After the January 6th hearing, which was broadcast live on Thursday, the former president Donald Trump launched into a tirade on his social media platform Truth Social.
After the January 6th hearing, which was broadcast live on Thursday, the former president Donald Trump launched into a tirade on his social media platform Truth Social.
Why didn’t the Unselects request Secret Service verification of the alleged “choke hold”?, Trump questioned. Because they are aware of the solution and dislike it. What a Kangaroo Court!
The former president was making reference to Cassidy Hutchinson, an ex-Mark Meadows assistant, who testified at a hearing last month that she heard Trump try to grasp the wheel after his detail declined to transport him to the Capitol Building on January 6.
A D.C. police witness Thursday night backed up a portion of her account.
Rep. Liz Cheney, the vice chair of the committee, presided over the primetime hearing after Chairman Bennie Thompson received a positive COVID test, and Trump also attacked her.
Trump wrote, “Liz Cheney is a pretentious loser.” She is savvy to The Great State of Wyoming. Why not interview those who question the election with proof or show the tapes?
He also criticized Mitch McConnell, the minority leader in the Senate, whose criticism of Trump on the Senate floor was aired throughout the hearing.
Is this the same Mitch McConnel who, after suffering a crushing defeat in Kentucky, visited the White House to beg for support and an endorsement? Trump enquired. “He would have lost in a landslide without me.” A treacherous sleazy bag!
Trump persisted in spreading the so-called “great lie,” and he also persisted in spreading the myth that he had authorized National Guard troops to defend the Capitol before of the attack, but that Democratic leadership had turned down his request.
“Nancy Pelosi is to blame, she rejected the troops!” Trump sent a message early on Friday. Maybe she was single, looking for her husband, or both! Trump continued, probably alluding to Paul Pelosi’s recent DUI arrest.
During the hearing on Thursday night, committee members made it plain that Trump never asked for more security personnel to be deployed to the Capitol during the hours between his speech on the Ellipse and his videotaped message requesting his supporters to leave.
“Our Country and I experienced an election that was rigged and stolen from us.” America is destined for hell. Is it expected that I be joyful? Trump added earlier on Friday.
The committee opened the hearing by displaying a photo of Trump, who was wearing a coat, standing in the Oval Office on January 6 after returning from the Ellipse rally. He later moved to the dining room, where he spent hours watching the Capitol violence unfold on television.
The discussion focused on the 187 minutes that passed between the conclusion of Trump’s remarks on the Ellipse, where he encouraged supporters to demonstrate outside the Capitol, and his tepid video address requesting that they return home.
Members of the committee saw that neither a formal call log nor the White House diary contained any entries on Trump during his more than three hours spent in the White House dining room watching Fox News Channel.
What witnesses did reveal to committee members was that Ivanka Trump and Counsel Pat Cipollone, among other White House officials, pushed the president to issue a statement to supporters to stop the attack.
According to an unidentified individual whose identity the committee withheld, members of Vice President Mike Pence’s security detail inside the Capitol were so concerned about the rising violence that they were making “personal calls” to say goodbye to their families because they “feared for their lives.”
The official stated that “at this point, the members of the VP detail were beginning to worry for their own lives.” ‘Over the radio, there was a lot of screaming and very private calls. I don’t enjoy talking about it because it was upsetting.
The insider stated, “For whatever the cause was on the ground, the VP detail feared this was going to get extremely ugly. There were calls to say farewell to family members, so on and so forth.”
The committee witness, whose voice was obscured, couldn’t confirm what the VP’s detail was going through, but the atmosphere of their talk suggested that things were “going to a whole other level shortly.”
Republican Rep. Adam Kinzinger, a committee member, claimed that President Trump didn’t act because the mob was achieving his goals.
“President Trump did not fail to act during the 187 minutes between leaving the Ellipse and ordering the crowd to go home,” the statement reads.
“He decided not to act.”
Elaine Luria, a Democratic representative from Virginia, claimed that President Trump was aware of the Capitol’s siege and attack within 15 minutes of leaving the podium.
But according to committee testimony, Trump never requested a more robust security response.
For instance, when asked if he was aware of Trump making calls to the secretaries of defense, homeland security, or attorney general, former White House counsel Pat Cipollone gave a negative response.
Luria claimed that Cipollone, not Trump, took the call when the Pentagon dialed the White House to plan a response to the attack.
Instead, Trump asked Kayleigh McEnany, a former White House press secretary, for a list of senators he might call in an effort to get them to challenge the Electoral College results, according to her testimony before the committee.
Matthew Pottinger and Sarah Matthews, the panel’s two in-person witnesses, gave an account of what they saw that day.
On January 6, Pottinger and Matthews both submitted their resignations due to Trump’s behavior.
Later, Trump attacked Matthews on Truth Social.
How soon Trump could have arrived at the White House press briefing room to halt the attack was described by Matthews.
The distance between the press briefing room and the Oval Office dining room, according to Matthews, would be covered in less than 60 seconds.
“The president could have been on camera almost immediately if he had chosen to make a statement and address the American people,” she continued.
This was cited by the panel as more evidence that Trump had no desire to put an end to the riot.
Later, in court, Matthews said that McEnany had informed her that Trump didn’t want to tweet any messages calling for peace.
And he didn’t agree to it until Ivanka Trump offered the term “remain calm,”‘ Matthews informed the audience.
Witnesses claimed that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy made calls in an effort to convince Trump to put an end to the riot.
In his video testimony, Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner stated, “I got the sense that they were afraid.
“Kushner acknowledged that he had received a call from the top GOP House leader and added, “I think he was scared, yeah.”
In the end, Trump did release a video statement; he tweeted it at 4:17 p.m.
Trump’s video production outtakes and pictures of him working with staffers were shown to the committee.
“I understand your suffering. In the video played for the committee, Trump tells his followers, “I feel your hurt.
“Trump goes on to say that the election was “taken from us” and that it was a “landslide.”
People were “emotionally tired by the time that film was done,” Trump’s attorney Eric Herschmann claimed to the committee, raising questions as police continued to combat protestors on the opposite end of Pennsylvania Avenue.
At 6:01 p.m., Trump put out another tweet.
“These are the things and occurrences that occur when great patriots who have been mistreated and wrongly treated for so long have a sacred landslide election victory so brutally and unceremoniously taken away from them.” Go in peace and affection to your house.
Never forget this day!
Trump “excused the violence as a normal response to the election,” Kinzinger said.
The Illinois Republican remarked that “he exhibited absolutely no remorse.”
The committee also released a picture of Trump entering the house afterwards.
Trump told a staff member, “Mike Pence let me down,” before ascending the steps, but he made no mention of the violence.
Trump’s address to the nation on January 7 was excerpted and shared with the House Select Committee on January 6 as well.
In one of the clips, Trump is heard saying, “I don’t want to say the election is over.
“Without declaring that the election is finished, I only want to say that Congress has certified the results.
The former president is shown having trouble speaking.
At one point, he adds, “Yesterday is a hard word for me,” to which his daughter Ivanka Trump, who can be heard speaking outside the picture, suggests he change.
He has a hard time reading the teleprompter as well.
He laments, “I can’t see it very well.”
He eventually delivers this three-minute address after straightening his suit jacket.
He tells the camera, “My only purpose was to safeguard the integrity of the vote.”
Additionally, witnesses strengthened Hutchinson’s testimony from late last month.
Hutchinson reported an unexpected conversation she had with Bobby Engel, the head of Trump’s security detail, and former deputy chief of staff Tony Ornato on January 6, following Trump’s speech at the Ellipse.
She claimed that Engel asked her, “Did you hear what effing happened in the Beast?”
Then it was revealed to her that Trump became upset when told he couldn’t visit the Capitol.
“Sir, you need to take your hand off the steering wheel, we’re going back to the West Wing, we’re not going to the Capitol,” Mr. Engel grabbed the president’s arm and shouted, according to Hutchinson’s testimony.
Sgt. Mark Robinson of the D.C. Police remembers hearing that Trump was “upset” at the hearing on Thursday.
The president was unhappy and adamant on coming to the Capitol, and there was a heated dispute over it, Robinson said of the sole description he had.
Robinson informed the committee that despite riding in the presidential motorcade “probably over 100 times,” he had never heard of such an incident before.
Additionally, he claimed to have heard about armed MAGA mob members.
So whenever a POTUS is nearby, there is always anxiety, he explained.
The committee learned that the motorcade had been held on standby for a further 45 to 60 minutes because Trump insisted on traveling to the Capitol even after returning to the White House, according to Rep. Elaine Luria, who was leading the questioning.
Republican Sen. Josh Hawley, who famously raised his fist in support of the encircling mob as he entered the Capitol Building, was also briefly embarrassed by committee members.
The January 6 panel played video from that day of Hawley and other senators running for their lives from the mob.
The audience members laughed as they imagined Hawley running away.