Jan 6 Committee Hearing 8 – “he chose not to act!”

The January 6 committee, in its final public hearing until the fall, presented damning new evidence Thursday highlighting then-President Donald Trump’s three-hour refusal to publicly condemn the unfolding insurrection at the US Capitol or to call off the violent mob.

The House Committee laid out the evidence of how, as a mob of his supporters assaulted the Capitol, former Trump sat in his dining room off the Oval Office, watching the violence on Fox News and choosing to do nothing to stop it even as the lives of law enforcement officers, members of Congress and his own vice president Pence were under threat by his supporters.

The committee provided a detailed account, narrated by sworn testimony from former staff and advisers, about a president who could not be moved to act until after it was clear that the riot (i.e. coup) had failed to stop the counting of electoral votes.

They detailed how every person in the White House – the top White House lawyer, senior advisors, aides, Pentagon officials and even his daughter – urged Trump to respond to the attack, but he willfully declined to do so.

You’er the Commander in chief. “You’ve got an assault going on the Capitol of the United States, and there’s nothing?” General Mark Milley, chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, the nations highest ranking military officer, told the panel. “No call? Nothing? Zero?”

In perhaps the most jarring revelation, the committee presented evidence that a call from a Pentagon official hoping to coordinate a response to the assault went unanswered because, according to one of Trump’s lawyers, “the president didn’t want anything done.”

Mike Pence, who as vice president held the ceremonial role of certifying the election results, was a specific target of both Trump and the insurgents on Jan. 6. The panel played Secret Service radio transmissions and testimony that showed in chilling detail how close the rioters came to Mike Pence, including an account of the Secret Service detail so rattled that they were contacting their family to say a final goodbye, fearing a confrontation that would lead to their death. Both pieces of testimony were provided by a former White House official whom the committee did not identify and whose voice was altered to protect his identity. Let me say that again. In the United States of America, a former White House official had to have his identity protected from the former president of the United States!

The committee also played dramatic radio recordings over a span of 10 minutes, from 2:14 to 2:24 PM from the Secret Service seeking a safe route to evacuate the Vice President. You could hear the stress in the voices of the typically stoic Secret Service members as they were only a few feet from the rioters separated by a handful of Capitol Police officers.

This was a closing argument of sorts in the case built against Trump, where the central assertion is that the former president was derelict in his duty for failing to do anything at all for 187 minutes to call off the assault carried out in his name. In fact, the assertion was that this was his plan and not incompetence. Trumps inaction during the riot was a glaring violation of his oath of office coming proceeding as a last gasp at the end of many unsuccessful attempts to overturn the results of the 2020 election.

White House officials recounted how the president declined to take a few steps down the hallway to the White House briefing room to call off the violence, instead tweeting an attack on Mike Pence as he was fleeing for his life. “I think in that moment, for him to tweet out a message about Mike Pence, it was pouring gasoline on the fire and making it worse,” said Sarah Matthews, a White House press aide who resigned on Jan. 6 and was one of the two witnesses testifying in person. The other was Matthew Pottinger, a Marine Corp veteran and who was the deputy national security adviser and the highest ranking White House official to resign on Jan. 6. “That was the moment that I decided that I was going to resign, that that would be my last day at the White House,” Pottinger said referring to Trump’s tweet condemning the Vice President. “I simply didn’t want to be associated with the events that were unfolding on the Capitol.”

I think that it is significant that Trump stayed in the dining room and not the Oval Office or the Situation Room where action is expected and multiple doors of entry. The dining room has only one door. During the 187 minutes, there were no calls on the White House call log or visits in the visitor log. When the White House photographer who photographs everything having to with the president was told by Trump that she was not needed the dining room on that day. Trump knew his actions were a violation of his oath.

While armed rioters were overrunning the Capitol and Trump was sitting in a dining room watching Fox News, he was, the committee contends, actively calling different US senators in an attempt to put off the electoral count vote, the basic purpose of the day. He also called Rudy Giuliani on at lest 2 occasions. If Congress didn’t certify the results that day, it might have been unconstitutional to confirm President Biden as the winner on Jan. 7.

While Trump was in the dining room watching television and using the phone, everyone he saw in person was telling him to call off his supporters as they descended on the Capitol. This included his legal counsel, children, his chief of staff, and his press secretary, not to mention calls from people like House Republican Leader Kevin McCarthy. So the idea that Trump was getting any other advice just isn’t true. He ignored all of them.

The committee showed two videos. The first was the video on January 6 where he ignored the written speech and spoke off the cuff reiterating that the election had been stolen but everyone should go home and that he loved them.

Trump: “I don’t want to say the election is over.” The second was on January 7 where he wouldn’t say the election is over. In neither video did he mention or say anything to the Capitol police or he family of the officer(s) who gave their lives defending the Capitol and likely our democrat on that day.

The committee was presenting evidence to show that not only was Trump not calling off the mob, but his public silence during those 187 minutes was also part of his plan to attempt a coup.

In an unusual aside as it did not seem pertinent to the hearing, the committee showed US Senator Josh Hawley R- Mo.

On Jan. 6, 2021, before a violent mob of then-President Donald Trump’s supporters stormed the U.S. Capitol, Sen. Hawley., was photographed with his fist raised in solidarity with the pro-Trump protesters who had gathered outside the security gates. During the House select committee’s primetime hearing on Thursday night, the panel showed the picture of Sen Hawley with his fist raised followed by surveillance video of Hawley fleeing down the hall inside the Capitol as the rioters stormed the building. Laughter could be heard in the hearing room as the committee showed footage of Hawley running. He was also shown briskly walking down steps with other lawmakers as they were evacuated shortly after the joint session of Congress had been convened to certify Joe Biden’s victory over Trump in the 2020 presidential election.

US Rep Liz Cheney, the vice chair of the Jan. 6 House select committee investigating the attack, delivered a forceful and sober final statement at the conclusion of a nearly three-hour hearing on Capitol Hill.

The patriotism of many Americans was turned into a “weapon” during the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol, by a former president who continues to prey on his supporters, Rep. Liz Cheney said Thursday night.

The Republican congresswoman from Wyoming addressed her comments to those who are skeptical of the committee’s work, which includes many voters in her own home state.

“The case against Donald Trump in these hearings is not made by witnesses who were his political enemies. It is, instead, a series of confessions by Donald Trump’s own appointees, his own friends, his own campaign officials, people who worked for him for years, and his own family,” Cheney said.

Cheney made a distinction between Trump and his supporters, noting that many who voted for the former president would eagerly defend the country with their own lives. “Donald Trump knows that millions of Americans who supported him would stand up and defend our nation were it threatened. They would put their lives and their freedom at stake to protect her,” she said.

But, she said, on Jan. 6, 2021, Trump “turned their love of country into a weapon against our Capitol and our Constitution.”

Trump is even now “preying on their patriotism” by continuing to insist he somehow won the 2020 election, despite no evidence to support his baseless claims, Cheney said.

The nine hearings so far, Cheney said, have shown that “Donald Trump’s plan to falsely claim victory in 2020, no matter what the facts actually were, was premeditated.”

The hearing Thursday showed evidence that Trump did nothing to stop the violence on Jan. 6, that former Vice President Mike Pence called in police and military units to shut down the riot and that Trump rejected calls from his family and aides to call off the mob until he knew the attack would be repelled by law enforcement.

Cheney closed her comments by asking Americans to consider the gravity of allowing Trump back into power again.

“Every American must consider this: Can a president who is willing to make the choices Donald Trump made during the violence of Jan. 6 ever be trusted with any position of authority in our great nation again?” she said.

Cheney ended the hearing Thursday by making clear that the committee’s work is not done, and that there will be more hearings after Labor Day.

“Ronald Reagan’s great ally Margaret Thatcher said this: ‘Let it never be said that the dedication of those who love freedom is less than the determination of those who would destroy it,’” she said. “Let me assure every one of you this: Our committee understands the gravity of this moment, the consequences for our nation. We have much work yet to do, and will see you all in September.”

Boston Globe and CNN – July 22, 2022