Eliana Willis

January 6 hearing to focus on Trump’s tweet to extremist groupFormer president’s notorious ‘Be there, will be wild!’ tweet was catalyst for violent protests, congress members will argue The House January 6 select committee is expected to make the case at its seventh hearing Tuesday that Donald Trump gave the signal to the extremist groups that stormed the Capitol to target and obstruct the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s electoral college win.The panel will zero in on a pivotal tweet sent by the former president in the early hours of the morning on 19 December 2020, according to sources close to the inquiry who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the forthcoming hearing.“Big protest in D.C. on January 6th,” Trump said in the tweet. “Be there, will be wild!”Trump lawyers feel heat as legal net tightens on plot to overturn electionRead moreThe select committee will say at the hearing – led by congressmen Jamie Raskin and Stephanie Murphy – that Trump’s tweet was the catalyst that triggered the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers groups, as well as Stop the Steal activists, to target the certification.And Trump sent the tweet knowing that for those groups, it amounted to a confirmation that they should put into motion their plans for January 6, the select committee will say, and encouraged thousands of other supporters to also march on the Capitol for a protest.The tweet was the pivotal moment in the timeline leading up to the Capitol attack, the select committee will say, since it was from that point that the Proud Boys and Oath Keepers seriously started preparations, and Stop the Steal started applying for permits.The select committee also currently plans to play video clips from former White House counsel Pat Cipollone’s recent testimony to House investigators at Tuesday’s hearing.Raskin is expected to first touch on the immediate events before the tweet: a contentious White House meeting on 18 December 2020 where Trump weighed seizing voting machines and appointing conspiracy theorist Sidney Powell as special counsel to investigate election fraud.The meeting involved Trump and four informal advisers, the Guardian has reported, including Trump’s ex-national security adviser, Michael Flynn, ex-Trump campaign lawyer Sidney Powell, ex-Overstock CEO Patrick Byrne and ex-Trump aide Emily Newman.Once in the Oval Office, they implored Trump to invoke executive order 13848, which granted him emergency powers in the event of foreign interference in the election – though that had not happened – to seize voting machines and install Powell as special counsel.The former president ultimately demurred on both of the proposals. But after the Flynn-Powell-Byrne-Newman plan for him to overturn the election fell apart, the select committee will say, he turned his attention to January 6 as his final chance and sent his tweet.The response to Trump’s tweet was direct and immediate, the panel will show, noting that Stop the Steal announced plans for a protest in Washington set to coincide with Biden’s certification just hours after the former president sent his missive. Bannon initiates talks with January 6 panel on testifying over Capitol attackRead moreThe Proud Boys – whose top members has since been indicted for seditious conspiracy over the Capitol attack – also started to crystalize what their plans were for January 6 the following day, according to federal prosecutors prosecuting the case.On 20 December 2020, prosecutors have said, the former Proud Boys national chairman Enrique Tarrio created an encrypted group chat called “MOSD Leaders Group” – described by Tarrio as a “national rally planning” committee that included his top lieutenants.The day after Tarrio started the MOSD Leaders Group – the Monday after Trump’s tweet that came on a Saturday – the leaders of Stop the Steal applied for a permit to stage a protest on “Lot 8” near the Capitol, and around that time, sent live the WildProtest.com website.Through the rest of December and spurred on by Trump’s tweet, the select committee will say citing the Proud Boys indictment, the Proud Boys leaders used the MOSD chats to plan a “DC trip” and tell their members to dress incognito for their operation on January 6.Top members of the Oath Keepers militia group led by Stewart Rhodes, who have also been indicted for seditious conspiracy, made similar plans as they prepared to obstruct the congressional certification of Biden’s election win, the panel intends to show.The select committee will then focus on how the Oath Keepers stockpiled weapons and created an armed quick reaction force ready to deploy to the Capitol, and how the group ended up as the security detail for far-right activist Roger Stone and other Trump allies.One of the witnesses providing public testimony at the hearing is expected to be Jason van Tatenhove, a former spokesperson for the Oath Keepers who left the group around 2017 but is slated to discuss their motivations and how they operated.The 1st Amendment Praetorian, Flynn’s paramilitary group, is also expected to get a brief mention at the hearing, as will the various “war rooms” at the Willard hotel, where both Stone and Flynn, as well as Trump’s attorney, Rudy Giuliani, were spotted ahead of January 6.The select committee, through Raskin’s portion of the hearing, will run through the effects of Trump’s tweet on preparations for January 6 right up until the morning of the Capitol attack and Trump’s speech at the Save America rally on the Ellipse.Congresswoman Murphy is then expected examine the Ellipse rally itself, and Trump’s incendiary rhetoric where he told his supporters that he would march with them to the Capitol, giving the pro-Trump crowd the ultimate incentive to storm Biden’s certification.TopicsUS Capitol attackDonald TrumpUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

Trump lawyers feel heat as legal net tightens on plot to overturn election Jeffrey Clark, Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman face escalating legal threats amid expanding DoJ investigation and explosive testimonyAn accelerating justice department investigation into a “fake electors” scheme to help Donald Trump overturn the 2020 election, plus explosive testimony from January 6 hearings, have created intense legal heat for the lawyers Jeffrey Clark, Rudy Giuliani and John Eastman, who were key players in the abortive effort, say ex-prosecutors.Trump White House counsel to cooperate with January 6 committeeRead moreWhile Giuliani and Eastman were key lawyers for Trump and his campaign, respectively, and Clark was a senior justice department official, the trio played big roles in a brazen multi-front drive not to certify some Biden electors but bogus ones for Trump. That could fuel charges against Trump, who they collaborated with, for obstruction of an official proceeding, or defrauding the US.Recent justice department actions, including seizing electronic devices of Eastman and Clark, coupled with more evidence at committee hearings, are increasingly likely to spur charges against the three lawyers related to the drive to replace electors Biden won in seven states with fake ones for Trump, say legal experts.The justice’s expanding criminal inquiry became palpable on 22 June when FBI agents raided Clark’s home, and separately seized Eastman’s cellphone, as grand jury subpoenas involving the scheme were served on top Republican figures and Trump allies in Georgia and Arizona.In another stark sign of the legal jeopardy Giuliani and Eastman face, recent House committee hearings into the attack on the Capitol offered evidence that both lawyers sought pardons from Trump, presumably tied to plotting strategies to block Biden’s certification by Congress on 6 January, and fiery speeches they gave along with Trump at a rally on the Ellipse before a mob of his allies attacked the Capitol.The legal threats facing Clark were underscored at a 23 June panel hearing by scathing testimony from former top justice officials about Trump’s plotting with Clark to elevate him to acting attorney general to push the fake electors scheme by falsely claiming in a proposed letter to Georgia officials that the department had “significant concern” about election fraud there and in other states.The former acting deputy attorney general Richard Donoghue was scalding as he detailed Trump’s efforts to replace the acting attorney general, Jeffrey Rosen, with Clark in late December 2020, and to pressure state legislators to reject Biden electors by promoting baseless charges of widespread fraud.Donoghue recounted how he warned Trump at a bizarre 3 January White House meeting – that was attended by Rosen, Trump counsel Pat Cipollone and other top lawyers – that elevating Clark to be acting AG would spark mass resignations, and Clark would be “left leading a graveyard”, at the department. Cipollone, who was recently subpoenaed by the House panel, also threatened to resign if Clark replaced Rosen.Further, according to shocking testimony on 28 June by Cassidy Hutchinson, a top aide to the ex-White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, Cipollone warned her early on 6 January of potential criminal liability for Trump and others if Trump went to the Capitol as he had discussed doing, and asked Hutchinson to “please make sure we don’t go up to the Capitol”.All of it adds up to potentially grave consequences for the three lawyers.Michael Zeldin, an ex-DoJ prosecutor, said: “The strong evidence presented about the fake electors scheme at recent House committee hearings, including testimony by senior justice department officials, laid the foundation for charging Trump’s legal advisers, Eastman and Giuliani, and possibly Clark, with multiple state and federal crimes including obstruction of an official proceeding, conspiracy to defraud the United States, false statements in connection with the fake electors scheme, and election fraud.”He added: “The cumulative evidence presented over the course of the hearings paint a picture of a president who was told explicitly by multiple people that he lost the election and that once he exhausted his judicial remedies (losing nearly 60 cases) his continuing pressure campaign to prevent the orderly transfer of power was illegal.“Yet Trump and his attorneys persisted.”Other ex-prosecutors stress that the FBI raids to obtain Clark and Eastman’s phones indicate the investigations of the two lawyers have escalated.“Search warrants of Clark and Eastman’s phones means that a judge found probable cause to believe that evidence of a crime would be found on each of those devices,” Barbara McQuade, a former US attorney for eastern Michigan, told the Guardian.Eastman’s exposure to criminal charges has been palpable and growing for months. In March, a federal judge, David Carter, in a crucial court ruling involving Trump’s legal adviser Eastman, stated that Trump “more likely than not” broke the law in his weeks-long drive to stop Biden from taking office.“Dr Eastman and President Trump launched a campaign to overturn a democratic election, an action unprecedented in American history,” Carter wrote in a civil case which resulted in an order for Eastman to release more than 100 emails he had withheld from the House panel.Other revelations damaging to Trump and Eastman emerged at a mid-June House panel hearing when Greg Jacob, the ex-counsel to former vice-president Mike Pence, provided detailed testimony about how Eastman and Trump launched a high-pressure effort to persuade Pence to unlawfully block Biden’s certification by Congress on 6 January.The Eastman pressure included the scheme to substitute pro-Trump fake electors from states that Biden won for electors rightfully pledged to Biden. Jacob testified that Eastman acknowledged to him that he knew his push to get Pence on 6 January to reject Biden’s winning electoral college count would violate the Electoral Count Act, and that Trump, too, was informed it would be illegal for Pence to block Biden’s certification.In mid-December 2020, at least 59 Republicans from states Trump lost falsely asserted and signed legal documents that they were “duly” chosen electors for Trump in the electoral college.Former prosecutors say potential charges against Trump and his top lawyers have increased in part due to the powerful details that ex DoJ leaders testified about on 23 June involving how “Trump pushed to weaponize the justice department to facilitate the [fake electors] scheme,” McQuade said.McQuade noted too that the deputy attorney general, Lisa Monaco, months ago confirmed “DoJ had received evidence from state AGs about alternate slates of electors and was investigating. It appears that DoJ is now issuing subpoenas regarding this episode … One could imagine each link leading to the next and possibly all the way to Donald Trump.”On top of Trump’s involvement in the fake electors ploy, ex-deputy attorney general Donald Ayer, who served in the George HW Bush administration, told the Guardian that overall “the evidence is increasingly showing Trump’s culpability. Trump had extensive involvement in long conversations where he was personally working intently to overturn the election.”Ayer’s point was bolstered by Hutchinson’s eye-popping testimony about Trump’s knowledge of, and indifference to, the large cache of dangerous weapons that were being carried by his supporters.Paul Pelletier, a former acting chief of DoJ’s fraud section, said that for prosecutors the powerful testimony of Hutchinson “might be the final nail in the legal jeopardy coffin of Trump’s coterie of lawyers and enablers”.“Hutchinson’s testimony has lifted the curtain on the false narrative that the violent Capitol confrontation was spontaneous,” he added.The Democratic senator Sheldon Whitehouse sees a need for coordination of criminal investigations between the DoJ and others into the multiple efforts by Trump and key allies to block Biden’s win in Georgia, including Trump’s call to Georgia’s secretary of state, Brad Raffensperger, which is under scrutiny by the Fulton county district attorney and a special grand jury.“Phoney electors, the Clark memo, and Trump’s phone calls all converge on Georgia,” Whitehouse told the Guardian. “I hope and expect that the investigations are coordinated. The raid on Clark shows how serious this is, and false electors could make great witnesses.”Looking ahead, former federal prosecutor Dennis Aftergut told the Guardian prosecutors appear to be amassing growing evidence to pursue charges against the three lawyers who were central actors in various parts of the fake electors scheme.“Giuliani and Eastman seeking pardons is powerful evidence of ‘consciousness of guilt’,” Aftergut said.In a potential legal twist, Aftergut pointed out that if charges are filed against one of the three, prosecutors will seek their help in going after the others. “The earliest cooperators generally get the best deals from prosecutors … any of them could potentially provide damaging evidence against the other two and Trump.”TopicsUS Capitol attackJanuary 6 hearingsDonald TrumpUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

Georgia grand jury subpoenas Trump lawyers over effort to overturn electionRudy Giuliani and Lindsey Graham among members of legal team to receive subpoenas over ex-president’s efforts to ‘find’ votes The special grand jury investigating Donald Trump’s efforts to overturn the results of the 2020 presidential election in Georgia has subpoenaed several of the former US president’s legal advisers and political allies.Court documents show the Fulton county special grand jury has issued subpoenas to members of the Trump campaign legal team, including Rudy Giuliani, and Senator Lindsey Graham, a Republican of South Carolina.‘There’s nowhere I feel safe’: Georgia election workers on how Trump upended their livesRead moreThe grand jury is also seeking information from the conservative lawyers John Eastman, Cleta Mitchell, Kenneth Chesebro and Jenna Ellis. Mitchell participated in the phone call between Trump and Brad Raffensperger, the Republican secretary of state in Georgia, that sparked the grand jury investigation.On 2 January 2021, Trump called Raffensperger and urged him to “find” enough votes to reverse Biden’s victory in Georgia. Raffensperger refused to do so, and the call, which quickly became public, ignited widespread outcry.The Fulton county district attorney, Fani Willis, launched the criminal investigation weeks after the call was leaked, and Raffensperger testified before the grand jury last month.The latest round of subpoenas in the investigation indicates the grand jury is seeking additional information about Trump allies’ efforts to meddle with the Georgia results.In the weeks after the 2020 election, Giuliani repeatedly testified before Georgia legislators about his baseless claims of widespread fraud tainting the state’s results. Graham also reached out to Raffensperger days after the 2020 election and pressed him on whether he could reject all mailed-in votes cast in counties with higher levels of mismatched signatures on ballots. (Graham has denied that allegation.)The grand jury will continue to gather information about Trump and his allies’ attempts to interfere with Georgia’s election results, and the group will then submit a report about whether the former president or any of his associates should face criminal charges over their efforts. Willis will make the final decision about filing charges in the case.The newest development comes as the House select committee investigating the January 6 insurrection has looked more closely at Trump’s lies about the 2020 election. Raffensperger testified publicly before the committee last month, and he recounted how his office investigated a number of Trump’s election conspiracy theories and found no evidence to substantiate any of them.“The numbers are the numbers,” Raffensperger told the committee. “The numbers don’t lie.”TopicsGeorgiaUS elections 2020Donald TrumpRudy GiulianinewsReuse this content More

January 6 panel getting more new evidence by the day, says KinzingerCassidy Hutchinson’s testimony inspired more witnesses to come forward, says Republican congressman Republican congressman Adam Kinzinger has said that bombshell testimony given by Cassidy Hutchinson to the January 6 hearings last week has inspired more witnesses to come forward and the committee is getting more new evidence by the day.The panel is investigating the events surrounding the 2021 attack on the US Capitol by a mob of Donald Trump supporters. Kinzinger is one of two Republicans serving on the panel which has publicized explosive testimony about the insurrection and an apparent plot to subvert the 2020 election, which Joe Biden won.Liz Cheney won’t rule out criminal referral against Donald TrumpRead moreLast week Hutchinson, a former top aide to Trump’s chief of staff, Mark Meadows, gave sworn testimony that painted the former president as a violent and unstable figure desperately seeking to cling to power.“There will be way more information and stay tuned,” Kinzinger told CNN’s State of the Union co-anchor Dana Bash. “Every day, we get new people that come forward and say, ‘Hey, I didn’t think maybe this piece of a story that I knew was important, but now I do see how this plays in here.’”Kinzinger also pushed back on doubts raised about Hutchinson’s testimony, including from Secret Service sources that have disputed her account that Trump tried to grab the steering wheel of the presidential SUV when the Secret Service refused to let him go to the Capitol after the rally.Robert Engel and Tony Ornato, the Secret Service agents who were in the car, are reportedly prepared to testify that they were not assaulted by Trump and he did not try to grab the steering wheel.“We certainly would say that Cassidy Hutchinson has testified under oath,” Kinzinger said. “We find her credible, and anybody that wants to cast disparagements on that, who were firsthand present, should also testify under oath and not through anonymous sources.”At least two more hearings are scheduled this month that aim to show that Trump illegally directed a violent mob toward the Capitol, and failed to direct supporters to stop once the siege began.In a separate interview, another committee member, Congressman Adam Schiff, said: “There’s certainly more information that is coming forward … we are following additional leads. I think those leads will lead to new testimony.”Schiff added that part of the reason the committee had wanted to put Hutchinson to testify would be to encourage others to do so as well. “We were hoping it would generate others stepping forward, seeing her courage would inspire them to show the same kind of courage,” he said.As Trump reportedly mulls declaring himself a candidate for 2024 as soon as this month – a tactic, many believe, for heading off potential criminal charges – Schiff also responded to comments by Liz Cheney, committee vice-chair, that criminal referrals could result from the hearings.“For four years, the justice department took the position that you can’t indict a sitting president. If the department were now to take the position that you can’t investigate or indict a former president then a president becomes above the law,” Schiff said. “That’s a very dangerous idea that the founders would have never subscribed to.”TopicsJanuary 6 hearingsUS Capitol attackDonald TrumpUS politicsHouse of RepresentativesnewsReuse this content More

Liz Cheney won’t rule out criminal referral against Donald TrumpJanuary 6 committee vice-chairwoman says ‘a man as dangerous as [him] can never be anywhere near the Oval Office ever again’ The vice-chairwoman of the congressional committee investigating the January 6 attack on the US Capitol is not ruling out a criminal referral against Donald Trump, saying “a man as dangerous as [him] can never be anywhere near the Oval Office ever again”.Liz Cheney’s remarks Sunday came after the committee’s chairman, Bennie Thompson, once said he did not expect the panel to indicate whether or not it would make a recommendation for federal prosecutors to charge the former president with an alleged role in the Capitol attack.But, on a pre-recorded interview on ABC’s This Week, Cheney said she, Thompson and others on the committee could change their minds about their initial position after there was sworn testimony that Trump knowingly sent armed supporters to the Capitol on the day of the deadly attack in hopes of preventing the congressional certification of his defeat to Joe Biden in the 2020 election.As Trump’s star wanes, another rises: could Ron DeSantis be the new Maga bearer?Read more“What kind of man knows a mob is armed and sends the mob to attack the Capitol?” Cheney said on the program, adding that some in the crowd intended to hang Mike Pence that day. “His own vice-president [was] under threat … Congress [was] under threat. It’s just very chilling.”The Republican representative from Wyoming correctly pointed out that the US justice department does not need a recommendation from the Capitol attack committee to charge Trump. But the panel of seven Democrats and two Republicans has made such referrals in the cases of former Trump aides Steve Bannon, Peter Navarro, Mark Meadows and Dan Scavino, who refused to cooperate with the committee.The justice department – which is the only entity that can prosecute Trump – filed charges against Bannon and Navarro, who have pleaded not guilty. But it did not charge Scavino or Meadows.Cheney, the daughter of former vice-president Dick Cheney, also spent much of her appearance Sunday defending the testimony of former Trump White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson at a recent committee hearing.Explosive testimony piles pressure on Trump – how likely are criminal charges?Read moreMany believe one part of Hutchinson’s testimony drew Trump closer than ever to demonstrable criminal conduct. She said Trumpknew some in the crowd for his speech near the White House on the day of the Capitol attack had handguns and rifles. Yet the then president still urged his audience to “fight like hell” and march on the Capitol, Hutchinson testified.A bipartisan Senate committee later linked seven deaths to the ensuing violence at the Capitol. The key legal questions about Trump’s potential criminal exposure appear to be whether he intended to cause that violence and knew it was likely to occur, according to experts.Hutchinson also testified under oath that Trump was furious that the Secret Service denied him permission to go to the Capitol that day, at one point even lunging for the steering wheel of the vehicle in which he was being driven that day. That aspect of her testimony was quickly met with reports in some quarters that senior Secret Service agents were prepared to testify that Trump never did that.Mark Meadows’ associate threatened ex-White House aide before her testimonyRead moreBut on Sunday, Cheney said the committee was prepared to stage more sworn testimony about Trump’s “intense anger” at not being allowed to go to the Capitol at the height of the attack, the culmination of his false claims that electoral fraudsters had stolen the election from him.“The committee is not going to stand by and watch [Hutchinson’s] character be assassinated,” Cheney said, in what was her first sit-down media interview during the panel’s six hearings so far.The other Republican on the committee, Illinois congressman Adam Kinzinger, said in a separate interview on CNN’s State of the Union that he invited anyone who could contradict Hutchinson to “come and also testify under oath” like she did.“We find her credible,” Kinzinger said.Cheney said the hearings to this point had convinced her “Donald Trump can never be anywhere near the Oval Office again”. And she said she believed the Republican party would lose its legitimacy if it nominated Trump to run for president against Biden in 2024.“He can’t be the party nominee,” Cheney said. “I don’t think the party would survive that.”Cheney’s service on the January 6 committee has been costly for her politically. She is trailing in polls as she tries to fend off a challenge in a 16 August primary against one-time Trump critic turned loyalist Harriet Hageman.TopicsJanuary 6 hearingsDonald TrumpUS Capitol attackUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

‘Truth matters’: Liz Cheney lambasts Trump-backed rival in Wyoming debateRepublican vice-chair of January 6 committee, trailing in primary, challenges Harriet Hageman to say 2020 election was not stolen More

New Zealand declares US far-right Proud Boys and the Base terrorist groupsProud Boys’ involvement in US Capitol attack cited in ruling outlawing organisation New Zealand’s government has declared that the American far-right groups the Proud Boys and the Base are terrorist organisations. The two groups join 18 others, including the Islamic State group, that have been given an official terrorist designation, making it illegal in New Zealand to fund, recruit or participate in the groups, and obligating authorities to take action against them. The US groups are not known to be active in New Zealand, but the South Pacific nation has become more attuned to threats from the far right after a white supremacist shot and killed 51 Muslim worshippers at two Christchurch mosques in 2019.Proud Boys leaders charged with seditious conspiracy in 6 January riotRead moreThe New Zealand massacre inspired other white supremacists around the world, including a white gunman who killed 10 Black people at a supermarket in Buffalo, New York, in May.In the US, the state department only lists foreign groups as terrorist entities. But the Proud Boys were last year named a terrorist group in Canada, while the Base has previously been declared a terrorist group in Britain, Canada and Australia. In a 29-page explanation of the Proud Boys designation published Thursday, New Zealand authorities said the group’s involvement in the violent attack on the US Capitol building on 6 January 6 2021 amounted to an act of terrorism. The statement said that while several militia groups were involved, it was the Proud Boys who incited crowds, coordinated attacks on law enforcement officers and led other rioters to where they could break into the building. The statement said there were unlinked but ideologically affiliated chapters of the Proud Boys operating in Canada and Australia. New Zealand authorities argued that before the Capitol attack, the Proud Boys had a history of using street rallies and social media to intimidate opponents and recruit young men through demonstrations of violence. It said the group had put up various smoke screens to hide its extremism. Earlier this month, the former leader of the Proud Boys, Henry “Enrique” Tarrio, and four others linked to the group were charged in the US with seditious conspiracy for what federal prosecutors say was a coordinated attack on the Capitol.The decline of Proud Boys: what does the future hold for far-right group?Read moreThe indictment alleges that the Proud Boys conspired to forcibly oppose the lawful transfer of presidential power. The five are scheduled to stand trial in August in Washington DC’s federal court. Asked by media on Thursday in New Zealand if the Proud Boys weren’t better known for protest actions rather than extreme violence, the South Pacific nation’s police minister, Chris Hipkins, said: “Well, violent protests attempting to overthrow the government, clearly there is evidence of that.” In making its case against the Base, New Zealand authorities said a key goal of the group was to “train a cadre of extremists capable of accelerationist violence”. The statement said founder Rinaldo Nazzaro “has repetitively counselled members online about violence, the acquisition of weapons, and actions to accelerate the collapse of the US government and survive the consequent period of chaos and violence”.TopicsNew ZealandThe far rightUS Capitol attacknewsReuse this content More

Mark Meadows’ associate threatened ex-White House aide before her testimonyIt was the second warning Cassidy Hutchinson had received before her deposition, cautioning her against cooperating with the panel Former Trump White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson received at least one message tacitly warning her not to cooperate with the House January 6 select committee from an associate of former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, according to two sources familiar with the matter.Ex-White House aide delivers explosive public testimony to January 6 panelRead moreThe message in question was the second of the two warnings that the select committee disclosed at the end of its special hearing when Hutchinson testified about how Donald Trump directed a crowd he knew was armed to march on the Capitol, the sources said.“[A person] let me know you have your deposition tomorrow. He wants me to let you know that he’s thinking about you. He knows you’re loyal, and you’re going to do the right thing when you go in for your deposition,” read the message. The redaction was Meadows, the sources said.The message was presented during closing remarks at the special hearing with Hutchinson by the panel’s vice-chair Liz Cheney, who characterized the missive as improper pressure on a crucial witness that could extend to illegal witness tampering or intimidation.The exact identity of the person who sent Hutchinson the message – beyond the fact that they were an associate of Meadows – could not be confirmed on Thursday, but that may be in part because the select committee may wish to interview that person, the sources said.That appears to indicate that the person who sent the message was a close associate of the former White House chief of staff who may themselves be a fact witness to what Trump and Meadows were doing and thinking ahead of the Capitol attack.Neither a spokesman for Meadows nor Hutchinson responded to a request for comment Thursday evening.The other message was also directed at Hutchinson, the sources said; the quote displayed on the slide was one of several calls from Trump allies that Hutchinson recounted to House investigators.“What they said to me is, as long as I continue to be a teamplayer, they know that I’m on the team, I’m doing the right thing, I’m protecting who I need to protect, you know, I’ll continue to stay in the good graces in Trump World,” the slide read.“And they reminded me a couple of times that Trump does read transcripts and just to keep that in mind as I proceeded through my depositions and interviews with the committee.”The identity of the people who called Hutchinson, warning her presumably not to implicate the former president, could not be established beyond the fact that they were people close to Trump, though the select committee is understood to be aware of all of the people.Politico, which first reported that the message to Hutchinson came from an associate of Meadows, also reported that it came before her second interview with the select committee. Hutchinson changed lawyers before her fourth deposition that preceded her public testimony.TopicsJanuary 6 hearingsUS Capitol attackUS politicsDonald TrumpMark MeadowsnewsReuse this content More