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On Thursday, the House committee investigating the attack on the US Capitol put out a stinging, prime-time indictment of Donald Trump’s reluctance to stop or denounce the violence, insisting he should be held accountable for a serious abdication of presidential duty.
Committee chairman Bennie Thompson claimed Trump “recklessly forged a path of lawlessness and corruption” as he moved to change the outcome of the 2020 US election.
The Mississippi lawmaker, speaking electronically before the committee due to his COVID-19, said there must be “accountability” for what he called an attack on democracy.
During a two-and-a-half-hour hearing, legislators heard from White House officials who claimed Trump watched the Capitol incident on television and refused their repeated requests to persuade his supporters to leave.
“He watched on TV as the attack escalated from the safety of his dining room,” Adam Kinzinger, one of two Republicans on the panel, said.
“He fired inflamatory tweets,” Kinzinger added. “He refused to end the attack for three hours.”
“Donald Trump’s behaviour on January 6 was a flagrant violation of his oath of office and a terrible dereliction of his duty to our country,” Kinzinger stated. “It’s a blot on our record.”
According to Thompson, Trump “did everything in his power to overturn an election — he lied, bullied, and breached his oath.”
With Trump considering a second presidential bid in 2024, Republican vice chair Liz Cheney asked, “Can a president who is ready to make the choices Donald Trump made during the bloodshed of January 6 ever be trusted with any position of authority in our wonderful nation again?”
Lawmakers delivered a minute-by-minute summary of Trump’s activities beginning with a fiery speech to his supporters near the White House saying the November 2020 election had been stolen and concluding with him telling the rioters they were “really special” but should go home.
Outtakes from a message taped the next day by Trump were played, in which he failed to stick to a written script on a teleprompter. “I don’t want to claim the election is done,” he replied, rebuffing the script’s term.
‘It was one of the saddest days of my life.’
Two former White House staffers testified on their choice to retire on January 6: deputy White House press secretary Sarah Matthews and National Security Council member Matthew Pottinger.
According to Matthews, it was “one of the darkest days in our country’s history,” and “President Trump was treating it as a festive occasion.”
“His unwillingness to act and call the mob off that day, as well as his refusal to denounce the violence,” she stated.
Trump’s tweet criticising Vice President Mike Pence for refusing to block congressional certification of Democrat Joe Biden’s victory, according to Pottinger, was “like fuel being poured on the fire.”
“That was the moment I decided to resign,” he claimed.
Thursday’s prime-time hearing was the eighth and final in this series. Members of the committee stated that additional hearings would be held in September.
Previous committee hearings focused on Trump’s attempt to sway election officials in swing states that Biden narrowly won in order to put pressure on Pence.
The committee also looked at the impact of a tweet Trump wrote in December asking supporters to converge on Washington on January 6.
Members of right-wing militia organisations the Proud Boys, the Oath Keepers, and other Trump supporters interpreted the president’s tweet as a “call to arms,” lawmakers claimed.
Over 850 people have been arrested in connection with the attack on Congress, which resulted in the deaths of at least five people and the injuries of 140 police officers.
After the Capitol brawl, the 76-year-old Trump was impeached for the second time by the House, but he was acquitted by the Senate, where only a few of Republicans voted to convict him.
The House committee will present its findings to Congress this fall.
The committee has the authority to recommend criminal cases to the Justice Department, leaving it up to Attorney General Merrick Garland to decide whether Trump or others should be charged for attempting to alter the results of the 2020 election.
Garland stated on Wednesday that the January 6 inquiry is the “most important” the Justice Department has ever performed, emphasising that “no one is above the law in this nation.”
