Everyone needs to see what came out in yesterday's January 6 hearing.
Donald Trump didn't just know, he actually tried to lead the armed mob of insurrectionists into the Capitol.
Trump's Chief of Staff Mark Meadows knew. Trump's lawyer Rudy Giuliani knew. Trump's daughter knew. Trump's MAGA allies in Congress and in state legislatures knew.
They knew that they'd lost the 2020 election. They knew that Trump's legal challenges were a charade. They knew what he was doing when he told MAGA world to rally in D.C. on January 6. And when Trump told his supporters to march on the Capitol on January 6, that he would join them there, he knew that the crowd included people armed with assault rifles, bear spray, and other weapons all slated to aid Trump's insurrection.1
Yesterday's sixth hearing of the January 6 select committee was chilling: It included sworn testimony about Trump's anger and intention to incite the violent insurrection on January 6.
Over the past three weeks, we’ve heard revealing public hearings of the congressional committee investigating the January 6 attack on our country. The hearings so far have uncovered how closely coordinated the effort to overthrow the 2020 election was and how far Trump and countless high-ranking Republican officials were willing to go to stay in power. Which gives us a clue into how far they're still willing to go.
These important hearings are covering a lot of ground, condensing more than a thousand depositions and hundreds of thousands of documents. Here's the bottom line of what they've found:
- Trump knew he had lost the 2020 election. Everything he did after that (and is still doing!) is a willful sabotage of our democracy.2
- Trump and his allies knew there was a potential for violence. And still encouraged those rallying to march to the Capitol.3
- Trump is at the center of a sprawling criminal conspiracy, yet he's hardly acting alone. MAGA Republicans at all levels are eagerly fueling it, from white supremacist brawlers to the head of the Republican National Committee.
- The attack didn't end on January 6, 2021. It's still underway: More than 100 MAGA election deniers have already secured their GOP nominations for the November ballot.4 They must be held accountable and prevented from corruptly seizing power.
As we said, these hearings aren't just looking backward—they're also shedding light on the ongoing attacks on our elections. In response, MoveOn is doing something we've never done in our history: investing millions of dollars into a democracy defense campaign to defeat right-wing candidates who are part of Trump's criminal conspiracy and who want to control our next elections. Sign up now to support MoveOn’s Democracy Slate and our plan to defeat MAGA's criminal conspiracy to sabotage elections at the ballot in November.
On the first night of hearings, the committee laid out the chilling seven-point conspiracy to overthrow the U.S. government they've uncovered.5 Trump himself put pressure on the Department of Justice to make claims of a false election. According to former Deputy Attorney General Richard Donoghue, Trump told him, “Just say the election was corrupt and leave the rest to me and the Republican congressmen.”6 It's clear that Trump was at the center of the attempts to sabotage the 2020 election results, but he didn’t act alone.
Last week, it was revealed that staff in MAGA Senator Ron Johnson’s office attempted to hand Pence a counterfeit slate of electors for Wisconsin and Michigan.7 Sen. Johnson claimed he was “basically unaware” of this, but two days later, he has come clean with new information about the documents and is now throwing his other MAGA colleagues under the bus by blaming GOP Representative Mike Kelly.8 And it doesn’t stop there. We learned the names of multiple House Republicans who coordinated with Trump and who also allegedly sought presidential pardons after the January 6 insurrection.9
Yesterday's testimony from former White House aide Cassidy Hutchinson brought us inside the White House in the moments leading to the insurrection. She revealed that Donald Trump and his closest circle knew of potential violence and that there were weapons at the rally, and Trump still refused to deescalate the situation and condemn violence. And although Trump gave a speech on January 7 acknowledging that Biden would become president, Hutchinson revealed that he did so only because there were fears of the 25th Amendment's being invoked, and that he still believed that the insurrectionists did nothing wrong on January 6.10
MoveOn will continue to update you on how you can fight to protect our fragile democracy.
Thanks for all you do.
–David, Nakia, Dan, Alexis, and the rest of the team
Sources:
2. "Trump's inner circle testifies his claims were bogus," The Hill, June 13, 2022
3. "7 takeaways from Tuesday's shocking January 6 hearing," CNN, June 29, 2022
4. "More than 100 GOP primary winners back Trump's false election claims," The Washington Post, June 14, 2022
5. "January 6 Vice Chair Cheney said Trump had a 'seven-part plan' to overturn the election. Here's what she meant," CNN, June 10, 2022
10. "7 takeaways from Tuesday's shocking January 6 hearing," CNN, June 29, 2022
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