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Jan. 6 hearing
Trump tried to contact committee witness, an effort referred to Justice Department, Cheney says
LATEST UPDATES
Analysis: Capitol rioter apologizes to police after hearing ends
4:38 p.m.
Cheney previews Cipollone testimony for next hearing
4:31 p.m.
Analysis: An effective use of a Capitol rioter
4:24 p.m.
Analysis: Committee treads familiar ground about extremists
4:18 p.m.
Key update
Trump tried to call Jan. 6 witness after last hearing, Cheney says
4:15 p.m.
Former Oath Keepers spokesman calls it a ‘violent militia’
4:04 p.m.
Murphy cites roots in Vietnam as personal impetus for defending democracy
4:02 p.m.
Key update
Raskin says Trump’s ‘true legacy’ is ‘American carnage’
3:57 p.m.
Analysis: Thompson’s push for civil rights at center of Jan. 6 hearing
3:49 p.m.
Rioter says he left Capitol as soon as Trump told crowd to disperse
3:49 p.m.
Key update
Brad Parscale said Trump’s rally speech was ‘asking for civil war’
3:49 p.m.
Analysis: Ayres embodies political conversion of some Jan. 6 defendants
3:44 p.m.
Key update
Analysis: Committee shows how Trump barreled through warnings
3:43 p.m.
Ex-Oath Keepers member says leader saw Trump’s messages as ‘nod’ to act
3:41 p.m.
Aide to Ivanka Trump says she attended rally to calm her father
3:38 p.m.
Key updates
- Trump tried to call Jan. 6 witness after last hearing, Cheney says
- Raskin says Trump’s ‘true legacy’ is ‘American carnage’
- Brad Parscale said Trump’s rally speech was ‘asking for civil war’
Panel reveals how Trump summoned extremist groups to D.C. ... 5:04
he Jan. 6, 2021 House committee held its seventh public hearing on July 12 focusing on how President Donald summoned far-right militant groups to D.C. (Video: Mahlia Posey/The Washington Post, Photo: Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
By John Wagner, Eugene Scott, Amy B Wang, Isaac Arnsdorf and Mariana Alfaro
Updated July 12, 2022 at 4:38 p.m. EDT|Published July 12, 2022 at 7:21 a.m. EDT
Former president Donald Trump recently attempted to contact an unnamed witness in the House select committee investigation of the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot — an effort that the panel has since referred to the Justice Department, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), vice chairwoman of the panel, said Tuesday.
“Let me say one more time: We will take any effort to influence witness testimony very seriously,” Cheney said.
The revelation came toward the end of a hearing in which the committee zeroed in on the violent rhetoric and planning that flowed from a tweet by Trump weeks before Jan. 6 promising a “wild” protest. Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.), one of the panel members leading Tuesday’s hearing, said what transpired was “openly homicidal.”
The dead-of-night tweet by Trump on Dec. 19, 2020, followed what was described as an “unhinged” meeting in which White House lawyers and Trump allies advocating baseless claims about the election shouted at one another for hours.
Here’s what to know
The committee heard live testimony from Jason Van Tatenhove, who previously served as national spokesman for the Oath Keepers, a group that participated in the riot. Van Tatenhove said the organization is a “dangerous militia” that attracted “white nationalists” and “straight-up racists.”
Stephen Ayres, a rioter who illegally entered the Capitol on Jan. 6, also testified. He said he was inspired to come to Washington by Trump’s social media posts. “I was hanging on every word he was saying,” Ayres said.
In recorded testimony, several White House advisers, including former White House counsel Pat Cipollone, said they had pushed Trump to concede the election long before Jan. 6.
In a recorded conversation played Tuesday, Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-Ariz.) warned that Trump supporters would “go nuts” at the Capitol on Jan. 6 and said congressional leadership should “come up with a safety plan for members.”
The panel presented evidence that there was advance planning for Trump to go to the Capitol on Jan. 6 after his speech on the Ellipse near the White House.
Analysis: Capitol rioter apologizes to police after hearing ends
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By Jacqueline Alemany4:38 p.m.
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Capitol rioter hugs police officers ... 1:22
Capitol rioter Stephen Ayres, who testified to the Jan. 6 committee, hugged and appeared to apologize to Capitol police officers following the July 12 hearing. (Video: The Washington Post)
A hearing full of extraordinary revelations ended with an extraordinary gesture of atonement: Capitol rioter Stephen Ayres, who pleaded guilty last month to charges related to his actions on Jan. 6, approached former and current U.S. Capitol Police and D.C. police officers who defended the Capitol from the mob of which he was a part. At the conclusion of the hearing, Ayres walked up to Capitol Police Officer Harry Dunn, former U.S. Capitol Police Sgt. Aquilino Gonell, former D.C. police officer Michael Fanone and D.C. Police Officer Daniel Hodges to make amends. “I’m really sorry,” Ayres said to Dunn, before embracing the officer.
Cheney previews Cipollone testimony for next hearing ... 4:31 p.m.
By Isaac Arnsdorf
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In her closing statement, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), vice chairwoman of the committee, previewed testimony from former White House counsel Pat Cipollone that the panel will present at its next hearing — one that focuses on Donald Trump’s activities during the riot on Jan. 6, 2021.
In clips from his videotaped interview conducted Friday, Cipollone said that on Jan. 6 he pushed for a strong statement telling people to leave the Capitol. “I felt it was my obligation to continue to push for that, and others thought it was their obligation, as well,” he said.
Cipollone also confirmed that at any time after the outbreak of violence, Trump could have gone into the briefing room to address the nation. Trump did not release a videotaped statement until 4:17 p.m., more than two hours later.
“Yes, it would have been possible,” Cipollone said.
Cheney said the next hearing would walk through the events of Jan. 6 “minute by minute.”
Analysis: An effective use of a Capitol rioter ... 4:24 p.m.
By Josh Dawsey
Stephen Ayres, who pleaded guilty last month to charges related to the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, and Jason Van Tatenhove, former member of the Oath Keepers, are sworn in as the House select committee holds a public hearing on July 12.
Stephen Ayres, who pleaded guilty last month to charges related to the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol riot, and Jason Van Tatenhove, former member of the Oath Keepers, are sworn in as the House select committee holds a public hearing on July 12. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
This seems to have been an effective use of a Capitol rioter by the Jan. 6 committee. In a series of questions, the committee got Stephen Ayres, who illegally entered the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, to say he would probably not have come to Washington had he known President Donald Trump didn’t have evidence for his claims. He also said he originally planned to not go to the Capitol but was convinced to go by Trump’s speech and Trump’s vow that he would join them.
Former Oath Keeper describes split from organization ... 2:23
Jason Van Tatenhove, former national spokesman for the Oath Keepers, testified on July 12 to the Jan. 6 select committee about his time with the organization. (Video: The Washington Post)
Ayres said he left the Capitol immediately after Trump tweeted for the rioters to leave, proving — at least in the eyes of one rioter — that Trump’s indifference for hours mattered. “As soon as that came out, everyone started talking about it. It seemed it started to disperse some of the crowd. … It definitely dispersed a lot of the crowd.”
Analysis: Committee treads familiar ground about extremists ... 4:18 p.m.
By Rachel Weiner
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While the Jan. 6 committee has provided shocking information from inside and around the Trump White House, it has not revealed as much about the armed groups that supported him. Testimony on Tuesday about the role of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys in the Capitol attack largely echoed public court filings describing how the two groups coordinated in advance and worked with Trump associate Roger Stone on the day of the riot. Messages indicating Florida Oath Keeper Kelly Meggs led those efforts were produced in court months ago. Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) noted that he was relying on a recent filing from prosecutors for the allegation that the Oath Keepers brought not just guns but explosives to the U.S. Capitol that day. While several members of both groups have pleaded guilty to conspiracy charges, Meggs and other leaders are planning to go to trial and have refused to cooperate with investigators.
Key update
Trump tried to call Jan. 6 witness after last hearing, Cheney says ... 4:15 p.m.
By Mariana Alfaro
Cheney: Trump tried to call committee witness ... 0:46
On July 12, Vice Chairwoman Liz Cheney (W-Wyo.) stated that former president Donald Trump attempted to contact a Jan. 6 witness yet to publicly appear. (Video: The Washington Post)
Committee Vice Chairwoman Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) said Tuesday that former president Donald Trump tried to call one of the committee’s witnesses after the panel’s last hearing, which was held June 28.
“After our last hearing, President Trump tried to call a witness in our investigation, a witness you have not yet seen in these hearings,” Cheney said. “That person declined to answer or respond to President Trump’s call and instead alerted their lawyer to the call. Their lawyer alerted us.”
The committee, Cheney said, has “supplied that information to the Department of Justice.”
“Let me say one more time: We will take any effort to influence witness testimony very seriously,” Cheney warned.
This is not the first time the panel has warned of what it sees as potential attempts at witness tampering in connection to its investigation. During the June 28 hearing, Cheney said numerous witnesses described phone calls and other messages from former colleagues connected to Trump’s circle that seem to exert pressure in advance of their testimony.
One witness described a phone call in which the person was implored to be a “team player” and remain in “good graces in Trump world.” Another witness received a call the day before their deposition from a person who seemed to be delivering a message directly from Trump.
“He wants me to let you know that he’s thinking about you,” it said, according to Cheney’s account of the message. “He knows you’re loyal, and you’re going to do the right thing when you go in for your deposition.”
Former Oath Keepers spokesman calls it a ‘violent militia’ ... 4:04 p.m.
By Hannah Allam
Jason Van Tatenhove, a former Oath Keepers spokesman who for years served as a close aide to founder Stewart Rhodes, portrayed the group as a “violent militia” that dreamed of and trained for a seminal event such as the storming of the U.S. Capitol to trigger a wider extremist revolt. He left the group years ago and didn’t offer insight into Jan. 6 events, instead describing the general ideology and goals of the anti-government group.
Van Tatenhove told the committee that he first connected with the Oath Keepers during high-profile standoffs with the federal government. He spent around three years promoting the group before growing concerned as he witnessed an embrace of white nationalists and other “straight-up racists.” Van Tatenhove said he finally broke with Rhodes after hearing senior Oath Keepers denying the Holocaust.
Van Tatenhove portrayed the group as a vanity project for Rhodes, whom he said envisions himself as a powerful paramilitary leader. Still, Van Tatenhove stressed, the group should be considered dangerous due to its ability to widely disseminate violent messaging and radicalize followers. As ugly and chaotic as the Capitol attack got, Van Tatenhove said, it could have been worse.
“I think we’ve gotten exceedingly lucky that more bloodshed did not happen because the potential has been there from the start,” said Van Tatenhove, whose tattooed face and denim jacket stood out in the buttoned-up congressional hearing room.
Murphy cites roots in Vietnam as personal impetus for defending democracy ... 4:02 p.m.
By Amy Wang
Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) and Chairman Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.) at a House Jan. 6 committee hearing July 12, 2022.
Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) and Chairman Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.) at a House Jan. 6 committee hearing July 12, 2022. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.), who helped lead Tuesday’s Jan. 6 committee hearing, closed the session with a personal note, saying she was the only member not born in the United States.
“I was born in Vietnam after the Vietnam War. My family and I fled a communist government and were rescued by the U.S. Navy and were given sanctuary in America,” Murphy said. “My patriotism is rooted in my gratitude for America’s grace and generosity. I love this country.”
The Jan. 6 attack came four decades after her family had fled a place where political power had been seized through violence, she added. Murphy recalled being in the Capitol that day, “fleeing my fellow Americans.”
“Members of the angry mob had been lied to by a president and the other powerful people who tried to convince them without evidence that the election had been stolen from them,” Murphy said. “Some of them then tried to use physical violence to overturn the outcome of a free and fair election.”
“Our committee’s overriding objective is to fight fiction with facts,” she continued, “to create a full account for the American people and for the historical record, to tell the truth of what happened and why it happened, to make recommendations so it never happens again, to defend our democracy. To me, there’s nothing more patriotic than that.”
Key update
Raskin says Trump’s ‘true legacy’ is ‘American carnage’ ... 3:57 p.m.
By Mariana Alfaro
Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.), as the House Jan. 6 committee holds a public hearing July 12, 2022.
Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.), as the House Jan. 6 committee holds a public hearing July 12, 2022. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) did not mince his words about former president Donald Trump as he wrapped up Tuesday’s hearing.
“American carnage: That’s Donald Trump’s true legacy,” Raskin said. “His desire to overthrow the people’s election and seize the presidency interrupted the counting of electoral college votes for the first time in American history, nearly toppled the constitutional order and brutalized hundreds and hundreds of people.”
“The Watergate break-in was like a Cub Scout meeting compared to this assault on our people and our institutions,” the Maryland Democrat added.
Trump had vowed to end “American carnage” at his presidential inauguration in 2017.
The Founders, Raskin said, “actually warned everyone about Donald Trump. Not by name, of course, but in the course of advising about the certain process that ambitious politicians would try to mobilize violent mobs to tear down our institutions.”
“A violent insurrection to overturn an election is not an abstract thing,” Raskin said. “As we’ve heard, hundreds of people were bloodied, injured and wounded in the process.”
Raskin appeared to wipe away tears as he revealed that Capitol Police Officer Aquilino Gonell, who fought insurrectionists Jan. 6, 2021, suffered injuries so critical that he will no longer be able to serve as a police officer.
Gonell, an Army veteran who has spoken to the committee about the insurrection, told the panel that nothing he saw during his time in Iraq prepared him for the Jan. 6 attack.
“He was savagely beaten, punched, pushed, kicked, shoved, stomped and sprayed with chemical irritants along with other officers by members of a mob carrying hammers, knives, batons and police shields taken by force and wielding the American flag against police officers is a dangerous weapon,” Raskin said.
Now Gonell “must leave policing for good and figure out the rest of his life,” Raskin said.
Analysis: Thompson’s push for civil rights at center of Jan. 6 hearing ... 3:49 p.m.
By Jacqueline Alemany
Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) and Chairman Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.), seen July 12 during a House Jan. 6 committee hearing.
Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) and Chairman Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.), seen July 12 during a House Jan. 6 committee hearing. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
Rep. Bennie G. Thompson’s lifelong struggle for civil rights just took center stage on Capitol Hill as he grilled white nationalists in his capacity as chairman of the House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection. Thompson, who is the only Black member of the panel and attended a segregated junior high school in Mississippi, opened up the committee’s hearings last month to explain to the American public how the investigation fit into his life’s work to protect the right to vote.
Thompson was also the only member of the committee who was in the House gallery during the attack on the Capitol when rioters broke the glass doors to the room. Rep. Pete Aguilar (D-Calif.), a colleague on the committee, told the Los Angeles Times last month of a picture of Thompson from that moment: “Bennie Thompson’s, like, sitting there. And I took that as he’s been through a lot — civil rights and he’s talked about his own personal history with the [Ku Klux Klan] and Mississippi. Him seated and not ducking under and diving under chairs — to me it was him saying, ‘I’ve been through a lot.’ And, like, ‘I’m good, I got this.’ And it’s that kind of quiet assurance and leadership that kind of carries with him. That has been helpful.”
Rioter says he left Capitol as soon as Trump told crowd to disperse ... 3:49 p.m.
By Amy Wang
Jason Van Tatenhove, right, a former member of the Oath Keepers and Stephen Ayres, who pleaded guilty last month to charges related to the Jan. 6, 2021, riot, prepare to testify July 12 before the House Jan. 6 committee.
Jason Van Tatenhove, right, a former member of the Oath Keepers and Stephen Ayres, who pleaded guilty last month to charges related to the Jan. 6, 2021, riot, prepare to testify July 12 before the House Jan. 6 committee.
Stephen Ayres, a rioter who illegally entered the Capitol on Jan. 6, testified Tuesday that he genuinely believed the election had been stolen because of everything President Donald Trump said.
“I was very upset, as were most of his supporters. You know, that’s basically what got me to come down here,” Ayres said, referring to the Capitol on the day of the attack. He added that he now does “not so much” believe the election was stolen, after deleting his social media and “doing my own research” after the insurrection.
Asked whether it would have made a difference if he had known the extent to which Trump himself had been told by his advisers that the election wasn’t stolen, Ayres said, “Definitely.”
“Who knows? I may not have come down here then,” he said.
Ayres said that when he was in Washington on the morning of Jan. 6, he originally planned to just see the “Stop the Steal” rally but had no intention of marching to the Capitol.
“The president, you know, got everybody riled up, told everybody, ‘Head on down,’” he said. “So we basically just were following what he said. … I was already worked up, and so were most of the people there.”
Ayres said he thought Trump would be marching to the Capitol with them. When asked what made him decide to leave the Capitol, Ayres said it was after Trump tweeted a video at 4:17 p.m. on Jan. 6 asking the crowd to leave.
“Basically, when President Trump put his tweet out, we literally left right after that,” he said. “If he would have done that earlier in the day … maybe we wouldn’t be in this bad of a situation.”
Correction: An earlier version of this post incorrectly stated Ayres was a member of the Oath Keepers.
Key update
Brad Parscale said Trump’s rally speech was ‘asking for civil war’ ... 3:49 p.m.
By Eugene Scott
Former Trump campaign manager Brad Parscale responded to President Donald Trump’s speech at the rally preceding the Jan. 6 insurrection with great concern, according to texts between him and former campaign adviser Katrina Pierson.
“This is about Trump pushing for uncertainty in our country, a sitting president asking for civil war,” Parscale texted Pierson.
The texts were shown at the hearing Tuesday.
He said he felt guilty for helping Trump. Pierson attempted to console him, telling Parscale that he did what he thought was right.
“Yeah, but a woman is dead,” he replied. “And yeah, if I was Trump, and I knew my rhetoric killed someone …”
Pierson attempted to push back on the idea that the former president’s rhetoric was to blame.
“Yes, it was,” Parscale responded.
Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) said Trump’s lies in the speech were ammunition for his supporters.
“He lied to his supporters that the election was stolen. He stoked their anger,” Murphy said. “He called for them to fight for him. He directed them to the U.S. Capitol. He told them he would join them, and his supporters believed him.”
“And many headed towards the Capitol,” she added. “As a result, people died, people were injured. Many of his supporters’ lives will never be the same.”
Analysis: Ayres embodies political conversion of some Jan. 6 defendants
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By Tom Jackman3:44 p.m.
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Stephen Ayres is a live representative of the political conversion that perhaps four-fifths of the Jan. 6 defendants have undergone, from more than a year of watching their pleas and sentencings. Once arrested, they seem shocked by the public condemnation, they usually lose their jobs, they have hard conversations with their lawyers, and they begin to examine their beliefs. Ayres, who posted video on the afternoon of Jan. 6 blaming antifa for the riots, said he later signed off from social media, “started doing my own research” and realized the election wasn’t stolen. A small percentage of convicted defendants have not recanted.
Key update
Analysis: Committee shows how Trump barreled through warnings
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By Josh Dawsey3:43 p.m.
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What Tuesday’s hearing has repeatedly shown is that President Donald Trump was given multiple chances to dial it down, but instead kept dialing it up ahead of the Capitol riot on Jan. 6. Advisers warned him against attacking Vice President Mike Pence in his Ellipse speech; he added language anyway doing exactly that after calling Pence a “wimp,” according to witnesses. Others were concerned about his rhetoric and his tweets about the Jan. 6 rally, but he kept sending them. His advisers warned him against marching to the Capitol, but he kept pushing and told the crowd he was going. And now, at least one rioter is telling the committee that he did exactly what he did because Trump urged him to do so.
Ex-Oath Keepers member says leader saw Trump’s messages as ‘nod’ to act
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By Mariana Alfaro3:41 p.m.
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Jason Van Tatenhove, former member of the Oath Keepers, testifies before the House Jan. 6 committee in Washington on July 12.
Jason Van Tatenhove, former member of the Oath Keepers, testifies before the House Jan. 6 committee in Washington on July 12. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
Jason Van Tatenhove, who served as a national spokesman for the Oath Keepers and as a close aide to the group’s founder Stewart Rhodes, testified to the House Jan. 6 committee that the organization is a “dangerous militia” that attracted “white nationalists” and “straight-up racists.”
“I spent a few years with the Oath Keepers and I can tell you that they may not like to call themselves a ‘militia,’ but they are,” he said. “They’re a violent militia.”
Van Tatenhove said the “dangerous militia” is “in large part fed by the ego and drive of Stewart Rhodes.”
“He is a militia leader,” Van Tatenhove. “He had these visions of being a paramilitary leader and the Insurrection Act would have given him a path forward with that.”
The fact that Trump was communicating, “whether directly or indirectly messaging” with the group ahead of the insurrection, “kind of gave [Rhodes] the nod,” Van Tatenhove said.
“All I can do is thank the gods that things did not go any worse that day,” Van Tatenhove said.
Van Tatenhove explained that he first came into contact with the armed group during the standoff at Bundy Ranch in Nevada in 2014. Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy and hundreds of militiamen — many of whom ultimately became Oath Keepers — were facing off with federal law enforcement officers who had impounded Bundy’s cattle. Van Tatenhove — then an independent reporter — was offered a job with the group after interacting with them a few times.
Rhodes, he described, was very invested in turning the group into a paramilitary force. From the very start, Van Tatenhove said, “there was always the push for military training.”
“I have three daughters. I have a granddaughter, and I fear for the world that they will inherit if we do not start holding the these people to account,” Van Tatenhove said.
Aide to Ivanka Trump says she attended rally to calm her father
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By Isaac Arnsdorf3:38 p.m.
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Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) said President Donald Trump was worked up after the call with Vice President Mike Pence, leading his daughter Ivanka Trump to decide to attend the rally with him in the hopes of calming him down. The committee showed videotaped testimony from Ivanka Trump denying that: “I don’t know who said that or where that came from.”
Immediately after, a clip showed taped testimony from her chief of staff, Julie Radford, recalling that Ivanka Trump told her the president needed to be calmed down.
“She shared that he had called the vice president an expletive word,” Radford said. “I think that bothered her, and I think she could tell based on the conversations and what was going on in the office that he was angry and upset and people were providing misinformation, and she felt like she might be able to help calm the situation down, at least before he went onto stage.”
When Donald Trump delivered the speech, he included additional references to Pence, as well as marching to the Capitol. “A single scripted reference in the speech to Mike Pence became eight,” Murphy said. “A single scripted reference to rallygoers marching to the Capitol became four, with President Trump ad-libbing that he would be joining the protesters at the Capitol.”
2 days after election, Stone used encrypted group chat to coordinate efforts to overturn result
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By Jon Swaine3:33 p.m.
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An image of Roger Stone is shown on a screen as the House Jan. 6 committee holds a hearing Tuesday. (Doug Mills/Pool/AP)
An image of Roger Stone is shown on a screen as the House Jan. 6 committee holds a hearing Tuesday. (Doug Mills/Pool/AP)
Roger Stone began using his encrypted group chat to coordinate efforts to overturn the 2020 election less than two days after polls closed, video footage shows.
The committee presented messages posted in “Friends of Stone,” a discussion group on the encrypted app Signal. Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) noted that Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio and Stewart Rhodes of the Oath Keepers were among the group’s members.
The Washington Post first reported on Stone’s Signal group, along with his use of the app to chat with Tarrio and Rhodes, in a March article about the veteran Republican operative’s activities leading up to the Jan. 6 attack.
Video recorded by Danish filmmakers, who were following Stone for a feature-length documentary, shows that on Nov. 5, 2020, Stone directed the Signal group members to recruit retired military and law enforcement officials for the “Stop the Steal” movement. The Washington Post reviewed the footage.
Dictating messages to the group chat through his iPhone headphones as he paced around his office in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., Stone told members to keep checking “Friends of Stone” for updates, while an aide drew up an action plan that included demonstrations and pressure on state lawmakers to keep President Donald Trump in power. Also on Nov. 5, Stone had a 15-minute phone call with former national security adviser Michael Flynn, the video shows.
Several Proud Boys and Oath Keepers members have been charged with seditious conspiracy for their part in the riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6. Stone and Flynn have denied any involvement in or prior knowledge of the attack.
Trump added Pence pressure to speech after calling him ‘wimp’ on phone ... 3:32 p.m.
By Isaac Arnsdorf
A committee exhibit shows former vice president Mike Pence on the phone from his secure location during Jan. 6, 2021, riot, as the House committee investigating the attack on the Capitol holds a hearing in Washington on June 16. (Susan Walsh/AP)
A committee exhibit shows former vice president Mike Pence on the phone from his secure location during Jan. 6, 2021, riot, as the House committee investigating the attack on the Capitol holds a hearing in Washington on June 16. (Susan Walsh/AP)
Trump revised the speech that he planned to deliver to the rally on the Ellipse on Jan. 6, 2021, to increase the pressure on Mike Pence after his vice president told him he would not overturn the election results, according to evidence presented at the hearing.
On the morning of Jan. 6, Trump added a line urging Pence to reject the electoral college results during a meeting with speechwriter Stephen Miller, according to drafts and calendars obtained by the committee. White House lawyer Eric Herschmann intervened with Miller, saying the line could be “counterproductive,” Miller testified in a clip played during the hearing. So the speechwriters removed the line about Pence.
But later that morning, Trump and Pence spoke on the phone. Pence informed Trump that he would not reject the election results, and Trump responded by calling him a “wimp” and other derogatory terms, Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) recounted at the hearing.
After that, White House adviser Robert Gabriel told the speechwriters in an email, “REINSERT THE MIKE PENCE LINES.”
“President Trump wanted to use his speech to attack Vice President Pence in front of a crowd of thousands of angry supporters who had been led to believe the election was stolen,” Murphy said.
Analysis: Hearing shows Stone, Jones, Ali were central to Stop the Steal ... 3:29 p.m.
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By Spencer Hsu
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The statement to the Jan. 6 committee by Kellye SoRelle, a lawyer for the Oath Keepers and volunteer Trump campaign attorney, that Roger Stone, Infowars’ Alex Jones and Ali Alexander specifically “were the ones that became the centerpoint for everything” in the Stop the Steal movement is noteworthy.
Stone and Alexander have credited each other with inspiring and planning the pro-Trump Stop the Steal campaign, with Alexander saying he came up with the idea and helped organize the Jan. 6 rally that drew Trump supporters to Washington. Jones, a radio and web-streaming host, also amplified and intensified Trump’s incendiary and baseless claims that the 2020 election was illegitimate in the weeks leading up to the riot. Alexander, in a since-deleted video on Periscope weeks before the rally, said he and three hard-line pro-Trump Republican members of Congress “schemed up of putting maximum pressure on Congress while they were voting” on the election certification.
On Jan. 1, Jones told his viewers, “Roger Stone spent some substantial time with Trump in Florida just a few days ago, and I’m told big things are afoot and Trump’s got major actions up his sleeve.” Stone and Jones have said the White House asked them ahead of Jan. 6 to lead the march to the Capitol. Stone did not attend. Jones recorded himself following the crowd to the Capitol.
Rep. Jamie B. Raskin’s (D-Md.) introduction to SoRelle’s recorded statement that Stone and others brought extremists together says aloud what has been circumstantially apparent in court filings. But what participants actually may have discussed and planned remains murky. Alexander spoke to the House committee and also to a federal grand jury working with prosecutors, saying he has been assured he is only being viewed as a witness.
Stone and Jones have said they invoked their Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination in depositions with the committee.
Key update
Twitter employee warned platform ‘people were going to die’ if they didn’t intervene
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By Amy Wang3:26 p.m.
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An image of voice-altered testimony from a former Twitter employee testifying about a tweet by former president Donald Trump citing election fraud and inviting people to the Jan. 6, 2021, rally appears on a screen at a public hearing of the House committee on the Jan. 6 Capitol attack in Washington on July 12. (Michael Reynolds/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock)
An image of voice-altered testimony from a former Twitter employee testifying about a tweet by former president Donald Trump citing election fraud and inviting people to the Jan. 6, 2021, rally appears on a screen at a public hearing of the House committee on the Jan. 6 Capitol attack in Washington on July 12. (Michael Reynolds/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock)
A Twitter employee concerned about the prospects of violence among Trump’s supporters testified before the committee that they had tried to get someone at Twitter to intervene, flagging content from violent extremist groups, but to no avail.
The night of Jan. 5, 2021, the employee said they tried once more to alert someone at the social media platform of their fears.
“I believe I sent a Slack message to someone that something along the lines of, ‘When people are shooting each other tomorrow, I will try and rest in the knowledge that we tried,’ ” the Twitter employee, whose voice was disguised, said in taped testimony played by the committee. “I don’t know that I slept that night, to be honest with you. I was on pins and needles.”
The employee said they had been begging people at Twitter for months, “attempting to raise the reality that if nothing … if we made no intervention into what I saw occurring, people were going to die.”
On Jan. 5, 2021, the employee realized that no intervention was forthcoming.
“And even as hard as I had tried to create one or implement one, there was nothing,” the employee said. “And we were at the whim, at the mercy of a violent crowd that was locked and loaded.”
Rep. Lesko warned that Trump supporters would ‘go nuts’ in D.C., recording shows
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By Mariana Alfaro3:21 p.m.
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A graphic of Freedom Plaza in Washington is shown as the House Jan. 6 committee holds a public hearing July 12, 2022.
A graphic of Freedom Plaza in Washington is shown as the House Jan. 6 committee holds a public hearing July 12, 2022. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
In a recorded conversation played Tuesday by the House Jan. 6 committee, Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-Ariz.) warned that Trump supporters would “go nuts” at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
Lesko — who committee member Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) noted had promoted unfounded objections to the results of the 2020 elections — said during a conversation among Republican lawmakers that congressional leadership should “come up with a safety plan for members” ahead of Jan. 6, 2021.
“I’m actually very concerned about this because we have, who knows how many hundreds of thousands of people are coming here,” Lesko said.
Lesko said Trump supporters “who actually believe that we are going to overturn the election” would show up at the Capitol that day and would probably get violent once they realized the election results would not change.
“When that doesn’t happen — most likely will not happen — they are going to go nuts,” Lesko said of the Trump supporters, acknowledging that the House was not going to overturn the results of the election.
The committee did not say who made the recording or how the panel obtained it.
Analysis: Draft tweet raises questions about who knew of Trump’s desire to go to the Capitol
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By Josh Dawsey3:12 p.m.
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Evidence obtained by the committee investigating the attack on the Capitol suggests that there was more planning for President Donald Trump to call the crowd to march to the Capitol than previously known. The committee unearthed a draft tweet the former president had seen calling for the crowd to go (it was unclear whether Trump wrote it), and the committee showed texts from two organizers — Kylie Kremer and Ali Alexander — where they both told others they knew that Trump would “unexpectedly” call for people to march to the Capitol, in the words of Kremer. “POTUS is just going to call for it unexpectedly,” she wrote. The texts raise questions about how the two seemed to know Trump’s plans in advance, and who drafted a tweet in his voice that would urge the crowd to do so.
Key update
Trump allies Stone, Flynn had ties to Proud Boys and Oath Keepers
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By Amy Wang3:05 p.m.
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Michael Flynn, left, former national security adviser to former president Donald Trump, and Roger Stone, right, listen during a news conference for the America Project in Orlando on Feb. 25. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
Michael Flynn, left, former national security adviser to former president Donald Trump, and Roger Stone, right, listen during a news conference for the America Project in Orlando on Feb. 25. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
In the weeks leading up to the Capitol attack, leaders in the right-wing militia groups the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers worked with Trump allies, the Jan. 6 committee laid out Monday.
One of those allies was Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, President Donald Trump’s former national security adviser, who had connections to the Oath Keepers. Another was longtime Trump confidant Roger Stone, a political consultant who had ties to a network of extremist groups. Stone communicated with both the Proud Boys and the Oath Keepers in the weeks between the November 2020 election and the Capitol attack.
The committee showed photos from Dec. 12, 2020, that showed Flynn guarded by one Oath Keeper and next to Oath Keeper founder Stewart Rhodes. The committee also noted a group chat called “Friends of Stone” in which Rhodes urged other violent extremists to march on their state Capitols if they could not make it to Washington for the first Million MAGA March.
“These friends of Roger Stone had a significant presence at multiple pro-Trump events after the election, including in Washington on December the 12th,” Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) said. “On that day, Stewart Rhodes called for Donald Trump to invoke martial law, promising bloodshed.”
Trump pardoned both Flynn and Stone in the weeks after the November 2020 election, Raskin said.
Pierson on controversial rally speakers: Trump likes the ‘crazies’
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By Eugene Scott3:04 p.m.
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Katrina Pierson, a former spokeswoman for Donald Trump’s presidential campaign, told the Jan. 6 committee that the former president liked “the crazies” — and supported amplifying their voices at the rally that preceded the insurrection.
Pierson, who helped organize the speakers for the rally, told the committee that the former president “likes the crazies.”
“I was talking about President Trump,” she said. He “loves people who viciously defended him in public.”
“The people that would be very, very vicious in publicly defending him,” Pierson added.
Pierson said some of the individuals looking to excite the crowd were quite controversial and she was worried, so she expressed her concerns to Mark Meadows, Trump’s chief of staff at the White House. Concerns about speakers had created a bit of a feud between Pierson, Republican fundraiser Caroline Wren and other rally organizers — to the extent that the U.S. Park Police was called.
“Good afternoon. Would you mind giving me a call regarding this January six event,” she texted Meadows. “Things have gotten crazy and I desperately need some direction. Please.”
She said Meadows called her shortly afterward.
“I did briefly go over some of the concerns that I had raised,” she told the committee. “... I probably mentioned to him that they had already caused trouble at other capitals or at the previous event, the previous march that they did for protesting. And I just had a concern about it.”
Ex-Twitter employee says company leaders ‘relished’ being Trump’s favorite platform
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By Mariana Alfaro2:55 p.m.
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Twitter ‘relished’ being Trump’s favorite platform
3:53
On July 12, an unidentified, ex-Twitter employee testified that the company allowed President Trump to use rhetoric it wouldn't usually have tolerated. (Video: The Washington Post)
A former Twitter employee, in a recorded interview before the Jan. 6 committee, said the social media company considered adopting stricter content moderation policies after President Donald Trump told the Proud Boys right-wing group to “stand back and stand by” during a September 2020 presidential debate.
The company, however, chose not to act.
The former worker, whose voice was altered by the committee to protect their identity, said they raised concerns with Twitter leaders over Trump’s direct messages to his base, worried that they would spread rapidly on the social media platform, but those concerns were ignored.
“My concern was that the former president, for seemingly the first time, was speaking directly to extremist organizations and giving them directives,” the employee told the panel. “We had not seen that sort of direct communication before, and that concerned me.”
But Twitter leaders, the former employee said, “relished in the knowledge that they were also the favorite and most used service of the former president and enjoyed having that sort of power within the social media ecosystem.”
Trump, Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) said, remained on the platform, his power there “unchecked,” even as, on Dec. 19, 2020, the former president tweeted: “Big protest in D.C. on January 6th. Be there, will be wild!”
“After this tweet on December 19th, again, it became clear — not only were these individuals ready and willing, but the leader of their cause was asking them to join in this cause and in fighting for this cause in D.C. on January 6,” the former employee said. “I very much believe that Donald Trump posting this tweet on December 19th was essentially sticking a flag in D.C. on January 6th for his supporters to come in and rally.”
Ultimately, Trump was kicked off Twitter only after the deadly insurrection.
Analysis: Committee paints vivid picture of ‘unhinged’ Oval Office meeting
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By Jacqueline Alemany2:46 p.m.
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A Oval Office meeting on Dec. 18 that morphed into an expletive-laced screaming match was vividly described in a seven-minute montage of interviews and depositions provided by allies on both sides of the heated, late-night confrontation that played out four days after the electoral college confirmed Joe Biden as the nation’s next president.
Pat Cipollone’s bewilderment at the cast of characters who had made it past the White House gates and into President Donald Trump’s office to pitch lawyer Sidney Powell as special counsel to investigate voter fraud allegations was palpable as he described the scene to investigators:
“First of all, the Overstock person — I didn’t even know who this guy was,” an exasperated Cipollone said in his videotaped interview about conspiracy theorist Patrick Byrne, prompting nervous laughter in the hearing room.
The swing between almost-comedic moments and panicked descriptions of Powell and Co.’s efforts elicited audible gasps from the audience. “You’re a bunch of p------,” Giuliani told investigators about what was said to White House officials who wouldn’t go along with the Dec. 18 scheme to overturn the election.
Powell at one point is seen polishing off a soda as she walks investigators through the conspiracy-fueled plan to seize voting machines, causing more laughter in the Cannon Caucus room as the audience watched the surreal, deftly edited back-and-forth between White House aides and fringe allies in Trump’s orbit.
Cassidy Hutchinson summed it all up in a text she sent to deputy White House chief staff Anthony M. Ornato, showed by the committee: “The west wing is UNHINGED.”
Key update
Pro-Trump message board encouraged rioters to bring weapons to Capitol
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By Eugene Scott2:33 p.m.
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WASHINGTON, DC ‐ July 12, 2022:
A post from thedonald.win, referencing the murder of police, is shown on a screen as the House select committee holds a public hearing investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, July 12, 2022.
(Photo by Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
WASHINGTON, DC ‐ July 12, 2022: A post from thedonald.win, referencing the murder of police, is shown on a screen as the House select committee holds a public hearing investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, July 12, 2022. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
A website frequented by many of those who would go on to participate in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol told attendees to be ready for battle, urging them to bring handcuffs, zip ties and weapons, according to evidence presented at the House Jan. 6 committee hearing.
Posts on the pro-Trump message board TheDonald included violent threats and plans of those heading to the Capitol following the rally at which President Donald Trump falsely declared the 2020 election fraudulent.
One user told attendees to bring handcuffs and to wait near tunnels. Another suggested zip ties instead.
And one post encouraged attendees to bring body armor, brass knuckles, shields, bats and pepper spray. Police said all of those weapons were used, found and confiscated on Jan. 6.
About 140 law enforcement officers were injured during the insurrection, including members of U.S. Capitol Police and D.C. police. Rioters attacked law enforcement officers as they broke into the Capitol, set bonfires outside the building and protested efforts to officially declare Joe Biden the winner of the 2020 election.
One post on the site instructed people on how to get to lawmakers whom they viewed as threats to plans to keep Trump in office. Discussions of the tunnels beneath the Capitol complex that could be used to find Trump critics in Congress grew more aggressive online as the former president riled up his supporters on Twitter.
Analysis: Trump allies suggested smart thermostats were used to hack voting machines
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By Emma Brown2:29 p.m.
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During the wild, six-hour White House meeting Dec. 18, 2020, described in today’s hearing, former national security adviser Michael Flynn — asked repeatedly to provide evidence that the election was fraudulent — brought up smart thermostats. He made “some comment about, like, Nest thermostats being hooked up to the internet,” White House lawyer Eric Herschmann recalled in recorded testimony played at the hearing. The notion that smart thermostats somehow helped Joe Biden win might be one of the lesser-known conspiracy theories that made the rounds after Nov. 3, 2020, but it reached into the highest levels of government. Not only was it invoked during the Dec. 18 meeting, but Justice Department official Jeffrey Clark referenced it as he tried to pressure his superiors into taking action to overturn the election outcome. “If you have not seen it, white hat hackers have evidence (in the public domain) that a Dominion machine accessed the internet through a smart thermostat with a net connection trail leading back to China,” Clark wrote Dec. 28, 2020, in an email released last year by the Senate Judiciary Committee.
Analysis: How useful is a former Oath Keeper’s testimony?
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By Hannah Allam2:26 p.m.
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WASHINGTON, DC ‐ July 12, 2022:
Jason Van Tatenhove, former member of the Oath Keepers who served as the national spokesman for the far-right militia group, prepares to testify as the House select committee holds a public hearing investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, July 12, 2022.
(Photo by Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
WASHINGTON, DC ‐ July 12, 2022: Jason Van Tatenhove, former member of the Oath Keepers who served as the national spokesman for the far-right militia group, prepares to testify as the House select committee holds a public hearing investigating the Jan. 6 attack on the U.S. Capitol in Washington, Tuesday, July 12, 2022. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
The witness sounds tantalizing: Jason Van Tatenhove, a former top propagandist of the anti-government Oath Keepers extremist group who for years served as a close aide to founder Stewart Rhodes.
But the limits of Van Tatenhove’s testimony, scheduled for today, are in the fine print. He left the group around 2018, long before the “Stop the Steal” movement culminated in the storming of the U.S. Capitol, an attack that led to seditious conspiracy charges against Rhodes and many other Oath Keepers associates who were present that day.
Bottom line: Van Tatenhove probably won’t be able to add much on key questions of how the Oath Keepers planned for violence at the Capitol and whether they were coordinating with members of the Trump administration. However, he could help public understanding of the group’s long history of violent rhetoric, its makeup of loosely organized national chapters, and how Rhodes has a well-documented history of pushing his supporters into conflicts with the federal government while trying to keep himself out of legal trouble.
As a reporter who has covered the Oath Keepers and interviewed Van Tatenhove, I think he’s a risky choice as a witness if the discussion is about the Capitol attack. However, he’s ideal if the goal is to strip away the mythology of the Oath Keepers as a large paramilitary organization and to reframe it as Van Tatenhove and other former members described it to me last year: a cult of personality around Rhodes, who raked in membership dues while pumping out calls for a violent revolution and targeting legions of veterans and police officers for radicalization.
Analysis: Where the prosecutions stand
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By Tom Jackman2:19 p.m.
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Shortly before the House committee hearing began, a Maryland man was found guilty Tuesday morning of felony destruction of property for smashing windows at the Capitol and being one of the first people to enter the building. But after 18 months, Nicholas Rodean was only the 12th defendant from the Jan. 6, 2021, attack to go to trial, and the 11th to be convicted. Another 320 have pleaded guilty, but more than 500 cases are pending.
According to Washington Post databases, 836 people have been charged in federal court with Jan. 6-related offenses: 406 for felonies and 430 for misdemeanors. Of the 836 charged, 332 have been convicted or pleaded guilty: 69 for felonies, 263 for misdemeanors.
Of those charged, 46 defendants have been linked to the Proud Boys and 32 to the Oath Keepers.
Of those convicted, 206 defendants have been sentenced: 20 for felonies, 186 for misdemeanors. All 20 felony defendants have received jail or prison sentences, with the average sentence being 26 months. Of the 186 misdemeanor sentencings, 78 have been given jail time, with an average sentence of 44 days. Fifty-five people received probation only, 50 were sentenced to home detention, two were placed in a halfway house, and one received a fine only.
Key update
Pro-Trump YouTuber called for ‘red wedding’ — a massacre — in D.C. on Jan. 6
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By Mariana Alfaro2:18 p.m.
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Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) listens during a hearing of the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) listens during a hearing of the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
Salty Cracker, a pro-Trump YouTube streamer, said a “red wedding” would be carried out in D.C. on Jan. 6, 2021.
A “red wedding” is, in pop culture, a reference to a massacre.
“Better understand something, son, you better understand something,” the YouTuber says in a video shown during Tuesday’s hearing of the House Jan. 6 committee. “Red wave, b----. There’s going to be a red wedding going down January 6.”
“In that clip, you heard one of Trump’s supporters predict a red wedding, which is a pop culture reference to mass slaughter,” Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) explained during the hearing.
The reference comes from the “Game of Thrones” series by author George R.R. Martin, which was adapted for television by HBO. The “red wedding” in the series refers to a gruesome massacre carried out during a wedding celebration that resulted in the deaths of multiple main characters. The phrase has come to signify violence and mass murder in popular culture.
The panel used the clip to show how some of President Donald Trump’s supporters interpreted his messages and actions as invitations to come to Washington and commit acts of violence against Congress and Vice President Mike Pence.
Committee highlights ‘unhinged’ Dec. 18 White House meeting with outside lawyers
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By Amy Wang2:17 p.m.
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Text messages between Cassidy Hutchinson, aide to Trump White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, and Anthony Ornato, a senior Secret Service official, describing a Dec. 18, 2020, meeting at the White House are shown the hearing on Tuesday.
Text messages between Cassidy Hutchinson, aide to Trump White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, and Anthony Ornato, a senior Secret Service official, describing a Dec. 18, 2020, meeting at the White House are shown the hearing on Tuesday. (Jan. 6 select committee)
On Dec. 18, 2020, an outside group showed up at the White House to meet with President Donald Trump to push conspiracy theories about the election and figure out ways to keep him in power. The meeting lasted more than six hours and was characterized by the Jan. 6 committee as “a heated and profane clash” between the group and White House advisers, according to testimony from six meeting participants and former White House staffers who said they could hear screaming from outside the Oval Office.
The outside group included Sidney Powell, former national security adviser Michael Flynn and former Overstock chief executive Patrick Byrne. (“I looked at him and I said, ‘Who are you?’ ” former White House counsel Pat Cipollone testified he asked Byrne.) The outside group pushed outlandish theories, including that Venezuela was meddling with the 2020 election and that Nest thermostats hooked up to the internet were somehow changing votes.
The group demonstrated “a general disregard for the importance of actually backing up, say, facts,” Cipollone told the committee.
Throughout the meeting, the outside group accused Trump’s White House advisers of lacking the courage to continue contesting the election results.
“I would categorically describe it as: You guys are not tough enough,” former Trump attorney Rudy Giuliani said in taped testimony. “Or maybe I put it another way. You’re a bunch of p------. Excuse the expression, but … I’m almost certain the word was used.”
The committee on Tuesday showed a screenshot of texts from Cassidy Hutchinson, an aide to then-White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, to Anthony Ornato, a senior Secret Service official, one of which described the Dec. 18 meeting as “unhinged.”
‘Wild’ tweet kicked off right-wing media blitz
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By Isaac Arnsdorf2:14 p.m.
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A video of right-wing media personality Alex Jones is shown as the House Jan. 6 committee holds a public July 12. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
A video of right-wing media personality Alex Jones is shown as the House Jan. 6 committee holds a public July 12. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
The committee played a montage of right-wing influencers such as Alex Jones and Tim Pool seizing on Trump’s tweet summoning people to Washington for Jan. 6.
“One of the most historic events in American history has just taken place,” Jones said in the first clip. “He is now calling on we, the people, to take action to show our numbers.”
“We’re going to only be saved by millions of Americans moving to Washington, occupying the entire area, if necessary, storming right into the Capitol,” commentator Matt Bracken said. “If you have enough people, you can push down any kind of a fence or a wall.”
“This could be Trump’s last stand,” Pool said in another clip. “Trump supporters need to say this is it, it’s now or never.”
“There’s going to be a red wedding going down Jan. 6,” a pro-Trump YouTube personality known as Salty Cracker said Dec. 30, using a term that Raskin said means mass slaughter. “There going to be a million-plus geeked-up, armed Americans.”
Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) concluded, “The point is that Trump’s call to Washington reverberated powerfully and pervasively online.”
Key update
Cipollone slammed plan to name Sidney Powell special counsel
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By Isaac Arnsdorf1:54 p.m.
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Cipollone ‘vehemently opposed’ to Powell special counsel
2:36
On July 12, White House counsel Pat Cipollone said that he opposed appointing Sidney Powell as a special counsel to investigate seized voting machines. (Video: The Washington Post)
Trump White House counsel Pat Cipollone testified that he weighed in against a plan to appoint Sidney Powell as a special counsel tasked with investigating seized voting machines and prosecuting election-related crimes.
“I was vehemently opposed. I didn’t think she should be appointed anything,” Cipollone said in a clip played at the hearing.
The plan to appoint Powell was presented along with a draft executive order at the Dec. 18, 2020, meeting in the White House, Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) said at the hearing. Powell was the lawyer who tried to challenge the 2020 election results based on conspiracy theories involving purported Chinese and Venezuelan operations.
Cipollone said he agreed with then-Attorney General William P. Barr’s conclusion that there wasn’t widespread fraud in the election.
“To have the federal government seize voting machines? It’s a terrible idea for the country. That’s not how we do things in the United States. There’s no legal authority to do that,” Cipollone said in another clip. “I don’t understand why we have to tell you why that’s a bad idea. It’s a terrible idea.”
Key update
Aides urged Trump to end efforts after electoral college vote
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By Amy Wang1:48 p.m.
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A video deposition by former White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany is shown during a House Jan. 6 committee hearing July 12, 2022.
A video deposition by former White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany is shown during a House Jan. 6 committee hearing July 12, 2022. (Saul Loeb/AFP/Getty Images)
Several former Trump aides told the Jan. 6 committee they believed Dec. 14, 2020 — the date electors met to cast electoral votes consistent with the popular vote in their states — would or should have stopped President Donald Trump’s efforts, according to recorded testimony played at Tuesday’s hearing.
Former White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany told the committee that “upon the conclusion of litigation was when I began to plan for life after the administration.”
Ivanka Trump, Trump’s daughter and a senior adviser to the president, was asked if Dec. 14 was also “an important day” for her to that effect and if she realized then there was going to be an end to her father’s administration.
“I think it was my sentiment, probably prior as well,” she said.
Judd Deere, a former deputy White House press secretary, testified that he had told Donald Trump that “the means for him to pursue litigation was probably closed” after the electoral college had met.
Trump told Deere then that he disagreed, Deere testified.
Cipollone said Trump should have conceded election
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By Eugene Scott1:48 p.m.
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Cipollone: No evidence of widespread election fraud in 2020
2:40
In a taped deposition played on July 12, former White House counsel Pat Cipollone said there was no evidence of widespread voter fraud in the 2020 elections. (Video: The Washington Post)
In a recording of Pat Cipollone aired Tuesday during the hearing, the former White House counsel said Trump should have conceded the election after the results were official.
Cipollone was asked whether he believed Trump should have conceded defeat at a certain point after the election.
“I was the White House counsel. Some of those decisions are political,” Cipollone responded. “But if your question is did I believe he should concede the election at one time, yes, I did.”
Cipollone had initially been reluctant to testify before the committee, citing presidential privilege. He was subpoenaed and relented, testifying behind closed doors on Friday.
Cipollone pointed to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s words in December on the Senate floor, when he cited the electoral college tally as proof that the 2020 election had ended and that Democrat Joe Biden was the winner.
“The electoral college has spoken,” the Kentucky Republican said Dec. 16. “So, today, I want to congratulate President-elect Joe Biden.”
Trump’s Labor Secretary Scalia, son of the late justice, advised him to concede
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By Mariana Alfaro1:35 p.m.
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Secretary of Labor Eugene Scalia during his swearing-in on Sept. 30, 2019, in Washington.
Secretary of Labor Eugene Scalia during his swearing-in on Sept. 30, 2019, in Washington. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
Former labor secretary Eugene Scalia, the son of the late Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia, advised President Donald Trump to concede the election in mid-December 2020.
Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) said Scalia, an attorney, called the then-president to tell him it was time to accept that he’d lost the election and that the courts had proven that there had been no election fraud.
“I had to put a call in to the president,” Scalia said in an interview with the committee, video of which was shown Tuesday. “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.”
Scalia said he told Trump that the legal process was over and had found no proof that fraud had occurred. Scalia then told Trump that “once those legal processes were run, if fraud had not been established that had affected the outcome of the election, that unfortunately, I believe that what had to be done was [done].”
Video: Ivanka Trump’s conflicting statements
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1:33 p.m.
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Ivanka Trump’s conflicting statements
1:28
Ivanka Trump’s comments to the House Jan. 6 select committee about her father’s 2020 presidential loss conflict with her comments in 'Unprecedented.' (Video: Lindsey Sitz/The Washington Post, Photo: Jan. 6 committee/The Washington Post)
Former White House adviser Ivanka Trump’s comments to the House Jan. 6 select committee about her father’s 2020 presidential loss conflict with what she told filmmaker Alex Holder in his docuseries “Unprecedented.”
Ivanka Trump told the committee that she “accepted” comments from Attorney General William P. Barr about a lack of evidence of fraud in the election. In an interview for Holder’s project, she echoed some of President Donald Trump’s talking points in the aftermath of the election.
Murphy, Raskin zero in on ‘unhinged’ White House meeting
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By Isaac Arnsdorf1:31 p.m.
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Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) takes part in a House Jan. 6 committee hearing July 12, 2022.
Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) takes part in a House Jan. 6 committee hearing July 12, 2022. (Demetrius Freeman/The Washington Post)
Reps. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) and Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) kicked off the House Jan. 6 committee hearing by centering attention on a Dec. 18 meeting in the Oval Office. The meeting, which Raskin said had been called “unhinged” and “the craziest meeting of the Trump presidency,” included discussion of an executive order for the military to seize election machines. It ended, after midnight, with President Donald Trump sending a tweet calling his supporters to assemble in Washington.
“Will be wild,” Trump tweeted.
“This tweet served as a call to action and in some cases as a call to arms,” Murphy said. Raskin added that it specifically mobilized the Oath Keepers, Proud Boys and other right-wing extremists.
The White House meeting set in motion three forces that would collide Jan. 6, Raskin said: continued efforts by Trump and his advisers to overturn the election results in Congress, violent extremists planning to storm the Capitol, and the massive crowd assembling on the National Mall.
“The president's goal was to stay in power for a second term despite losing the election,” Murphy said. “The assembled crowd was one of the tools to achieve that goal.”
Murphy previewed new evidence, including how Trump “edited and ad-libbed” his speech Jan. 6 to inflame his supports and direct them to the Capitol.
Analysis: Cheney seemingly sends a message to Justice Department
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By Jacqueline Alemany1:28 p.m.
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Cheney: Trump ‘is not an impressionable child’
1:31
On July 12, Jan. 6 committee Vice Chairwoman Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) said that President Donald Trump was responsible for his own actions during the insurrection. (Video: The Washington Post)
Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) opened the hearing with an indirect message to the Justice Department: “President Trump is a 76-year-old man. He is not an impressionable child. Just like everyone else in our country, he is responsible for his own actions and his own choices.” Cheney not-so-subtly rebuked the “bottom-up” strategy employed by the Justice Department in investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection that has so far steered away from targeting the former president throughout the investigation, and has instead focused on rioters and mid-level staffers and associates around him who enabled the elector scheme.
Key update
Trump ‘seized on the anger he had already stoked,’ Thompson says
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By Amy Wang1:17 p.m.
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The House Jan. 6 committee on Tuesday.
The House Jan. 6 committee on Tuesday. (Hadley Green/TWP)
Opening Tuesday’s hearing, Jan. 6 committee chairman Bennie G. Thompson (D-Miss.) described how, in the United States, differences are usually settled at the ballot box and leaders usually accept their losses. But not President Donald Trump.
By mid-December 2020, many of Trump’s supporters were already convinced that the election had been stolen — because that’s what Trump had been telling them, Thompson said.
“So what Donald Trump was required to do in that moment — what would have been required of any American leader — was to say we did our best and we came up short,” he said. “He went the opposite way. He seized on the anger he had already stoked among his most loyal supporters. And as they approached the line, he didn’t wave them off. He urged them on.”
Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.), the vice chair of the committee, said the idea that Trump was “manipulated” by people outside the administration was nonsense.
“President Trump is a 76-year-old man. He is not an impressionable child. Just like everyone else in our country, he is responsible for his own actions and his own choices,” Cheney said.
Trump, she added, had access to “more detailed and specific information showing that the election was not actually stolen” than almost any other American.
“No rational or sane man in his position could disregard that information and reach the opposite conclusion,” Cheney said. “And Donald Trump cannot escape responsibility by being willfully blind, nor can any argument of any kind excuse President Trump’s behavior during the violent attack on January 6th.”
Analysis: Committee to show ties between extremists, Trump allies
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By Jacqueline Alemany1:09 p.m.
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A federal judge concluded in March that Donald Trump and a lawyer who advised him, John Eastman, had most probably committed felonies in their attempts to overturn his electoral defeat in 2020. U.S. District Judge David O. Carter of the U.S. District Court for the Central District of California concluded in that case that Eastman and Trump were probably guilty of two crimes: conspiracy to defraud the United States and obstructing a congressional proceeding.
This seventh public hearing of the Jan. 6 committee is likely to raise the specter of a third potential charge: seditious conspiracy. Lawmakers are expected to show ties between far-right extremists — some of whom have been criminally charged with seditious conspiracy in the U.S. Capitol riot — and Trump allies, according to a committee aide who briefed reporters Monday.
“Like mob cases where the crime boss is prosecuted for the overall conspiracy and may not have been engaged or even known about every act that a capo or foot soldier does, these contacts establish the overall structure and relationships,” said Norm Eisen, who served as counsel to House Democrats during the first impeachment and trial of Donald Trump. “The hearing will likely further advance that proof.”
Analysis: What were the origins of self-radicalized rioters?
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By Spencer Hsu1:05 p.m.
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The Jan. 6 committee has focused on two right-wing extremist groups, the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys, who served as bodyguards for Republican VIPs or street muscle for anti-leftist demonstrations in 2020, before allegedly organizing in support of President Donald Trump to oppose by force Congress’s certification of the presidential election results.
Among roughly 835 people federally charged in the Capitol riot, about 10 percent have alleged ties to the two groups, whose leaders face seditious conspiracy counts. They are accused of mobilizing members, gearing up with radios and tactical gear such as helmets and body armor, and, in the case of the Oath Keepers, staging firearms in the D.C. area, and, in the case of the Proud Boys, directing members of the mob and helping lead the break-in of the Capitol.
But there is a broader question. Scores more of those charged in the Capitol siege were effectively self-mobilized and self-radicalized, according to the FBI. That is, they brought body armor, weapons, helmets and hard gloves and otherwise came prepared for violence without known ties to organized groups, according to charging papers. Court filings have cited what was established, that online chatrooms and social media before Jan. 6 were radicalizing some followers with notions of storming the Capitol, hauling out lawmakers and stoking violent or purported “revolutionary” disorder.
Where did such talk originate, and was it spontaneous or coordinated? Prosecutors have given glimpses of organization in court filings, such as alleging the Oath Keepers shared a Serbian video and talking points directed at Americans that emerged shortly after the election and that proposed “storming parliament,” and that the Proud Boys had a planning document with a section called “Storm the Winter Palace,” referring to the Russian Revolution and the former imperial palace in St. Petersburg that was raided by Bolsheviks. But the question of who primed so many rioters for violence remains an open question.
Analysis: Rioter who pleaded guilty is expected to testify
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By Spencer Hsu12:16 p.m.
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One of Tuesday’s expected witnesses is an Ohio man, Stephen M. Ayres, who pleaded guilty last month to misdemeanor disorderly conduct in a restricted building or grounds. Ayres posted a Facebook video of the riot in which he and another man identified themselves at a hotel afterward. On Jan. 5, 2021, Ayers shared a poster encouraging people to go to Washington on Jan. 6, quoting President Donald Trump’s tweet, “Be there, will be wild,” and made additional posts saying, “Civil War will ensue,” and that it was “time for us to start standing up to tyranny.”
For example, on Jan. 3, Ayres said in plea papers, he posted: “Mainstream media, social media, Democrat party, FISA courts, Chief Justice John Roberts, Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, etc … all have committed TREASON against a sitting U.S. president! !! All are now put on notice by 'We The People!”
The other man in the video, Matthew Perna, was indicted with Ayres and pleaded guilty but died by suicide while sentencing was pending.
Analysis: Bannon under pressure as trial looms
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By Isaac Arnsdorf12:15 p.m.
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Former White House adviser Stephen K. Bannon is seen on the screen as the House Jan. 6 committee holds a public hearing on Capitol Hill on June 16.
Former White House adviser Stephen K. Bannon is seen on the screen as the House Jan. 6 committee holds a public hearing on Capitol Hill on June 16. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
Former Trump strategist Stephen K. Bannon has been surprisingly scarce in the Jan. 6 hearings so far, accounting for less than 30 seconds of airtime. He’s likely to surface again today as the committee examines the role of extremist groups in the attack on the Capitol. Panel members see Bannon as a key figure because they think his podcasts contributed to radicalizing some of President Donald Trump’s supporters, and they have evidence showing that Bannon repeatedly talked to Trump and his advisers in the lead-up to Jan. 6.
There’s additional interest in Bannon now that he has offered to testify; he is facing fines or jail time for his earlier refusal to cooperate. Bannon originally defied the committee’s subpoena, resulting in a contempt prosecution that is scheduled to go to trial next week. On Monday, the judge denied Bannon’s effort to delay the trial and excluded most of the defenses his attorneys wanted to present.
Who is Jamie Raskin?
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By John Wagner11:55 a.m.
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Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) participates in the 2022 4th of July Parade in Takoma Park, Md., on July 4. (Craig Hudson for The Washington Post)
Rep. Jamie Raskin (D-Md.) participates in the 2022 4th of July Parade in Takoma Park, Md., on July 4. (Craig Hudson for The Washington Post)
Jamie Raskin (D-Md.), who will lead Tuesday’s hearing along with Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.), is a familiar face to those who watched the second impeachment trial of former president Donald Trump.
Raskin, a former constitutional law professor, was the lead House manager during the Senate trial in February 2020 in which Trump was prosecuted for “incitement of insurrection” in relation to the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol.
At the conclusion of the trial, the Senate voted 57-43 to convict Trump, falling 10 votes short of the two-thirds majority required by the Constitution, and Trump was therefore acquitted.
Before Tuesday, Raskin has played a limited role during committee hearings but has been a frequent presence on in the media and elsewhere promoting its work.
Before the start of the series of summer hearings, Raskin pledged that they would “blow the roof off the House.”
More recently, he told NBC News that the Friday’s closed-door testimony from Trump White House counsel Pat Cipollone had corroborated virtually all of the revelations from previous witnesses, including former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson.
“I certainly did not hear him contradict Cassidy Hutchinson,” Raskin told NBC. “He had the opportunity to say whatever he wanted to say, so I didn’t see any contradiction there.”
Raskin, who represents a district that includes much of Montgomery County, Md., was formerly a member of the Maryland state Senate.
In 2020, his 25-year-old son died by suicide after battling depression.
Analysis: What happened at Dec. 18, 2020, White House meeting looms large
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By Rosalind Helderman11:48 a.m.
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A video of Sidney Powell, a former attorney for Donald Trump, is shown as the House Jan. 6 committee holds a hearing on June 13.
A video of Sidney Powell, a former attorney for Donald Trump, is shown as the House Jan. 6 committee holds a hearing on June 13. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
Members of the Jan. 6 committee have telegraphed that today’s hearing will feature discussion of a contentious, hours-long, rolling meeting at the White House on the night of Dec. 18, 2020.
During the meeting, lawyers Sidney Powell and Emily Newman, former Overstock chief executive Patrick Byrne and former national security adviser Michael Flynn tried to persuade Trump to use the National Guard to seize ballots and voting machines in key counties, potentially rerun the presidential election and appoint Powell as special counsel to oversee the election.
Already, the committee has collected lots of testimony from people who joined either part of that wild meeting or were present throughout it, many of whom have never before described it publicly — including White House lawyers Pat Cipollone, Eric Herschmann, Patrick Philbin, as well as Powell, Flynn and Rudy Giuliani, who rushed to the White House that night.
One key fact yet to be revealed: What happened after the outsiders left the White House? Byrne has said that the meeting ended about 12:15 a.m. At 1:42 a.m., Trump sent a tweet encouraging his supporters to come to Washington on Jan. 6. “Will be wild,” he wrote — a message that committee members have said served to incite a mob.
Will the committee reveal what sparked Trump’s tweet? And the committee will get even more information about that Dec. 18 meeting on Friday, when a person familiar with the matter said Byrne is scheduled to be interviewed.
Analysis: Background of Raskin, Murphy make them good fit for hearing
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By Jacqueline Alemany11:46 a.m.
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We’ll hear Tuesday from House Jan. 6 committee members Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.) and Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.), both of whom have backgrounds that make them a good fit to lead this hearing.
Raskin is a member of the Committee on Oversight and Reform, where he leads the subcommittee on civil rights and civil liberties. As chairman, he has held five hearings since the white supremacist attack in Charlottesville in 2017 to explore domestic violent extremism in the United States and the rise of white nationalism. He also served as a lead House impeachment manager for the second impeachment of Trump.
Murphy, who decided not to seek reelection, is a former Pentagon official who came to the United States as a Vietnamese refugee when her family fled an authoritarian government. We’re likely to hear a bit about her personal investment in the committee’s work at the outset of the hearing.
Michael Flynn, likely hearing subject, looms large in extremist QAnon ideology
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By Isaac Stanley-Becker11:26 a.m.
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Michael Flynn speaks at a campaign event for Republican Senate candidate Josh Mandel (not pictured) in Cortland, Ohio, on April 21.
Michael Flynn speaks at a campaign event for Republican Senate candidate Josh Mandel (not pictured) in Cortland, Ohio, on April 21. (Gaelen Morse/Reuters)
Michael Flynn, Donald Trump’s first national security adviser, may feature prominently in the House committee’s efforts to unspool the connections between the former president and extremist groups.
Flynn attended a Dec. 18, 2020, meeting at the White House that is under scrutiny by the panel. And he has been photographed with members of a paramilitary group called the 1st Amendment Praetorian that investigators say played a role in the riot at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021.
Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.), who is co-leading today’s hearing, has said evidence will point to a wide range of extremist ideologies motivating the rioters, including QAnon, an extremist ideology based on false claims.
Flynn is a key figure in the QAnon worldview. In 2020, he recorded a video of himself repeating an oath adopted by QAnon adherents. “Where we go one, we go all,” intoned Flynn, his right hand raised. He has also praised Trump’s “digital soldiers,” a title that has become a QAnon rallying cry. Flynn sought to trademark it.
Who is Jason Van Tatenhove?
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By Amy Wang, Jacqueline Alemany and Hannah Allam11:06 a.m.
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Members of the Oath Keepers gather on the east front of the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021.
Members of the Oath Keepers gather on the east front of the U.S. Capitol in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021. (Manuel Balce Ceneta/AP)
Jason Van Tatenhove is a former member of the Oath Keepers who served as the national spokesman for the far-right militia group. He is scheduled to appear as a live witness Tuesday during the Jan. 6 committee’s hearing focused on links between the White House and violent extremists.
Van Tatenhove also served as a close aide to Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes from around 2014 to 2018 — an era he said Rhodes considered “the golden years” for his group. He was part of the inner circle of Oath Keepers leadership in its formative years, but had left the group well before the 2020 election. Van Tatenhove’s job involved trying to get Rhodes on Fox News or Infowars, an online trafficker of conspiracy claims.
In interviews with The Washington Post last year, Van Tatenhove described the Oath Keepers as a cult of personality around Rhodes, who he said promoted violent ideology and called on supporters to revolt but was adept at shielding himself from legal consequences.
Van Tatenhove said Rhodes raked in membership dues to radicalize cadres of military veterans and former police officers. Rhodes amassed a large nationwide network, though he commanded few actual forces; the Jan. 6 showing was among the biggest in Oath Keeper history and ultimately was the group’s undoing.
Key update
Rioter who illegally entered Capitol expected to testify
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By John Wagner10:41 a.m.
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The scene outside the Capitol after supporters of President Donald Trump breached the building in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021.
The scene outside the Capitol after supporters of President Donald Trump breached the building in Washington on Jan. 6, 2021. (Bonnie Jo Mount/The Washington Post)
Witnesses at Tuesday’s hearing are expected to include Stephen Ayres, a rioter who illegally entered the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021, and who apparently was inspired to come to Washington by a tweet from President Donald Trump advertising a “wild” day.
The committee has not formally announced its witness list for the hearing, but Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.), who is helping lead the questioning Tuesday, tweeted a CBS News report that listed both Ayres and Jason Van Tatenhove, a former spokesman for the Oath Keepers, as testifying.
“Today, we’ll show how President Trump’s tweet in the early hours of December 19th activated domestic extremist groups, and how some Members of Congress amplified that message, all leading to the attack on January 6th,” Murphy tweeted.
Ayres, who lives in Ohio, pleaded guilty to a charge of disorderly conduct last month stemming from his activities on Jan. 6.
According to CBS, in the week before the attack, Ayres posted on Facebook about his plans for a Jan. 6 trip to Washington, D.C. One of his Facebook posts quoted Trump’s Dec. 19, 2020, tweet predicting a “wild” scene in the nation’s capital on that day.
Who is Stephanie Murphy?
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By Eugene Scott10:34 a.m.
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Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) listens as Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, testifies during the sixth hearing by the House Jan. 6 committee.
Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) listens as Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, testifies during the sixth hearing by the House Jan. 6 committee. (Brandon Bell/Getty Images)
Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) will help lead Tuesday’s hearing investigating the attacks on the U.S. Capitol that left more than a hundred law enforcement officers injured.
“I know how fragile democracies are, and I know how lucky I am to live in the United States of America, where we have a vibrant democracy, but only if we as citizens are willing to commit to keeping it,” she recently told a Florida news station. “That means that as an elected official, in this moment, I have an opportunity to provide the facts and the details, and to provide legislative recommendations to ensure that we don’t come this close again.”
Murphy, the first Vietnamese American woman elected to Congress, announced in December that she would not seek reelection in the upcoming midterms to spend more time with her family.
The married mother of two fled communist Vietnam with her family as a child before the U.S. Navy rescued them at sea after on Bell/Getty Images)
Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) will help lead Tuesday’s hearing investigating the attacks on the U.S. Capitol that left more than a hundred law enforcement officers injured.
“I know how fragile democracies are, and I know how lucky I am to live in the United States of America, where we have a vibrant democracy, but only if we as citizens are willing to commit to keeping it,” she recently told a Florida news station. “That means that as an elected official, in this moment, I have an opportunity to provide the facts and the details, and to provide legislative recommendations to ensure that we don’t come this close again.”
Murphy, the first Vietnamese American woman elected to Congress, announced in December that she would not seek reelection in the upcoming midterms to spend more time with her family.
The married mother of two fled communist Vietnam with her family as a child before the U.S. Navy rescued them at sea after their boat ran out of fuel.
A former national security specialist in the U.S. Department of Defense, Murphy grew up in Northern Virginia before studying economics at William & Mary. She later received a master’s in foreign service from Georgetown University.
She worked as an investment banking executive and was a business professor in college before running for Congress in 2016. She defeated Republican incumbent Rep. John L. Mica with the endorsement of President Biden, former president Barack Obama and other high-profile Democrats.
The Proud Boys got a boost after Trump told them to ‘stand back and stand by'
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By John Wagner9:55 a.m.
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Trump denounces white supremacy, one day after sidestepping debate question
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President Trump on Sept. 30 said he denounced white supremacy before pivoting to criticizing Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden over antifa. (Video: The Washington Post)
Well before President Donald Trump lost the 2020 election, there was a notable episode in which he refused to condemn the Proud Boys, one of the violent extremist groups whose involvement in the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol will be highlighted in Tuesday’s hearing.
It came in September 2020 during the first presidential debate between Trump and Democratic nominee Joe Biden, when moderator Chris Wallace, then with Fox News, asked if Trump was willing to condemn white supremacists and militia groups for their role in violence that had broken out in several cities.
After initially saying “sure,” Trump said, “I’m prepared to do that, but I would say almost everything I see is from the left wing, not from the right wing.”
Pressed by Biden to directly rein in his supporters, Trump said, “What do you want to call them? Give me a name … who would you like me to condemn?”
When Biden said “Proud Boys,” Trump responded by telling the group to “stand back and stand by.”
Trump’s comments were immediately celebrated on social media by the Proud Boys, a male-only group with a reputation for bashing leftist protesters during street brawls, and other far-right groups.
For many members of the Proud Boys, the president’s remark was seen as validation, which they quickly turned into a fundraising and recruitment drive.
Key update
Former Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne, who pushed election fraud claims, to meet with panel
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By Rosalind Helderman and John Wagner9:38 a.m.
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Chairman and chief executive of Overstock Patrick Byrne speaks during a news conference in Orlando on Feb. 25.
Chairman and chief executive of Overstock Patrick Byrne speaks during a news conference in Orlando on Feb. 25. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
Former Overstock chief executive Patrick Byrne, an ally of former president Donald Trump who spent millions trying to promote claims that the 2020 presidential election was rigged, is expected to meet behind closed doors Friday morning with investigators from the House Jan. 6 committee, according to a person familiar with the plans.
The scope of the planned meeting, first reported by CNN, was not immediately clear. The person who confirmed the meeting spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss a meeting that has not been publicly announced.
Among other things, Byrne participated in a Dec. 18, 2020, meeting in the Oval Office in which Trump was briefed on strategies to overturn the election, including a proposal to use the military to seize ballots or voting machines in an effort to prove fraud and then conduct a do-over of the election.
Byrne also financed a film called “The Big Rig,” which harnessed right-wing media outlets, podcasts and the social media platform Telegram to promote the falsehood that the 2020 election was rigged. That represented just a portion of the his spending on efforts to promote unsubstantiated claims of election fraud.
Who is Stewart Rhodes?
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By Eugene Scott9:12 a.m.
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Stewart Rhodes, founder of the right-wing extremist Oath Keepers group, speaks during a rally outside the White House in 2017.
Stewart Rhodes, founder of the right-wing extremist Oath Keepers group, speaks during a rally outside the White House in 2017. (Susan Walsh/AP)
Oath Keepers founder Elmer Stewart Rhodes started the far-right, self-styled militia group in 2009 to defend the U.S. Constitution above all else — even if it means breaking other laws.
Rhodes and his organization as well as their interactions with Trump allies will be part of the House committee’s focus as it investigates the deadly Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the U.S. Capitol by a pro-Trump mob. The violent attackers were determined to stop the certification of Joe Biden’s electoral college win and the peaceful transfer of power.
Rhodes spent many of his formative years in the American Southwest. He was born in California and graduated from the University of Nevada at Las Vegas and Yale Law School before clerking for Arizona Supreme Court Justice Michael Ryan and joining the staff of Rep. Ron Paul (R-Tex.). Before leading one of today’s most notorious extremist groups, Rhodes was a U.S. Army paratrooper.
Rhodes holds the belief that a society is best served when individuals honor their “oaths” to the Constitution over a leader that they deem unconstitutional.
A full-blown totalitarian police state “cannot happen here if the majority of police and soldiers obey their oaths to defend the Constitution and refuse to enforce the unconstitutional edicts of the ‘Leader,’ ” Rhodes wrote in S.W.A.T. magazine in 2008.
Rhodes has been charged with seditious conspiracy. He has denied wrongdoing, including in an interview with The Washington Post in March 2021, saying there was no plan to breach the Capitol. A trial is scheduled for Sept. 26.
Sen. Graham ordered to testify in Georgia election probe
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By John Wagner8:47 a.m.
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Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) arrives for a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington on April 7, 2022.
Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) arrives for a news conference on Capitol Hill in Washington on April 7, 2022. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
A judge has ordered Sen. Lindsey O. Graham (R-S.C.) to testify before a special grand jury in Georgia investigating whether then-President Donald Trump sought illegally to interfere with the result of 2020 presidential election in that state.
Fulton County Superior Court Judge Robert McBurney ordered that Graham testify on Aug. 2, calling him a “necessary and material witness.” The order was first reported by WSB-TV in Atlanta.
Graham, an ally of Trump’s, has drawn scrutiny for making telephone calls to Georgia Secretary of State Brad Raffensperger (R) and members of his staff after the 2020 election to ask about procedures for counting absentee ballots.
Trump, in a separate call to Raffensperger, famously asked him to “find” enough additional votes for him to defeat Joe Biden. That interaction was highlighted in an earlier hearing by the Jan. 6 committee, for which Raffensperger was a witness.
In a statement issued last week, lawyers for Graham said he would fight a subpoena issued by the Fulton County grand jury examining possible interference with the electoral process, calling it “all politics.”
“Fulton County is engaged in a fishing expedition and working in concert with the January 6 Committee in Washington,” the lawyers, Bart Daniel and Matt Austin, wrote, adding that, “As Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, Senator Graham was well within his rights to discuss with state officials the processes and procedures around administering elections.”
Video: Highlights of Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony
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8:30 a.m.
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The bombshell sixth Jan. 6 hearing in 3 minutes
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Former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson testified on June 28 about President Donald Trump’s actions surrounding the Jan. 6 Capitol attack. (Video: JM Rieger/The Washington Post, Photo: Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
Tuesday’s hearing is the first by the Jan. 6 House select committee since June 28, when Cassidy Hutchinson, an aide to former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, provided blockbuster testimony. Highlights of that hearing are above.
Analysis: A deepening knowledge about planning behind march to Capitol
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By Josh Dawsey8:12 a.m.
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Evidence obtained by the committee suggests there was more planning for President Donald Trump to call the crowd to march to the Capitol than previously known. The committee unearthed a draft tweet the former president had seen calling for the crowd to go, and the committee showed texts from two Jan. 6 rally organizers — Kylie Kremer and Ali Alexander — in which they told others they knew Trump would “unexpectedly” call for people to march to the Capitol, in the words of Kremer. “POTUS is just going to call for it unexpectedly,” she wrote. The texts raise questions about how the two seemed to know Trump’s plans in advance and who drafted a tweet in his voice that would urge the crowd to head to the Capitol.
Trump repeats baseless claims of election fraud hours before hearing
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By John Wagner8:03 a.m.
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Former president Donald Trump at a rally at the Iowa State Fairgrounds in Des Moines on Oct. 9.
Former president Donald Trump at a rally at the Iowa State Fairgrounds in Des Moines on Oct. 9. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
Former president Donald Trump weighed in hours before the start of Tuesday’s hearing, complaining about its focus while repeating his baseless claims about widespread election fraud.
“Isn’t it INCREDIBLE that the people who Cheated, Rigged, and Stole the 2020 Presidential Election, for which there is massive and incontestable evidence and proof … are totally protected from harm (the FIX is in!), and the people that caught them cheating are being investigated,” Trump wrote on Truth Social, his social media platform. “Someday soon this will change, or we won’t have a Country anymore!”
Trump also cheered a Wisconsin Supreme Court decision last month that barred the use of most ballot drop boxes, which Trump said are “impossible to control & easy to cheat with.” Voting rights proponents said the decision would make it harder for voters — particularly those with disabilities — to return their absentee ballots.
In later posts, Trump claimed the Jan. 6 committee is composed of “Political Hacks and Thugs” and that it was “formed solely for the purpose of bringing down my ‘numbers,’ or worse.”
Trump also renewed his attacks on Cassidy Hutchinson, the former White House aide who provided damaging testimony in the committee hearing on June 28. In his post, Trump called her “a female scam artist.”
Part of Cipollone’s taped testimony from Friday to be aired
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By Amy Wang and Olivier Knox7:45 a.m.
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Jan. 6 committee talks Cipollone, possible Bannon testimony
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On July 10, members of the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, Capitol attack discussed the impact of testimony on future public hearings. (Video: The Washington Post)
Lawmakers on the Jan. 6 panel say the public can expect to see parts of former White House counsel Pat Cipollone’s closed-door interview from Friday during the hearing on Tuesday.
Cipollone testified before the committee for eight hours, providing information that “corroborated key elements of Cassidy Hutchinson’s testimony,” committee spokesman Tim Mulvey said in a statement Sunday.
Hutchinson, a former White House aide, previously testified that Cipollone sought to prevent President Donald Trump from traveling to the Capitol on Jan. 6 with his supporters, fearing criminal liability and telling her “something to the effect of: ‘Please make sure we don’t go up to the Capitol, Cassidy. Keep in touch with me. We’re going to get charged with every crime imaginable if we make that movement happen.’ ”
There was a lot of information from Cipollone’s testimony that “fit into this bigger puzzle” that the committee is assembling, Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-Fla.) said Sunday on NBC News’s “Meet the Press.” She is scheduled to lead Tuesday’s hearing with Rep. Jamie B. Raskin (D-Md.).
“The overall message that we have been gathering out of all of these witnesses is that the president knew he had lost the election, or that his advisers had told him he had lost the election, and that he was casting about for ways in which he could retain power and remain the president, despite the fact that the democratic will of the American people was to have President Biden be the next elected,” she said.
Key update
Trump tweet advertising ‘wild’ event in Washington to draw scrutiny
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By Jacqueline Alemany and Hannah Allam7:20 a.m.
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Photo of a screen displaying a tweet from President Donald Trump sent on Dec. 19, 2020. (Factba.se/The Washington Post)
Photo of a screen displaying a tweet from President Donald Trump sent on Dec. 19, 2020. (Factba.se/The Washington Post) (The Washington Post)
Tuesday’s hearing is likely to drill down on the period after states cast their electoral college votes on Dec. 14, 2020, action that confirmed Joe Biden’s victory. President Donald Trump, the committee is expected to argue, then shifted his focus to using the date of the congressional counting of the votes, Jan. 6, 2021, to block a peaceful transfer of power.
A committee aide said on a conference call with reporters Monday that the hearing will lay out the way that far-right militant groups such as the Proud Boys, Oath Keepers and others took cues from Trump and his allies. Particular attention will be paid to his Dec. 19, 2020, posting on Twitter: “Big protest in D.C. on January 6th,” Trump tweeted. “Be there, will be wild!”
The tweet served as “a pivotal moment that spurred a chain of events, including preplanning by the Proud Boys,” noted the committee aide, who was not authorized to speak on the record. The tweet was issued “a little more than an hour after meeting with Rudy Giuliani, [retired Lt. Gen. Michael] Flynn, Sidney Powell and others where they consider taking actions like seizing voting machines, appointing a special counsel to investigate the election.”
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Hearing to highlight ties between Trump associates and extremist groups
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By Jacqueline Alemany and Hannah Allam7:09 a.m.
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A video screen shows Roger Stone, a longtime associate of President Donald Trump, as Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, testifies during a public hearing of the House Jan. 6 committee on June 28.
A video screen shows Roger Stone, a longtime associate of President Donald Trump, as Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, testifies during a public hearing of the House Jan. 6 committee on June 28. (Michael Reynolds/EPA-EFE/Shutterstock)
The Jan. 6 committee on Tuesday plans to highlight the ties between violent extremist groups and associates of President Donald Trump — connections lawmakers on the committee have already hinted at during previous hearings.
“We will show how some of these right-wing extremist groups who came to D.C. and led the attack on the Capitol had ties to Trump associates, including Roger Stone and General Mike Flynn,” a committee aide told reporters on Monday.
During a hearing late last month featuring Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to Trump White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, committee Vice Chairwoman Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) asked Hutchinson about her former boss’s communications with Stone, a longtime Trump associate, and Flynn, Trump’s former national security adviser.
“I’m under the impression that Mr. Meadows did complete both a call to Mr. Stone and General Flynn the evening of the 5th,” Hutchinson responded.
Hutchinson also testified in a videotaped deposition that she generally recalled “hearing the word ‘Oath Keeper’ and hearing the word ‘Proud Boys’ closer to the planning of the January 6th rally” when Trump lawyer Rudy Giuliani was present.
Key update
Former Oath Keepers spokesman expected to appear as live witness
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By Jacqueline Alemany and Hannah Allam7:07 a.m.
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Stewart Rhodes, founder of Oath Keepers, in February 2021.
Stewart Rhodes, founder of Oath Keepers, in February 2021. (Aaron Davis/The Washington Post)
One of the live witnesses scheduled to appear on Tuesday is Jason Van Tatenhove, who served as national spokesman for the Oath Keepers and as a close aide to Oath Keepers founder Stewart Rhodes from around 2014 to 2018 — an era he said Rhodes considered “the golden years” for his group.
Van Tatenhove’s job involved trying to get Rhodes on Fox News or Infowars, an online trafficker of conspiracy claims. Van Tatenhove was part of the inner circle of Oath Keepers leadership in its formative years, but had left the group well before the 2020 election. In interviews with The Washington Post last year, Van Tatenhove described Oath Keepers as a cult of personality around Rhodes.
Von Tatenhove is among many former Oath Keepers who say Rhodes, who boasts a Yale law degree, promoted violent ideology and called on supporters to revolt but was adept at shielding himself from legal consequences. Van Tatenhove said Rhodes raked in membership dues to radicalize cadres of military veterans and former police officers. Rhodes amassed a large nationwide network, though he commanded few actual forces; the Jan. 6 showing was among the biggest in Oath Keeper history and ultimately was the group’s undoing.
Rhodes is now among the Capitol riot defendants facing seditious conspiracy charges and his group has splintered into rogue chapters and spinoffs. A book proposal from Van Tatenhove last year described him as working “side by side” with Rhodes for about three years. “Jason has been waiting for the right time to tell his own story in his own words about his misadventures with Oath Keepers,” the proposal stated. “Now is that time.”
Key update
Judge rejects Bannon’s bid to delay trial, executive-privilege claim
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By Spencer Hsu7:04 a.m.
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Former White House adviser Stephen K. Bannon on a screen during the House Jan. 6 committee's hearing on June 6.
Former White House adviser Stephen K. Bannon on a screen during the House Jan. 6 committee's hearing on June 6. (Jabin Botsford/The Washington Post)
A federal judge refused Monday to delay Stephen K. Bannon’s trial next week after the Justice Department called an offer by the former Trump aide to testify before the House committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection a “last-ditch attempt to avoid accountability” on charges of criminal contempt of Congress.
“I see no reason for extending this case any longer,” U.S. District Judge Carl J. Nichols said in rejecting a host of Bannon’s defenses after a hearing, including his contention that former president Donald Trump had claimed executive privilege over his testimony and documents. The judge narrowed Bannon’s defenses at trial mainly to whether he understood the deadlines for answering lawmakers’ demands.
“While I am certainly cognizant of Mr. Bannon’s concerns regarding publicity, in my view the correct mechanism at this time for addressing that concern is through the [jury selection] process,” Nichols said, adding that he found it “unlikely” the court would be unable to find unbiased jurors.
Bannon, 68, Trump’s former chief strategist, was indicted in November on two counts of contempt of Congress after refusing to comply with a committee subpoena issued earlier for his testimony and records about his actions leading up to the Capitol riot by a pro-Trump mob. The misdemeanor charges are punishable by at least 30 days or up to one year in prison upon conviction.
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The Jan. 6 insurrection
The House select committee investigating the Jan. 6, 2021, insurrection held a series of high-profile hearings in June. The committee’s next public hearing is scheduled for July 12.
Congressional hearings: The House committee investigating the attack on the U.S. Capitol has conducted a series of hearings to share its findings with the U.S. public. The sixth hearing featured explosive testimony from Cassidy Hutchinson, a former White House aide.
Will there be charges? The committee could make criminal referrals of former president Donald Trump over his role in the attack, Rep. Liz Cheney (R-Wyo.) said in an interview.
What we know about what Trump did on Jan. 6: New details emerged when Hutchinson testified before the committee and shared what she saw and heard on Jan. 6.
The riot: On Jan. 6, 2021, a pro-Trump mob stormed the U.S. Capitol in an attempt to stop the certification of the 2020 election results. Five people died on that day or in the immediate aftermath, and 140 police officers were assaulted.
Inside the siege: During the rampage, rioters came perilously close to penetrating the inner sanctums of the building while lawmakers were still there, including former vice president Mike Pence. The Washington Post examined text messages, photos and videos to create a video timeline of what happened on Jan. 6.
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