The House Select Committee called a last minute hearing today….
Their ‘Star’ witness was Cassidy Hutchinson….
She spilled the beans on the ex-President’s actions …..
Minutes before Donald Trump took the stage at an Ellipse rally on Jan. 6, 2021, he urged the Secret Service to remove security magnetometers to let in people with weapons because “they’re not here to hurt me,” a former top White House aide told investigators on Tuesday.
Cassidy Hutchinson also testified to the Jan. 6 select panel that Trump intended to travel with his supporters at the rally to the Capitol, a progression that quickly became a violent mob. She also recalled hearing from security official Tony Ornato that, when Trump was informed he would be returning to the White House, he lunged for the steering wheel of his vehicle and was physically restrained by the head of his security detail — who sat by silently as Ornato relayed the story….
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The committee interspersed her live testimony with clips of four video depositions Hutchinson gave between February and earlier this month. Hutchinson spoke quietly but earnestly as she described with precise details her interaction with senior Trump White House officials during the chaotic post-election period leading up to Jan. 6.
Hutchinson also recalled that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy called her angrily after hearing Trump urge his supporters to march on the Capitol on Jan. 6.
“You told me this whole week you weren’t coming up here. Why did you lie to me? … Don’t come up here,” Hutchinson remembered McCarthy saying. A spokesperson for the House GOP leader did not immediately return a request for comment.
She described an eerily nonchalant reaction by Meadows as he learned details of the escalating violence at the Capitol.
“I remember distinctly Mark not looking up from his phone,” Hutchinson recalled.
And she further testified to the panel that Meadows raised concerns 100 hours before a violent mob stormed the Capitol on the day Trump had marked to subvert the 2020 election.
“Things might get real, real bad,” Hutchinson recalled Meadows telling her on Jan. 2, 2021.
Hutchinson said she questioned Meadows about Jan. 6 after Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, told her to anticipate Trump traveling to the Capitol that day and walking among his supporters to Congress. Meadows’ response left her shaken.
“That evening was the first moment that I remember feeling scared and nervous of what could happen on Jan. 6 and I had a deeper concern for what was happening with the planning aspects of it,” she recalled.
Another conversation she relayed to the panel, with then-Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, honed in on his growing fear that Trump’s effort to overturn the election could destabilize the country…..
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The committee interspersed her live testimony with clips of four video depositions Hutchinson gave between February and earlier this month. Hutchinson spoke quietly but earnestly as she described with precise details her interaction with senior Trump White House officials during the chaotic post-election period leading up to Jan. 6.
Hutchinson also recalled that House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy called her angrily after hearing Trump urge his supporters to march on the Capitol on Jan. 6.
“You told me this whole week you weren’t coming up here. Why did you lie to me? … Don’t come up here,” Hutchinson remembered McCarthy saying. A spokesperson for the House GOP leader did not immediately return a request for comment.
She described an eerily nonchalant reaction by Meadows as he learned details of the escalating violence at the Capitol.
“I remember distinctly Mark not looking up from his phone,” Hutchinson recalled.
And she further testified to the panel that Meadows raised concerns 100 hours before a violent mob stormed the Capitol on the day Trump had marked to subvert the 2020 election.
“Things might get real, real bad,” Hutchinson recalled Meadows telling her on Jan. 2, 2021.
Hutchinson said she questioned Meadows about Jan. 6 after Trump’s lawyer, Rudy Giuliani, told her to anticipate Trump traveling to the Capitol that day and walking among his supporters to Congress. Meadows’ response left her shaken.
“That evening was the first moment that I remember feeling scared and nervous of what could happen on Jan. 6 and I had a deeper concern for what was happening with the planning aspects of it,” she recalled.
Another conversation she relayed to the panel, with then-Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe, honed in on his growing fear that Trump’s effort to overturn the election could destabilize the country…..
WATCH THE KEY MOMENTS
The Hill…..
Here are six takeaways…..
Chris Cillizza
@ChrisCillizza
Today was a very good day for Ron DeSantis
George Conway🌻
@gtconway3d
THE MAN IN CHARGE OF THE WORLD’S SECOND-LARGEST ARSENAL OF NUCLEAR WEAPONS WANTED TO LEAD AN ARMED MOB TO THE CAPITOL AND PHYSICALLY ATTACKED HIS BODYGUARD.
Michael Beschloss
@BeschlossDC
Any have any doubt now how lucky we were to survive those four years?
Peter Alexander
@PeterAlexander
🚨 A source close to the Secret Service tells me both Bobby Engel, the lead agent, and the presidential limousine/SUV driver are prepared to testify under oath that neither man was assaulted and that Mr. Trump never lunged for the steering wheel.
…
Palmer Report
@PalmerReport
Replying to
@PeterAlexander
Bullshit. Engel already testified privately to the committee. They wouldn’t have put Hutchinson out there with that story if Engel had disputed it. This is a bullshit source. Why are you running with it? Are the retweets really worth it?
Jake Tapper
@jaketapper
Cheney: Do you believe the violence on January 6 was justified morally?
Flynn: takes the 5th
Cheney: Do you believe the violence on January 6 was justified legally?
Flynn: takes the 5th
Cheney: Do you believe in the peaceful transfer of power?
Flynn: takes the 5th
Smashing plates. Flipping tablecloths. Shouting expletives until he’s red in the face.
Sworn testimony Tuesday offered a dramatic glimpse of what former president Donald Trump is allegedly like in private. The shocking new accusations add to years of reports about his violent temper and abusive outbursts toward advisers and staff, sometimes spilling into public view.
This time, several of the flare-ups allegedly came during the 187 minutes when the then-president was out of public view while his supporters attacked the Capitol — a question that had been one of the enduring mysteries of the day. Cassidy Hutchinson, a former aide to White House chief of staff Mark Meadows, described Trump in a fit of rage that day….
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One longtime adviser to Trump acknowledged the difficulty of the sworn televised testimony, even for Republican voters who have overlooked Trump’s flaws in the past.
“It’s the most damaging political thing we’ve seen to him yet with these hearings. It puts a pin on him having a temper, and that’s tough politically,” one longtime adviser said, who like some others spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal details. “Politically today was a very bad day for the president and for Mark Meadows.”
Trump’s own response to the testimony was less than a paragon of poise. He released a barrage of posts on his Truth Social platform, denying Hutchinson’s claims, insulting her handwriting and emphasizing his points with all-caps and exclamation points.
“Her Fake story that I tried to grab the steering wheel of the White House Limousine in order to steer it to the Capitol Building is ‘sick’ and fraudulent, very much like the Unselect Committee itself,” Trump said. “Her story of me throwing food is also false … and why would SHE have to clean it up, I hardly knew who she was?”
Also on Jan. 6, Hutchinson described Trump’s pique at the size of the crowd for his speech on the Ellipse, demanding to remove metal detectors to let more people in despite warnings that some attendees were armed…
More…
There will ALWAYS be those that believe a pimping Bull Shitter…..
Donald J. Trump has ALWAYS been about himself, making money and NOT ‘Losing’…NOT a Damn thing More
Will the Jan. 6 Committee Finally Bring Down the Cult of Trump?
….Tuesday’s dramatic testimony to the committee by Cassidy Hutchinson, an aide to Trump’s chief of staff, Mark Meadows, changes the game. If what she says is true, no longer are we dealing with a committee that is putting a fluorescent light to a set of facts with which we were already broadly familiar.
This is something else: testimony that the president didn’t care that the mob that stormed Congress was armed and that he even tried to lead it by grabbing for the steering wheel of his armored limousine.
“You know, I don’t f-ing care that they have weapons,” Hutchinson testified she overheard the president saying during his rally on Jan. 6. “Let my people in. They can march to the Capitol from here.”
Until now, Trump’s supporters have told themselves an exculpatory story about Jan. 6 that goes like this: The president sincerely believed he had been robbed of the election. His efforts to reverse the outcome were the result of honest indignation. His “Be there, will be wild!” tweet inviting people to the Jan. 6 rally was just his usual hyperbole, not a threat…
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