during last week’s event.
There’s no indication that the ex-president will be charged in either probe. But the sense that Trump is approaching a moment of maximum legal peril is being driven both by signs of an increasingly aggressive investigation by special counsel Jack Smith and the realities of a calendar that offers limited time for any potential prosecutions before the 2024 campaign is in full swing. Trump’s already questionable hopes of winning a national election, meanwhile, could absorb new blows with the unveiling of the January 6 committee’s final report next week and its possible criminal referrals to the Department of Justice.
Trump and his company have always maintained their innocence, and have denied any wrongdoing. Trump has also won dismissals of two lawsuits this week in cases brought by his niece and his former attorney.
Did Trump handle classified material in a way that didn’t make sense? The documents were brought to the Mar-a-Lago resort after he left office, which is being investigated by the Justice Department. A federal grand jury in Washington has been empaneled and has interviewed potential witnesses to how Trump handled the documents. The National Archives, charged with collecting and sorting presidential material, has previously said that at least 15 boxes of White House records were recovered from Mar-a-Lago, including some classified records.
For a period of the maximum legal and political risk over his role in the Capitol insurrection and his efforts to become the next president, Donald Trump is headed.
There’s a warning that the future threat to truth and democracy is still acute but each sign that once slow burning attempts to work through the trauma of the election are heating up brings a parallel warning. Georgia Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene, for instance – a key force in the incoming GOP House majority that is likely to try to shut down or obstruct investigations into Trump – is embroiled in yet another controversy over the insurrection.
The Georgia Republican said that if she had her way, the mob that smashed into the Capitol would have been armed. She then rebuffed White House condemnations of her comments by insisting she was joking. The ex-president demanded that the Constitution be terminated in order to demonstrate how his potential second term might unfold if he wins the White House.
CNN reported Sunday that Smith is speeding up his probes into how Trump was involved in an attempt to disrupt the peaceful transfer of power in 2020. Smith’s team subpoenad Georgia’s Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger after he received a phone call asking him to overturn Joe Biden’s win in the Peach State. Smith has also issued a flurry of grand jury subpoenas since Thanksgiving, including to ex-Trump adviser Stephen Miller and two former White legal counsels.
700 days have passed since the full hour audio of the phone call was published by the Washington Post, but the DOJ hasn’t yet gotten around to subpoena him. When does it happen? Under Jack Smith.”
According to him, if Trump’s lawyers thought that Smith was less likely to be swayed by the January 6 attack and that a fresh mind would lean against indictments, they were in for a big lie.
In an interview on Sunday on NBC’s “Meet the Press,” Bharara said that Smith’s appointment and the assembling of a high-powered team of experienced prosecutors were bad news for Trump.
If the Justice Department was to charge, they would have left their former jobs in government and private practice. He thinks it will happen in a month.
Trump tried to use the idea that justice was being weaponized against him as part of his presidential campaign. It is Garland’s stated business that any potential prosecution of Trump must balance the interest of the country and the precedent it would set if a president tried to overthrow an election.
“We’re now coming up against a timeframe in which it is a challenge to finish either case, if it is brought, to finish it before the election,” said CNN legal analyst Jennifer Rodgers on “Newsroom” on Monday.
Rodgers said that the case on January 6 would probably take more time than before because they will bring a case on the documents side.
While Smith is following legal procedures, the political context makes it even more incumbent on the DOJ to demonstrate to Americans that it had no choice, for instance, to mount an unprecedented search at an ex-president’s home.
The former president’s conduct is sure to face more withering scrutiny with the final report of the House January 6 committee, which wants to make its case for posterity before it is likely expunged by the incoming House GOP majority next year.
It would be a surprise if the panel did not recommend the House refer Trump and other aides for criminal prosecution when it wraps up. Such a step would be merely symbolic, however, as the committee has no power to level charges itself. And the DOJ is not compelled to act on any recommendations. It would have to decide if professional prosecutors approved of the conclusions of Congress in its constitutional oversight role.
It is hard to tell how incriminating testimony about Donald Trump would be if it were cross examined in court, because the televised hearings did not include a cross examination of witnesses. The report and depositions will be sent to the Department of Justice, but they could be used to flesh out any criminal case by the special counsel, or to prepare the public for any move by Smith to charge Trump.
That’s yet another reason why the turn of the year and the early months of 2023 are beginning to look like a moment of reckoning for both Trump and those who are investigating him.
There is a question as to whether the higher standard of evidence required by a court would make it harder to convict the former president. While the committee’s hearings were packed with evidence suggesting a weeks-long pattern of wrongdoing by Trump, witnesses and evidence were not subjected to the kind of challenge and cross-examination seen in court, so it’s hard to judge the strength of any criminal case over Trump.
A Capitol Police officer spilled blood when the ex-presidents mob smashed their way into the Capitol. A mother and daughter who worked as election workers in Georgia were accused of vote stealing and faced racist threats. Rusty Bowers, the outgoing Republican speaker of the Arizona state House, testified that Trump’s calls for him to meddle with the election were “foreign to my very being.”
Often, it was Republicans – some who were with Trump in the West Wing on January 6 – who courageously testified about his assault on the Constitution, including Cassidy Hutchinson. The ex-aide to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows recalled, “It was unpatriotic. It wasn’t American. The Capitol was defaced over a lie.
Someone tried to get the state officials to find votes that didn’t exist. This is someone who tried to interfere with a joint session, even inciting a mob to attack the Capitol,” Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff, the chair of the House Intelligence Committee and a member of the January 6 committee, said on CNN’s “State of the Union” on Sunday. If that isn’t criminal, I don’t know what it is.
If the DOJ sends criminal referrals, could it make people think that there are separate investigations for the aftermath of January 6?
Will an impression that Trump is being hounded by referrals nearly two years after leaving the presidency help him rally Republicans to his failed campaign?
Do we really care about the events of two years ago when we were in a state of rapid inflation and the aftermath of a swine flu epidemic?
What did Liz Cheney and her colleagues tell us during the January 6 attack on Washington, the House Republicans, or the White House? A critical assessment and a roadmap to DOJ
On the first question, committee members – including Republican Vice Chair Liz Cheney, who lost her seat in Wyoming over her determination to hold Trump to account – have long argued that it is performing a service for posterity and have left a strong impression they want to fatally damage his future political hopes.
“Every American must consider this,” Cheney said at one of the committee’s public hearings, in July. Can a president who made choices during the violence of January 6 ever be trusted with authority in our great nation again?
It seems that her sacrifice of her career in the House GOP may be in vain, because many of her fellow Republicans didn’t acknowledge Cheney’s conduct. The public was riveted by the hearings, but it didn’t make sense that they were so important as to prompt the resignation of President Richard Nixon. Today’s polarized times and the power of conservative media to distort what really happened on January 6 may help explain this dichotomy.
Americans rejected many of Trump’s midterm candidates who had amplified his false claims of 2020 election fraud in order to protect American democracy.
It is impossible to quantify how the committee’s work affected voters in November. While the ex-president launched a new campaign to cast the probes into his conduct as politically motivated persecution, it kept the evidence of Trump’s insurrection in the news all year. This is especially important for some pro- Trump Republicans who are trying to hide what really happened in the Capitol attack.
The committee has undertaken a very large investigation. Huge amounts of evidence, a huge amount of witnesses being identified,” former federal prosecutor Shan Wu told CNN’s Pamela Brown on “CNN Newsroom” on Saturday.
“I think it’s the detail that accompanies the referrals themselves and the report that will give a roadmap to DOJ. DOJ has been kind of late to this party and they are playing catch-up but that detail could be very helpful to them and will put a lot of pressure on them as well.”
Future generations will be able to judge the determination of the panel members and the courage of witnesses who told the truth if nothing else.
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/19/politics/jan-6-committee-investigation-final-session/index.html
The Illinois Investigating Democrat vs. Democratic Rep. Kamala-Klein: How Donald Trump And Joe Biden Defended the 2020 Election
The Republican from Illinois said the lie was Trump’s truth and the democracy was being challenged by authoritarianism.
I fear that America’s elected leaders will not look within themselves for a way out if they do not search for a way out.
The committee released an executive summary of its report on Monday, and it plans to release the full report on Wednesday, as well as transcripts of committee interviews.
Committee Chairman Bennie Thompson, a Mississippi Democrat, said that he has “every confidence that the work of this committee will help provide a road map to justice, and that the agencies and institutions responsible for ensuring justice under the law will use the information we’ve provided to aid in their work.”
“Donald Trump broke that faith. He knew that he would lose the 2020 election. But he chose to try to stay in office through a multi-part scheme to overturn the results and block the transfer of power,” Thompson said. “In the end, he summoned a mob to Washington, and knowing they were armed and angry, pointed them at the Capitol and told them to ‘fight like hell.’ There is no doubt about this.
Trump knew the election wasn’t stolen and continued to push baseless claims of widespread voter fraud to upend Joe Biden’s victory.
The video featured body cam footage of officers being attacked by rioters, as well as how Trump attacks upended the lives of election workers.
The Biggs-Biggs Committee of Investigating Bipartisanship in Senate and Senate Corrupt Practices: Report, Status, and Perspectives
Rep. Andy Biggs of Arizona – one of the four subpoenaed GOP lawmakers that the panel referred to the House Ethics Committee on Monday – tweeted before the hearing that the committee was a “partisan sham.” Rep. Troy Nehls, a Texas Republican who boycotted the committee, called it a “partisan witch hunt.”
It’s important to remember how this all started. While there was partisan squabbling over which Republicans would be allowed to serve on the panel, House Democrats were willing to give committee slots to GOP lawmakers who had literally voted to overturn the 2020 results. Instead, Republicans boycotted.
Two Republicans agreed to join the panel, which was made up of Democrats and Republicans. They brought GOP staff members with them, and they worked for the committee.
Kinzinger said his House GOP colleagues were part of the effort to overturn the election. He highlighted evidence that Trump wanted top Justice Department officials to “put the facade of legitimacy” on his voter fraud claims so “Republican congressmen … can distort and destroy and create doubt” about the 2020 election results.
No matter what Trump and his allies say, Democrats will forever be able to accurately assert that the panel’s findings, conclusions, its final report and its criminal referrals are bipartisan.
The full report from the committee will come out this week, Thompson said. This will be studied for a long time. Never before has a sitting president tried to steal a second term.
These upcoming releases will provide fodder to Trump’s critics. Some Trump allies want the panel to make public the full context of its interviews. The Panel has been very secretive about the snippets of witness interviews that were played at public hearings.
Source: https://www.cnn.com/2022/12/19/politics/takeaways-jan-6-committee-meeting/index.html
What House Democratic Reps are going to say about the 2022 midterm elections in New Jersey and New York? A reappraisal
There aren’t many members who will be returning to Congress. Besides Cheney and Kinzinger, Democratic Rep. Stephanie Murphy of Florida is retiring, while Rep. Elaine Luria of Virginia was one of the handful of House Democratic incumbents who lost their seats in the 2022 midterms last month.