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      Ex-White House aide delivers explosive public testimony to January 6 panel

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      Ex-White House aide delivers explosive public testimony to January 6 panelCassidy Hutchinson tells committee Trump knowingly directed armed supporters to march to the Capitol02:44In explosive public testimony, a former White House aide told the January 6 committee Donald Trump knowingly directed armed supporters to march to the US Capitol in a last-gasp effort to overturn the 2020 presidential election.Appearing at a hastily scheduled hearing, Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to Trump’s final chief of staff, Mark Meadows, painted a devastating portrait of a raging president spiraling out of control and a White House often too ambivalent to stop him.Angry, violent, reckless: testimony paints shocking portrait of Trump Read moreHutchinson also offered stunning new details that Trump and key aides were aware that a rally on 6 January 2021 could turn violent days before Trump urged supporters to “fight like hell” to keep him in power.“Things might get real, real bad on 6 January,” Hutchinson recalled Meadows telling her on 2 January.“That evening was the first moment that I remember feeling scared and nervous about what could happen on January 6,” she said.The hearing concluded with another extraordinary disclosure: the committee vice-chair, Liz Cheney, suggested Trump allies have sought to “influence or impact” witnesses.“I think most Americans know that attempting to influence witnesses to testify untruthfully presents very serious concerns,” Cheney said, adding that the committee was “carefully considering our next steps”.Over nearly two hours, Hutchinson offered a shocking view into the West Wing before, during and after the Capitol attack. In gripping detail, she described Trump throwing his lunch against the wall, lunging for a secret service agent’s throat and insisting armed supporters be allowed entrance to the rally that preceded the riot.“I felt like I was watching a bad car accident about to happen, where you cannot stop it,” said Hutchinson, a conservative Republican who worked just steps from the Oval Office.On the morning of 6 January, Hutchinson was present for a briefing with Meadows in which they were informed by Tony Ornato, the deputy chief of staff, that members of the crowd in Washington were carrying knives, guns, rifles, bear spray, body armor and spears. Asked if Trump had been briefed, Meadows affirmed that he had.When they arrived at the Ellipse, Hutchinson said, Trump was furious that the crowd was not at capacity and demanded Secret Service loosen security precautions to let in supporters who did not want to go through metal detectors. She recalled overhearing him say, “They’re not here to hurt me.”Back at the White House, she recalled a disturbing conversation with Ornato, who rode in the presidential limousine with Trump after his remarks. Ornato told her Trump became “irate” when told he would return to the White House instead of going to the Capitol. Hutchinson testified that Trump told a Secret Service agent: “I’m the effing president, take me up to the Capitol now.”When the agent said he could not, Trump lunged for the steering wheel and when that failed, grabbed at the agent’s throat, she said. She said the agent, Robert Engel, was present when Ornato described the altercation to Hutchinson and did not dispute his account.Trump was so enraged that he threw his lunch at the wall. It wasn’t the first time Hutchinson had witnessed such an outburst. Weeks before, Trump threw his lunch against the wall after his attorney general, William Barr, said the president’s claims of a stolen election were without merit.“There was ketchup dripping down the wall, and there was a shattered porcelain plate on the floor,” Hutchinson recalled.As Trump’s supporters inched closer to the Capitol on 6 January, Hutchinson said she sought to sound the alarm at the White House. But instead of seeking to calm the situation, Trump sent a tweet saying Mike Pence lacked the “courage” to stop the electoral count.“As an American, I was disgusted,” Hutchinson said. “It was unpatriotic. It was un-American. We were watching the Capitol building get defaced over a lie.”Capitol police officers engaged in hand-to-hand combat, trying to stop the mob as lawmakers and the vice-president were rushed to safety. An early hearing revealed that the rioters chanting “hang Mike Pence” had come with 40ft of him. Trump refused to condemn the violence or issue a statement urging supporters to go home. He even expressed approval of the chants about Pence, Hutchinson said.Pat Cipollone, the former White House counsel, implored Meadows to “do more” to stop the violence, saying: “They’re literally calling for the vice-president to be effing hung.”“You heard him, Pat,” Meadows replied. “He thinks Mike deserves it. He doesn’t think they are doing anything wrong.”Having said it would next hold hearings in July, the committee scheduled Hutchinson’s appearance abruptly. Opening the hearing, the committee chair, Bennie Thompson, said it was “important that the American people hear that information immediately”.Trump sought to discredit Hutchinson on his social media platform, calling her a “phony” and a “bullshit artist”. But former Trump aides who broke with him over January 6 praised her courage.Few Trump loyalists were left unscathed by Tuesday’s hearing, including Michael Flynn, the former national security adviser.The committee played a montage of Flynn invoking his Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination. In one revealing exchange, the retired general declined to answer when asked if he believed in the peaceful transfer of power.The committee had previously relied on Hutchinson’s testimony to reveal that several far-right members of Congress who attempted to stop certification of Biden’s victory sought pardons after the attack.On Tuesday, Hutchinson recalled walking Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, to his car on the evening of 2 January. He told her Trump was planning to be with his allies on Capitol Hill during the certification. When she reported this to Meadows, she said he replied something to the effect of: “Things might get real, real bad on January 6.”She also told the committee she recalled mentions of the far-right groups the Oath Keepers and the Proud Boys when Giuliani was around at the White House in the days leading up to January 6.Hutchinson said Meadows and Giuliani sought presidential pardons. She also told the committee members of Trump’s cabinet discussed invoking the 25th amendment, which allows for the forced removal of a president.Tuesday’s hearing came as a surprise but the committee has said its public sessions are prompting more witnesses to come forward, helping uncover new evidence about what Thompson said was the “culmination of an attempted coup”.‘He thinks Mike deserves it’: Trump said rioters were right to call for vice-president’s deathRead moreIn its episodic presentation, the committee has made use of recorded depositions, blending tapes with moving public testimony and dramatic speech-making from lawmakers and staff.At least two more hearings are expected next month, to explore how far-right and paramilitary groups organized and prepared for the January 6 attack and Trump’s abdication of leadership during the hours-long siege of the Capitol.The panel’s leaders praised Hutchinson for not taking the “easy course” and remaining silent. Cheney urged others who have so far declined to speak to the panel, Cipollone among them, to follow Hutchinson’s example.“Our nation is preserved by those who abide by their oaths to our constitution,” she said in closing. “Our nation is preserved by those who know the fundamental difference between right and wrong.”TopicsJanuary 6 hearingsUS Capitol attackDonald TrumpUS politicsRepublicansnewsReuse this content More

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      ‘He thinks Mike deserves it’: Trump said rioters were right to call for vice-president’s death

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      ‘He thinks Mike deserves it’: Trump said rioters were right to call for vice-president’s deathTrump aides wanted to be ‘doing something more’ to stop the riot, Cassidy Hutchinson told January 6 committee A crucial witness before the House January 6 committee testified that senior aides had described how Donald Trump thought his vice-president, Mike Pence, deserved to be hanged for not blocking certification of election results, as demanded by the mob that attacked the US Capitol.Trump knew crowd at rally was armed yet demanded they be allowed closerRead moreDescribing events at the White House on the afternoon of 6 January 2021, Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to Trump and his chief of staff, Mark Meadows, said: “I remember Pat [Cipollone, the White House counsel] saying something to the effect of, ‘Mark, we need to do something more. They’re literally calling for the vice-president to be fucking hung.’“And Mark had responded something to the effect of, ‘You heard him, Pat, he thinks Mike deserves it. He doesn’t think they’re doing anything wrong.’“To which Pat said something like, “This is fucking crazy. We need to be doing something more.”Liz Cheney, the committee vice-chair, repeated: “When rioters chanted ‘hang Mike Pence’, the president of the United States, Donald Trump, said that, quote, ‘Mike deserves it’ and that those rioters were not doing anything wrong.”Hutchinson’s description of Trump’s words was included in a previous hearing, via recorded testimony. The committee had also previously shown that at one point the mob was just 40ft away from Pence.Hutchinson appeared in person on Tuesday, in a sixth public session announced at short notice and full of explosive revelations.Cheney, from Wyoming and one of two anti-Trump Republicans on the January 6 committee, played a recording in which Trump, speaking to Jon Karl of ABC News, refused to condemn the rioters who chanted for Pence to be hanged.“Because it’s common sense,” Trump said. “It’s common sense that you’re supposed to protect … if you know a vote is fraudulent, how can you pass on a fraudulent vote to Congress?”Electoral college results confirming Trump’s defeat by Joe Biden were not fraudulent. Trump’s claim that they were and his instruction to “fight like hell” in service of his lie fueled the mob that attacked the Capitol.Cheney said: “President Trump’s view that the rioters were not doing anything wrong and that, quote, ‘Mike deserved it’, helps us to understand why the president did not ask the rioters to leave the Capitol for multiple hours.”The mob did not succeed in stopping certification of election results. A bipartisan Senate committee linked seven deaths to the riot. More than 840 people, some members of far-right groups, have been charged with seditious conspiracy.TopicsDonald TrumpJanuary 6 hearingsUS Capitol attackMike PencenewsReuse this content More

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      Trump knew crowd at rally was armed yet demanded they be allowed to march

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      Trump knew crowd at rally was armed yet demanded they be allowed to marchCassidy Hutchinson, aide of ex-chief of staff Mark Meadows, testified former president didn’t care people had guns on them Donald Trump knew members of the crowd at his rally near the White House on 6 January 2021 were armed, but demanded security apparatus be removed to allow them closer, then instructed the crowd to march on the US Capitol, a key witness told the January 6 committee.Cassidy Hutchinson: who is the ex-aide testifying in the January 6 hearings?Read moreAccording to the witness, Cassidy Hutchinson, the president later attempted to assault an aide who refused his demand that he go to the Capitol too.Hutchinson, a former aide to Trump and his chief of staff, Mark Meadows, testified in person on Tuesday.She described how, backstage at the Ellipse shortly before his speech, Trump demanded supporters be allowed in, to fill the area to capacity as his remarks were shown on TV.The president was warned by a Secret Service official that protesters outside security magnetometers were carrying weapons.Trump said: “I don’t fucking care that they have weapons, they’re not here to hurt me. They’re not here to hurt me. Take the fucking mags away. Let my people in. They can march to the Capitol from here, let the people in and take the mags away.”Liz Cheney, vice-chair of the January 6 committee, led questioning of Hutchinson.The Wyoming Republican presented law enforcement recordings from 6 January 2021 in which officers described protesters carrying AR-15-style rifles and handguns.Cheney also presented evidence about protesters wearing body armour and carrying bear spray and flagpoles to use as spears.Cheney said: “Let’s reflect on that for a moment. President Trump was aware that a number of the individuals in the crowd had weapons and were wearing body armour. And here’s what President Trump instructed the crowd to do.”The committee played video of Trump’s speech at the Ellipse.Trump said: “We’re going to walk down and I’ll be there with you … we’re gonna walk down to the Capitol.”The riot that ensued bore out a prediction Hutchinson said Meadows made to her on the evening of 2 January: “Things might get real, real bad on January 6.”A bipartisan Senate committee linked seven deaths to the riot, which failed to stop certification of Joe Biden’s election victory. The January 6 committee has shown that the vice-president, Mike Pence, came within 40ft of the mob, members of which chanted that he should be hanged.In video testimony played in earlier hearings, Hutchinson described how Trump responded to such chants: saying maybe Pence deserved it, for refusing to reject electoral college results.Later in the hearing, Hutchinson relayed an astounding story of the president attempting a violent act himself.Hutchinson said Tony Ornato, a Secret Service official and deputy chief of staff, told her of a physical altercation in the presidential vehicle, the armoured limousine known as the Beast, when Trump was told he could not go to the Capitol too.Trump, Hutchinson said, tried to grab the steering wheel, then lunged at the chief of his security detail.TopicsJanuary 6 hearingsDonald TrumpUS Capitol attackUS politicsnewsReuse this content More

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      January 6 hearing: former aide to Mark Meadows to testify – live

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      It’s worth noting that Cassidy Hutchinson recently changed her legal representation in connection to the January 6 investigation.Hutchinson’s decision to replace her former lawyer, Stefan Passantino, with Jody Hunt of the law firm Alston Bird was interpreted as a signal of her increased willingness to cooperate with the January 6 committee’s requests for information.Politico reported earlier this month:.css-knbk2a{height:1em;width:1.5em;margin-right:3px;vertical-align:baseline;fill:#C70000;} Hutchinson’s former attorney, Stefan Passantino, has deep Trump World connections. Her new lawyer, Jody Hunt, is a longtime close ally of Jeff Sessions and served as his chief of staff when the former attorney general enraged Trump by recusing from the Russia probe. …
      Passantino, Hutchinson’s former attorney, was the Trump White House’s chief ethics lawyer. And Passantino’s firm, Michael Best, has Trump World connections; its president is former White House chief of staff Reince Priebus, and Justin Clark — also a top Trump World lawyer — is currently on leave from the firm, according to its website.Today’s testimony from Cassidy Hutchinson could also reveal more details about Donald Trump’s response to insurrectionists’ chants of “Hang Mike Pence!” on January 6.At the January 6 committee’s first public hearing earlier this month, Liz Cheney, the Republican vice-chair of the panel, said witness testimony indicated Trump was informed of the chants and reacted approvingly to them.“You will hear that President Trump was yelling and ‘really angry’ at advisers who told him he needed to be doing something more,” Cheney said at the first hearing. “And aware of the rioters’ chants to hang Mike Pence, the president responded with this sentiment, ‘Maybe our supporters have the right idea.’ Mike Pence ‘deserves it.’”According to CNN, Hutchinson was the witness who provided the committee with that information, so today’s hearing could give her an opportunity to offer valuable new insight into how Trump reacted as January 6 turned violent. The House committee investigating the January 6 insurrection is expected to hear live public testimony on Tuesday from Cassidy Hutchinson, a former top aide to Mark Meadows, the last chief of staff to Donald Trump, according to a source familiar with the matter.The committee on Monday abruptly scheduled a hearing for Tuesday, suggesting a sense of urgency to disclose what it said was “recently obtained evidence”. The committee had previously said it would not hold any more hearings until next month.It is the sixth public hearing held by the committee after a year-long investigation into the Capitol attack. Two more hearings are expected next month.The hearings next month are expected to delve into the role of far-right and paramilitary groups organized and prepared for the January 6 attack and Trump’s abdication of leadership during the hours-long siege of the Capitol.January 6 committee schedules surprise session to hear new evidenceRead moreJoe Biden will meet tomorrow with Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, the president of Turkey, as the two leaders attend the Nato summit in Madrid, Spain.The White House announced the planned meeting during the daily press briefing, which was held today aboard Air Force One as Biden flew from Germany, where he attended the G7 summit, to Spain.Biden has just arrived in Madrid, where he will soon meet with the Spanish prime minister, Pedro Sánchez, and King Felipe VI.The exact format and timing of the Erdoğan meeting is still unclear, but Jake Sullivan, Biden’s national security adviser, told reporters that the focus of the discussion would be on US-Turkish relations and the bids from Finland and Sweden to join Nato.Turkey has raised objections to Finland and Sweden’s bids, which were submitted in response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine. Erdoğan has specifically accused Sweden of being a “hatchery” for terrorist organizations, per Reuters.The meeting tomorrow could give Biden an opportunity to press Erdoğan on those reservations and attempt to convince him to support Nato membership for Finland and Sweden.It remains unclear what new information Cassidy Hutchinson, former senior aide to Trump White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, might provide in her testimony today before the January 6 committee.But according to Brendan Buck, a longtime adviser to former Republican House speaker Paul Ryan, Hutchinson joined every meeting that Meadows participated in as a congressman. (Meadows served in the House from 2013 to 2020.)“I don’t know Cassidy Hutchinson, and I can’t speak to how things worked at the White House, but when Meadows was on the Hill he always insisted that she be in *every* meeting he had, no matter how small,” Buck said on Twitter. “It was odd then, and [doesn’t] seem to be working out for him now.”I don’t know Cassidy Hutchinson, and I can’t speak to how things worked at the White House, but when Meadows was on the Hill he always insisted that she be in *every* meeting he had, no matter how small. It was odd then, and doesnt seem to be working out for him now.— Brendan Buck (@BrendanBuck) June 28, 2022
      The House select committee investigating the January 6 Capitol attack is closely focused on phone calls and conversations among Donald Trump’s children and top aides captured by a documentary film-maker weeks before the 2020 election, say sources familiar with the matter.The calls among Trump’s children and top aides took place at an invitation-only event at the Trump International hotel in Washington that took place the night of the first presidential debate on 29 September 2020, the sources said.The select committee is interested in the calls, the sources said, since the footage is understood to show the former president’s children, including Donald Jr and Eric Trump, privately discussing strategies about the election at a crucial time in the presidential campaign.House investigators first learned about the event, hosted by the Trump campaign, and the existence of the footage through British film-maker Alex Holder, who testified about what he and his crew recorded during a two-hour interview last week, the sources said.Read the Guardian’s full report:January 6 committee focuses on phone calls among Trump’s children and aidesRead moreGreetings from Washington, live blog readers.The House select committee investigating the January 6 insurrection will hold its sixth public hearing of the month at 1pm ET, after the panel surprisingly announced the event yesterday.According to multiple reports, the star witness for today’s surprise hearing will be Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to Mark Meadows, who served as Donald Trump’s White House chief of staff. (Punchbowl News first reported Hutchinson’s expected appearance.)Hutchinson has already spoken to investigators behind closed doors, and she provided the committee with some of its most damning evidence about the Trump White House’s ties to the attack on the Capitol.In a clip of her private testimony played at a hearing last week, Hutchinson named several Republican members of Congress who sought president pardons in connection to their involvement in the insurrection.Today could give Hutchinson her first opportunity to speak directly to the American people about what she witnessed in the White House on January 6 and in the aftermath of that violent day.The hearing will kick off in a few hours, and the blog will have updates and analysis once it starts. Stay tuned.And here’s what else is happening today:
      Joe Biden is traveling from Germany to Spain. Biden is participating in the final day of the G7 summit in Schloss Elmau, Germany, before traveling on to Madrid, Spain, for the start of the Nato summit.
      Karine Jean-Pierre will gaggle with reporters aboard Air Force One en route to Madrid. The White House press secretary will be joined by Jake Sullivan, Biden’s national security adviser.
      Today marks the 10th anniversary of the supreme court’s decision to uphold key portions of the Affordable Care Act. The anniversary comes as the country awaits the court’s final four decisions of the term, which has already seen conservative justices overturn Roe v Wade and deliver a major victory to gun rights groups.
      The blog will have more coming up, so stick around. More

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      Cassidy Hutchinson: who is the ex-aide testifying in the January 6 hearings?

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      Cassidy Hutchinson: who is the ex-aide testifying in the January 6 hearings?The former executive assistant to Mark Meadows will be the first ex-Trump White House employee to testify in person The House January 6 hearings into the attack on the Capitol may not yet have found their John Dean – the White House counsel who turned on President Richard Nixon during Watergate – but in Cassidy Hutchinson they have turned up a surprisingly potent witness.January 6 hearing: former aide to Mark Meadows to reportedly testify – liveRead moreHutchinson was an executive assistant to Mark Meadows, Donald Trump’s last chief of staff, and a special assistant to the president for legislative affairs.In taped testimony, she has described Trump’s approval of chants from Capitol rioters about hanging the then vice-president, Mike Pence, and attempts by Republicans in Congress to have Trump issue pardons before leaving office.On Tuesday, she is expected to testify in person – the first former Trump White House employee to do so.According to Hutchinson’s LinkedIn page, she studied political science and American studies at Christopher Newport University, a public school in Virginia. Hutchinson’s page also follows St Andrew’s Episcopal school, in Austin, Texas.While in college, Hutchinson interned at the Trump White House. In October 2018, she told her student newspaper she was “brought to tears when I received the email that I had been selected to participate”, and called the internship “an honor and a tremendous growing experience”.Hutchinson also interned and for two powerful figures on the hard right of a hard-right party: Steve Scalise, the House Republican whip, and the Texas senator Ted Cruz.According to the Washington Post, Hutchinson recently switched lawyers, swapping a former Trump White House ethics lawyer for an attorney with links to Jeff Sessions, the former Alabama senator who became the attorney general Trump fired in 2018.That move, the Post said, indicated a new willingness to cooperate with the January 6 committee.Hutchinson’s former boss, Meadows, first flirted with cooperating with the committee then refused to do so. The committee referred him to the Department of Justice (DoJ), for criminal contempt of Congress. The DoJ declined to pursue charges.In the absence of testimony from Meadows, Hutchinson’s voice has come to the fore in a series of explosive hearings.Earlier this month, Norm Eisen, a former ethics tsar in the Obama White House, told the Post: “Cassidy Hutchinson might turn out to be the next John Dean.”TopicsJanuary 6 hearingsUS Capitol attackTrump administrationUS politicsexplainersReuse this content More

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      January 6 committee schedules surprise session to hear new evidence

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      January 6 committee schedules surprise session to hear new evidenceSense of urgency suggested by sudden plan to hear new testimony from Cassidy Hutchinson, former aide to Mark Meadows The House committee investigating the January 6 insurrection is expected to hear live public testimony on Tuesday from Cassidy Hutchinson, a former top aide to Mark Meadows, the last chief of staff to Donald Trump, according to a source familiar with the matter.The committee on Monday abruptly scheduled a hearing for Tuesday, suggesting a sense of urgency to disclose what it said was “recently obtained evidence”. The committee had previously said it would not hold any more hearings until next month.It is the sixth public hearing held by the committee after a year-long investigation into the Capitol attack. Two more hearings are expected next month.The session is scheduled for 1pm on Capitol Hill, the committee announced. Hutchinson’s appearance before the committee was first reported by Punchbowl News and later confirmed by other outlets, including the Guardian.Hutchinson has provided the committee with some of its most shocking revelations, including that Trump approved of his supporters chanting “Hang Mike Pence” and that several far-right members of Congress who had attempted to stop the congressional certification of Joe Biden’s victory sought pardons after the attack. The disclosures emerged during Hutchinson’s closed-door testimony to the committee, videos of which have been played during the hearings.Tuesday’s hearing came as a surprise after Mississippi congressman Bennie Thompson, the chair, said last week that the panel would not hold another hearing until July. But the committee also made clear that the public sessions were prompting more witnesses to come forward, helping to uncover new evidence about what Thompson said was the “culmination of an attempted coup”.In its episodic presentation, the committee has made use of recorded depositions with witnesses, blending the tapes with moving public testimony and dramatic speech-making from lawmakers and staff who led the investigation. At the end of each hearing, members of the panel have directed anyone with information to their tip line and called on those with direct knowledge of the events to come forward and testify publicly.The committee recently obtained documentary footage from the British film-maker Alex Holder, who was embedded with Trump, his family and inner circle from before the election to after the January 6 attack. The committee is particularly interested in footage he captured involving phone calls and conversations among Trump’s children and top aides discussing election strategies on the evening of the first presidential debate on 29 September 2020, sources told the Guardian.Holder is cooperating with the committee.The hearings next month are expected to delve into the role of far-right and paramilitary groups organized and prepared for the January 6 attack and Trump’s abdication of leadership during the hours-long siege of the Capitol.TopicsJanuary 6 hearingsUS Capitol attackDonald TrumpnewsReuse this content More

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      January 6 committee focuses on phone calls among Trump’s children and aides

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      January 6 committee focuses on phone calls among Trump’s children and aidesFootage captured by documentary film-maker understood to show ex-president’s children privately discussing election strategies The House select committee investigating the January 6 Capitol attack is closely focused on phone calls and conversations among Donald Trump’s children and top aides captured by a documentary film-maker weeks before the 2020 election, say sources familiar with the matter.The calls among Trump’s children and top aides took place at an invitation-only event at the Trump International hotel in Washington that took place the night of the first presidential debate on 29 September 2020, the sources said.The select committee is interested in the calls, the sources said, since the footage is understood to show the former president’s children, including Donald Jr and Eric Trump, privately discussing strategies about the election at a crucial time in the presidential campaign.‘Watergate for streaming era’: how the January 6 panel created gripping hearingsRead moreHouse investigators first learned about the event, hosted by the Trump campaign, and the existence of the footage through British film-maker Alex Holder, who testified about what he and his crew recorded during a two-hour interview last week, the sources said.The film-maker testified that he had recorded around seven hours of one-to-one interviews with Trump, then-vice president Mike Pence, Trump’s adult children and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, the sources said, as well as around 110 hours of footage from the campaign.But one part of Holder’s testimony that particularly piqued the interest of the members of the select committee and chief investigative counsel Tim Heaphy was when he disclosed that he had managed to record discussions at the 29 September event.The select committee is closely focused on the footage of the event – in addition to the content of the one-on-one interviews with Trump and Ivanka – because the discussions about strategies mirror similar conversations at that time by top Trump advisors.On the night of the first presidential debate, Trump’s top former strategist Steve Bannon said in an interview with The Circus on Showtime that the outcome of the election would be decided at the state level and eventually at the congressional certification on January 6.“They’re going to try and overturn this election with uncertified votes,” Bannon said. Asked how he expects the election to end, Bannon said: “Right before noon on the 20th, in a vote in the House, Trump will win the presidency.”The select committee believes that ideas such as Bannon’s were communicated to advisers to Donald Jr and his fiancee, Kimberly Guilfoyle, even before the 2020 election had taken place, the sources said – leading House investigators to want to review the Trump hotel footage.What appears to interest the panel is whether Trump and his children had planned to somehow stop the certification of the election on January 6 – a potential violation of federal law – and to force a contingent election if Trump lost as early as September.The event was not open to the public, Holder is said to have testified, and the documentary film-maker was waved into the Trump hotel by Eric Trump. At some point after Holder caught the calls on tape, he is said to have been asked to leave by Donald Jr.Among the conversations captured on film was Eric Trump on the phone to an unidentified person saying, according to one source familiar: “Hopefully you’re voting in Florida as opposed to the other state you’ve mentioned.”January 6 hearings: if Republicans did nothing wrong, why were pardons sought?Read moreThe phone call – a clip of which was reviewed by the Guardian – was one of several by some of the people closest to Trump that Holder memorialized in his film, titled Unprecedented, which is due to be released in a three-part series later this year on Discovery+.Holder also testified to the select committee, the sources said, about the content of the interviews. Holder interviewed Trump in early December 2020 at the White House, and then twice a few months after the Capitol attack both at Mar-a-Lago and his Bedminster golf club in New Jersey.The select committee found Holder’s testimony and material more explosive than they had expected, the sources said. Holder, for instance, showed the panel a discrepancy between Ivanka Trump’s testimony to the panel and Holder’s camera.In her interview in December 2020, the New York Times earlier reported, Ivanka said her father should “continue to fight until every legal remedy is exhausted” because people were questioning “the sanctity of our elections”.That interview was recorded nine days after former attorney general William Barr told Trump there was no evidence of election fraud. But in her interview with the select committee, Ivanka said she had “accepted” what Barr had said.TopicsJanuary 6 hearingsUS Capitol attackUS politicsDonald TrumpRepublicansDonald Trump JrSteve BannonnewsReuse this content More

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      January 6 committee focuses on phone calls among Trump’s children and aides weeks before election

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      January 6 committee focuses on phone calls among Trump’s children and aides weeks before electionFootage captured by documentary film-maker understood to show former president’s children privately discussing election strategies The House select committee investigating the January 6 Capitol attack is closely focused on phone calls and conversations among Donald Trump’s children and top aides captured by a documentary film-maker weeks before the 2020 election, say sources familiar with the matter.The calls among Trump’s children and top aides took place at an invitation-only event at the Trump International hotel in Washington DC that took place the night of the first presidential debate on 29 September 2020, the sources said.The select committee is interested in the calls, the sources said, since the footage is understood to show the former president’s children, including Donald Jr and Eric Trump, privately discussing strategies about the election at a crucial time in the presidential campaign.‘Watergate for streaming era’: how the January 6 panel created gripping hearingsRead moreHouse investigators first learned about the event, hosted by the Trump campaign, and the existence of the footage through British film-maker Alex Holder, who testified about what he and his crew recorded during a two-hour interview last week, the sources said.The film-maker testified that he had recorded around seven hours of one-to-one interviews with Trump, then-vice president Mike Pence, Trump’s adult children and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner, the sources said, as well as around 110 hours of footage from the campaign.But one part of Holder’s testimony that particularly piqued the interest of the members of the select committee and chief investigative counsel Tim Heaphy was when he disclosed that he had managed to record discussions at the 29 September 2020 event.The select committee is closely focused on the footage of the event – in addition to the content of the one-on-one interviews with Trump and Ivanka – because the discussions about strategies mirror similar conversations at that time by top Trump advisors.On the night of the first presidential debate, Trump’s top former strategist Steve Bannon said in an interview with HBO’s The Circus that the outcome of the 2020 election would be decided at the state level and eventually at the congressional certification on January 6.“They’re going to try and overturn this election with uncertified votes,” Bannon said. Asked how he expects the election to end, Bannon said: “Right before noon on the 20th, in a vote in the House, Trump will win the presidency.”The select committee believes that ideas such as Bannon’s were communicated to advisors to Donald Jr and his fiancee, Kimberly Guilfoyle, even before the 2020 election had taken place, the sources said – leading House investigators to want to review the Trump hotel footage.What appears to interest the panel is whether Trump and his children had planned to somehow stop the certification of the election on January 6 – a potential violation of federal law – and to force a contingent election if Trump lost as early as September.The event was not open to the public, Holder is said to have testified, and the documentary film-maker was waved into the Trump hotel by Eric Trump. At some point after Holder caught the calls on tape, he is said to have been asked to leave by Donald Jr.Among the conversations captured on film was Eric Trump on the phone to an unidentified person saying, according to one source familiar: “Hopefully you’re voting in Florida as opposed to the other state you’ve mentioned.”January 6 hearings: if Republicans did nothing wrong, why were pardons sought?Read moreThe phone call – a clip of which was reviewed by the Guardian – was one of several by some of the people closest to Trump that Holder memorialized in his film, titled Unprecedented, which is due to be released in a three-part series later this year on Discovery+.Holder also testified to the select committee, the sources said, about the content of the interviews. Holder interviewed Trump in early December 2020 at the White House, and then twice a few months after the Capitol attack both at Mar-a-Lago and his Bedminster golf club.The select committee found Holder’s testimony and material more explosive than they had expected, the sources said. Holder, for instance, showed the panel a discrepancy between Ivanka Trump’s testimony to the panel and Holder’s camera.In her interview in December 2020, the New York Times earlier reported, Ivanka said her father should “continue to fight until every legal remedy is exhausted” because people were questioning “the sanctity of our elections”.That interview was recorded nine days after former attorney general William Barr told Trump there was no evidence of election fraud. But in her interview with the select committee, Ivanka said she had “accepted” what Barr had said.TopicsJanuary 6 hearingsUS Capitol attackUS politicsDonald TrumpRepublicansDonald Trump JrSteve BannonnewsReuse this content More