By Todd Lassa
(PICTURED: Still from a video Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio shot before the January 6 Capitol insurrection, as presented by the Select Committee.)
Donald J. Trump has been subpoenaed by the House Select Committee to Investigate the January 6th Attack on the U.S. Capitol, which in its ninth public hearing (formally, a business meeting) Thursday showed that the former president began his scheme to deny peaceful transfer of power at least as early as July 2020, more than half a year before he lost re-election. Trump also acknowledged privately to White House aides and officials that he had indeed lost the election.
Among nearly 1 million electronic messages retrieved from the Secret Service are two reports from the “rally” site that agents should wear protective gear to prepare for Trump riding the “Beast” limo to the Capitol after he had been driven back to the White House against his will, and another at 1:25 p.m. that the president “is planning on holding at the White House for the next approximate two hours, then moving to the Capitol.”
Based on the former president’s reputation, Trump’s attorneys will do all they can to fight and at least delay any appearance before the 1/6 panel, which will publish its report by the end of the year. Vice Chair Liz Cheney’s (R-WY) resolution, passed 9-0, subpoenas Donald J. Trump for documents and testimony under oath in connection with the attack. It will not take much legal maneuvering to delay such testimony to next year and the 118th Congress, when Cheney and fellow panel member Adam Kinzinger (R-IL) will no longer be members of the House of Representatives.
As for Trump’s documents required in the subpoena, during Thursday’s hearing the U.S. Supreme Court rejected the former president’s request to overturn the 11th Circuit District Court’s ruling allowing the Justice Department to review confidential papers that the FBI seized from Mar-a-Lago last August 8.
It is both a testimony to the depth of evidence and material, which the panel has continued to collect as additional witnesses have come forth, and the lengths to which the former president was willing to go to subvert our democracy to avoid having to leave the White House that made Thursday’s hearing as news-infested as it was. There were no new live witnesses. But the panel does have those Secret Service emails and other electronic communications that were requested at the last hearing, July 21, after it was revealed most of them from January 5 and 6, 2021, were said to be lost after the agency updated its devices.
Secret Service emails on Trump supporters planning to come to the Capitol on January 6, from December 26, 2020:
•“They think that they will have a large enough group to march into DC armed and will outnumber the police so they can’t be stopped.”
•“Their plan is to literally kill people. Please, please take this tip seriously and investigate further.”
•“The proud boys have detailed their plans on multiple websites such as [Donald Trump-“wins” website].
Brad Parscale, advisor in the 2020 Trump campaign said in video testimony that “Trump planned as early as July he would say he won.”
Panel member Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA) told of how campaign advisor Bill Stepien and White House advisor/son-in-law Jared Kushner wanted Trump to encourage Republicans to vote by mail-in ballot, “but the president’s mind was made up” to claim that mail-in ballots are a key contributor to voter fraud, according to Stepien’s video testimony. On election night, Trump declared victory early and then called on the vote-counting to stop, as ballots came in well into the morning from Democrat-heavy urban areas.
Trump planned to “declare victory no matter the results,” Lofgren concluded. The panel also produced evidence that Trump did not believe his own Big Lie, even as he was doing all he could to prove his case.
In another piece of video testimony, Cassidy Hutchinson, aide to ex-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, said Trump told Meadows “I don’t want people to know we lost.”
FRI 10/14/22
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