Committee aides wouldn’t say whether or not they had any additional engagement with Trump or former Vice President Mike Pence about testifying. Pence said this summer that he’d “take into account” testifying earlier than the committee.
Rep. Bennie Thompson, the committee chair, said final month that the committee plans to place collectively an interim report in mid-October, with a last report to return earlier than the top of the 12 months, after the midterm elections.
The committee held a collection of public hearings over the summer season that have been additionally broadcast nationally. The hearings confirmed never-before-seen video from the assault but additionally confirmed video testimony from Trump administration officials about his refusal to simply accept election outcomes and plans by his allies to replace electors in battleground states that President Joe Biden gained whereas additionally threatening local and state elections officials.
Thompson confirmed over the summer that the committee has been having “conversations” with the Justice Division concerning the phony elector plan. Within the June 21 public hearing, committee member Rep. Adam Schiff mentioned these faux electors finally met on Dec. 14, 2020, in Arizona, Georgia, Michigan, Pennsylvania, New Mexico, Nevada and Wisconsin, signing paperwork claiming they have been duly elected electors from their state.
The committee mentioned that GOP Sen. Ron Johnson of Wisconsin needed at hand ship alternate, fraudulent electors to Pence forward of the joint session of Congress, based on texts the committee supplied.
The hearings highlighted Trump and his allies’ strain campaigns on completely different branches of presidency to overturn the 2020 election outcomes, together with the previous president’s try and install environmental lawyer Jeffrey Clark on the helm of the Justice Division, lawyer John Eastman’s argument to Pence that he had the facility to override the Electoral Faculty, and Rudy Giuliani’s attempts to influence native and state elections officers.
The hearings additionally featured in-person testimony from former Trump administration officers, a former Fox News political editor, a Capitol police officer, a rioter who pleaded guilty, amongst others.
The hearings included bombshell revelations about Trump’s response to the Jan. 6 assault.
Hutchinson and different former White Home aides testified – each in particular person and on video testimony – that they knew Trump had misplaced the election and that pushing the narrative that he had gained was a lie. Sarah Matthews, a former deputy press secretary, testified that as violence erupted at the Capitol, the press workplace was arguing over Trump’s response and appeared stunned {that a} colleague did not wish to condemn the rioting as a result of doing so can be “handing a win to the media.”
“I could not consider that we have been arguing over this in the course of the West Wing .. And so, I motioned up on the TV and mentioned, ‘Do you suppose it appears to be like like we’re f’ing profitable? As a result of I do not suppose it does,'” Matthews mentioned.
In that very same listening to, the committee performed a never-before-seen video exhibiting Trump rehearsing to provide a press release on Jan. 7, 2021. Even after the mayhem of Jan. 6 and that Congress had licensed the Electoral Faculty depend, Trump refused to say he had misplaced the election.
“I want to start by addressing the heinous assault yesterday, and to those that broke the regulation, you’ll pay,” Trump mentioned within the footage. “You don’t signify our motion, you don’t signify our nation, and when you broke the regulation — cannot say that. I already mentioned you’ll pay…”
“However this election is now over. Congress has licensed the outcomes,” he continued, earlier than stopping and presumably addressing his aides. “I do not wish to say the election’s over. I simply wish to say Congress has licensed the outcomes with out saying the election’s over.”
